By day, John Shevlin makes hats, but once a year he transforms into James Joyce

JOHN SHEVLIN RECEIVED an unusual request from a neighbour a few years ago. The manager of the James Joyce Centre – across the road from ShevLin’s home on North Great George’s Street in Dublin city centre – had spotted him coming and going over the years, and noticed his incredible likeness to the author himself. A request to appear at one event in full 1920s costume has led to a side-job for Shevlin as the centre’s resident Joyce lookalike. He takes the role seriously, and has a carefully selected range of props – a vintage pair of glasses (with prescription lens made without modern methods by his optometrist, Donal McNally of Optica), an antique cane carefully adjusted to be the correct length for his height, and a bar of lemon-scented soap from Sweny’s, as featured in Ulysses. To top it all off is a handmade Panama hat, made by ShevLin himself in his day-job as a milliner where he keeps a family tradition of hat making alive since his late father first opened a shop in Malahide back in 1960. Based from a studio in Temple Bar, he specialises in Panama hats made using traditional Ecuadorian straw (despite the name, they don’t originally come from Panama). President Michael D Higgins, a fan of Panama hats, has received several from Shevlin over the years, and was most recently spotted wearing one in Cuba last year. We spoke to ShevLin ahead of Bloomsday, his busiest time of the year. TheJournal.ie is an Irish news website that invites its users to shape the news agenda. Read, share and shape the day’s stories as they happen, from Ireland, the world and the web. Submit your clips to [email protected] Stay up to date with all of the latest videos by subscribing to our channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/thejourna... Download our free iOS app: https://itunes.apple.com/ie/app/thejo... Download our free Android app https://play.google.com/store/apps/de... Twitter: twitter.com/thejournal_ie Facebook: facebook.com/TheJournal.ie Instagram: instagram.com/thejournal_ie Snapchat: thejournal.ie