Duffle Coat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A Duffle Coat, also Duffel Coat, is a warm coat made from thick wool. The name derives from Duffel, a town in the province of Antwerp in Belgium where the material originates. The term Duffle Bag originates from its use as a bag for duffle coats.
Duffle coats are a traditional British garment, dating from 1890 when John Partridge, a manufacturer of outdoor clothing, started to market coats made from duffle fabric.
There are many varying styles to the duffle coat, although the most common British style would be composed of the following features:
- Made of genuine Duffel, lined with a woolly tartan pattern.
- A hood and buttonable neck strap
- Four front wooden toggle-fastenings (known as "walrus teeth") with four leather loops to attach them to.
- Two large outside pockets with covering flaps.
- It should be three-quarter length.
After rain, a duffle coat has a characteristic smoky smell.
The duffle coat owes its popularity to the British Royal Navy, who issued a camel-coloured variant of it widely as an item of warm clothing during World War II. Large stocks of post-war military surplus coats available at reasonable prices to the general public meant that these coats became a ubiquitous and popular item of clothing in the 1950s and 1960s.
They were seen in the popular press as a form of uniform for stereotyped supporters of the left wing, as characterised by Labour leader Michael Foot, who was accused, inaccurately, by the right wing press, especially the Daily Mail, of having worn one to the remembrance day ceremony at the Cenotaph in 1982. Other famous duffle coat wearers include Belle and Sebastian, a Scottish band, Dudley Moore, Jonathan Creek, Camera Obscura, another twee Scottish band with links to the Riot Grrrl Movement, Paddington Bear, a children's story and television character, and Architecture In Helsinki, a band from Melbourne.
