In the same way that France is deeply divided over the issue of the chocolatine, misnamed Pain au chocolat in some territories, families in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department are regularly torn apart over a fundamental issue:
Is the beret Bearn or Basque?
And it’s not easy to answer.
Of course, the name
Basque beret
came from Paris with the rise of tourism in the 19th and 20th centuries, and is now widely used in the common language. And this is favored by the massive use of this headdress in the great summer festivals that are Pamplona (in Navarra) and Bayonne.
But if we look at it strictly from the point of view of production, it is indisputable that Bearn wins. Still today, the last beret factory is located in Oloron-Sainte-Marie, at the meeting point of the Bearn valleys. The Laulhère brand, has found its letters of nobility for a few years and exports its berets throughout the world.
A symbol of the Pyrenees… and of France
Let’s put everyone in agreement, if the Basque and Bearn cousins dispute nicely the paternity, all know that during centuries the beret was an object made at home in all the chain of the Pyrenees, the Landes and beyond…
We can therefore find a consensus around a Pyrenean object that has become a national symbol carrying the image of France throughout the world. The beret is French, Béarnese certainly, but French.
And the Constanti beret?
Made in Béarn, more precisely in Lanne en Baretous, at the limit of the Basque Country, the Constanti beret takes the best of its territory. It will bring in your coffees, your snacks, a little bit of Béarn and a little bit of the Basque Country without forgetting some more exotic flavors from all over the world.
