formal jackets and the cookie cutter aversion

[MacLowlife]

I was chatting with my brother today about the relative standardization of Saxon formal wear and the tendency of the kilted folk to avoid it. We wondered how things got to be this way. I stand ready to be corrected, but I came up with a couple of things:

1) the well known independent spirit of the Scot.

2) With relatively few people ( If there are about 5 million souls in Scotland today, how many were there in 1925 and how many of them had occasion to wear formal wear? Of those few hundred or so ( my guess) surely most would have their formal garments tailored (or have inherited them). Unlike the hundreds of men buying off the peg dinner suits in any given week at Moss Bros, they would assert their own individual taste, creating the dozens of different styles of doublets, jackets and coatees we see today.

Or have I got it all wrong?

[piperdbh]

You might also factor in a bit of isolation between tailors, who could come up with personalized patterns, and the 19th century taste for ornamentation. And don't forget the desire to show off the wealth of the customer.

[Paul]

You might also factor in a bit of isolation between tailors, who could come up with personalized patterns, and the 19th century taste for ornamentation. And don't forget the desire to show off the wealth of the customer.

One of my Prince Charlies is quite different to those made now-a-days and it's only 40 years old. It's got the buttons in a different place, the shape seem to be more "downwards". It's quite diagonal from the front to the back (with a rise) and the sleeved are made to a shoter length (I realise generally you get short sleeves, regular sleeves and long sleeves) as the jacket was tailored to someone the exact same height with slightly longer arms than me and it still looks too short compared to a "modern equivilant" on me.
I think everyone has to do with both personal style and currently fashions at the time of tailoring.

[Jock Scot]

I well remember going into the tailors in Fort William,long gone now, in about 1960 and I would have been aged 20. There I was full of young man arrogance and there was nothing that I did not know and no one could tell me anything. UNTIL I went in to have a kilt day jacket made. I was politely measured, measurements religiously jotted down, my requirements for the "new" fashion that I was going to lead the world; with no Argyll(gauntlet) cuffs, no epaulettes, two buttons at the front, non antler buttons and no buttons on the pocket flaps.Job done I thought and off I went.

A couple of months later I was summoned to the tailors to pick up my new jacket ready to show the world my new creation. UNTIL, I saw it! It was exactly the same cut as all the other kilt jackets in the area and the tailor had taken no notice of what I had wanted. Of course the arrogant 20 year old blew his top! Anyway after a few minutes of huffing and puffing all went quiet and the tailor looked me square in the eyes and said " .....if you want a jacket as you described you should have known not to come here,in this part of the world, the West Highlands, if you want a kilt jacket made by me, THIS is what you get---nothing else." Oh yes, I learned a lot that day, about people and about tailors!

Oh yes, the jacket! I wore it for years and last time I saw it one of my sons was wearing it!

[MacMillan of Rathdown]

I think it safe to say that during the Edwardian Era (roughly 1900-1919) gentlemen's Highland attire became fairly standardized. The cut of day wear jackets tended, then as now, to follow general trends in men's fashions, slowly evolving into the "standardized" jackets that we see today, hardly changed from the styles of, say, 1939.

Evening wear followed in much the same path and, again aside from minor differences in the actual cut, today's formal doublets and coatees would not be out of place at a dinner or ball in 1925. Because there were far more formal dances, etc. before 1960 more people tended to own their own (usually off the peg) formal attire. But for those who didn't-- or couldn't afford to-- "own their own" there were numerous firms that could supply rental jackets, and even kilts, back in the 40s, 30s, 20, and beyond.

I think the reason so much of what we see to day looks "cookie cutter" is down to two factors:
1) Because so much of it is poorly made, compared to the hire garments of 30-40 years ago;
2) Because there are far few occasions to wear formal attire there are far fewer "accessories" for gentlemen.

With everyone wearing a made-in-China Prince Charlie, a bovine sporran with chrome plated pot metal cantle, and white, throw away, socks a certain "cookie cutter look" is, sadly inevitable.

[Bugbear]

The best I can do is observe from the outside, and keep launching questions at the "flotilla" of Scots traditionalists. As soon as you run out of questions, one of them will bring up another unusual item or aspect of Highland attire.

[MacLowlife]

Thanks, all for your thoughts , especially Jock Scot, for your story. I was inspired in part by reading an earlier post from Ted Crocker and I thank you here.

These are the doublets and jackets I can think of:
1) Argyle jacket
2) "stripped down" Argyle jacket ( no gauntlet cuffs, no epaulets, plain pockets)
3) Prince Charlie
4) Regulation doublet
5) Sheriffmuir doublet
6) Montrose doublet
7) ( Not sure what this is called- a Balmoral?) Single Breasted, with flaps and lapels
8) Single breasted with military collar and flaps all round ( Piper's doublet)
9) Dress Mess/ Eton / Bum freezer / Spencer

Presumably, one could put flaps on or take flaps off of just about anything, one could make most of them in velvet or wool ( solid or tartan), one could cut the tartan on the square or on the bias, one could add contrasting facings, either solid or tartan. If the garment has lapels, they can be notched, peaked or shawl. I have seen jackets that look like the Montrose, worn open and buttoned back ( like an 18th century military jacket.) And I am sure I have left out more than I have named. I'd be grateful to see pictures and additional types posted.


I recognize that most of those same options ( SB or DB, lapels, number of buttons) are available in Saxon formal wear, but they tend to cluster a lot more.

Yr humble, &c,
MacLowlife

[Bugbear]

Don't forget pin wale corduroy.

[MacRobert's Reply]

At about the same time Jock Scot was having his kilt jacket made, so was I but further south by Hector Russell in Greenock. Parents and guardians decided that my weedy 11 or 12-year-old body was too slight for Harris tweed or gauntlet cuffs, so the jacket was made from lighter English tweed with single button cuffs. Apparently sooth moother tailors were more accommodating than Jock's highlanders. However, what was obvious was that this was a kilt jacket. It really could not be mistaken for anything else and it was well tailored to fit even my scrawny frame.

MacMillan of Rathdown has it petty well taped but the European ban on using sealskin for sporrans, due to be introduced next year, means that the bovine, rabbit fur (or even synthetic fur) options are likely to dominate future sporran making in Scotland. I am told that only the old white seal-fur sporrans were the product of clubbed seal pups on the ice flows and that gray and black seal-fur sporrans were made from humanely culled animals. So if you want to buy a traditional Scottish seal-fur sporran, you have only about 11 months until their sale is banned.

Iain

[Smayniac]

Don't forget pin wale corduroy.

gee Ted, I have a rusty orange(you of the right age remember the color) Levis WIDE wale corduroy blazer. As it has no lining, it ought to be easy to modify. Can you all imagine it with, well any kilt you can think of?

Bob