A nephew of mine begins his Ph.D. program at Michigan this Fall. I reminded him that he'd need a tweed jacket and recommended a look at the film The Good Shepherd for a professorial example. When I went back to look myself, I was struck by something I hadn't noticed the first time. Costume designer Ann Roth has Sir Michael Gambon, who plays the English professor, in a double breast pocketed odd jacket. Never saw one of those before.
Does one wear it with two pocket squares or leave them both empty?
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
A Double Breast Pocketed Jacket
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8 comments:
This is a bit of an oddball style, to be sure. I've only seen it done one other time.
In the shop, a gentleman came in and ordered an odd jacket, in a very country, check patterned wool, and he wanted double open patch breast pockets. Why he did, I have no idea, but we made the jacket for him. When I saw the finished product I was very much reminded of the old British shooting jackets (its a shame he didn't get bellowed pockets and knickers!).
I thought it was such a unique cut, so for this fall I ordered a small batch of sizes of similar cut for our ready-made selection. I'll email a picture when they come in. Either way, it'll get people to look in the window!
As to whether or not two pocket squares would be required - you got me there!
I've seen them with two flapped and button pockets but never open patch. Definitely send me photos when yours come in.
I think this jacket is great and solves a dilemma for the modern working man - and the pocket square problem simultaneously! I never wear a pocket square, except in my morning coat for weddings and in my dinner jacket for evening functions. Why not? Because I find that the breast pocket is the best place for my mobile phone. I could, of course, put it in my ticket pocket nestling at the bottom inside of my jackets - but after almost losing it while on the London Underground, I have never repeated that experiment; and besides the breast pocket is just so much more convenient. So, with a mobile phone occupying the breast pocket there isn't room for a pocket square (the reason, of course, that I can wear a pocket square in my morning coat & dinner jacket is that one always switches the phone off during weddings and dinners, and therefore one can stow it in another, less accessible, pocket).
Therefore, I think a new dress etiquette could evolve using this jacket - pocket square in the left breast pocket, while the phone goes in the right breast pocket. While this might look a bit unbalanced, I personally think that two pocket squares would be a step too far.
My only wish is that it could be done up in a slightly more modern tweed - the example in the photograph looks pretty ancient - like the tweeds Hackett use for their sports jackets.
The Marmath explanation is completely correct.Altough rarely seen and worn by old styled people the double breast open patch pocketed odd jacket worn by the english professor is a typical brithish country jacket. In this kind of jacket , only the left breast pocket was devoted to the pocket square whereas the right one was utilized for keeping some pleasure items of a country gentleman such as cigars , cigarette-case, pipe or one or more ink- pens etc. Indeed this was the original use for at the beginning of the XX century ,during the Edward II period when country dressing started to diffuse also in the cities.
Of course today the right breast pocket seems the ideal place where to put the mobile phone , mainly in the case of non smokers gentlemen.
That's the most autrhoritative explanation I've heard. Thank you.
Sorry for the misprint, due to the computer writing. The king of England at the beginning of the XX century , whom I was referring to in my post, is Edward VII (reign:1901-1910).
There is a picture of just such a jacket in Schoeffler and Gale Esquire's 'Encyclopeia of 20th Century Men's Fashions' (page 50). It is from a 1926 advertisement for a semi-Norfolk style coat called the 'Oxford'. This suggests it was, or was promoted, as a campus style. Protective pocket flaps would not be necessary on campus whereas the open patch pockets would be ideal for pens and bits of lab equipment of various shapes and sizes.
So there is. Thanks for pointing it out.
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