Technically every NHL goalie designs his own to best fit his need for comfort, visibility, and style. That's why you see some goalies like Dominik Hasek who have very unique goalie masks.
The outside design of the goalie mask is purely aesthetic and is often times picked specifically depending upon the match being played. Important dates in team history may effect the outside design of the mask/helmet but some goalies just like their helmet to be flashy and have an artistic design on the outside.
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Jacques Plante, who insisted upon wearing his mask during NHL games after a puck broke his nose.
Jacques Plante made the first hockey mask because during one game he was injured so badly by a hockey puck to the face that he required several stitches. Following his injury he felt it appropriate to wear face protection (as he was a goalie and the odds of the injury re-occuring were fairly good).
gerry cheevers while playing for the Boston bruins.he added stitches every time his mask was hit with a puck.
Fibreglass Canada worked with Canadiens Goalie Jaques Plante to develop the first-ever hockey goalie mask in 1960. http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blhockey.htm Montreal Candiens goalie Jacques Plante January 7, 1930, Montreal Canadien great Howie Morenz rings a shot off Clint Benedict's nose and cheekbone, the goalie for cross-town rival Montreal Maroons. This shot would cause Benedict to don a makeshift facemask based on either a football face guard or one worn by that of sparring boxers. Benedict found that the large protective nose piece impaired his vision, so after two games, he gave it up. Benedict' experiment was not recorded as the first goalie mask in history. That moment came nearly thirty years later on November 1, 1959 after New York Ranger Andy Bathgate hit Montreal Canadien goalie Jacques Plante with a shot off the face. Plante would leave the game to get stitched up and later return wearing a mask he had made himself for practices. Plante won the game. This was the birth of the goalie mask.
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