English Costume

by Dion Clayton Calthrop

THE MEN

This surely is the age of elegance, if one may trust such an elegant and graceful mind as had Vandyck. In all the wonderful gallery of portraits he has left, these silvery graceful people pose in garments of ease.

The main thing that I must do is to show how, gradually, the stiff Jacobean dress became unfrozen from its clutch upon the human form, how whalebones in men’s jackets melted away, breeches no longer swelled themselves with rags and bran, collars fell down, and shirts lounged through great open spaces in the sleeves.

It was the time of an immaculate carelessness; the hair was free, or seemed free, to droop in languid tresses on men’s shoulders, curl at pretty will on men’s foreheads. Shirts were left open at the neck, breeches were loosed at the knee. Do I revile the time if I say that the men had an air, a certain supercilious air, of being dukes disguised as art students?

We know, all of us, the Vandyck beard, the Carolean moustache brushed away from the lips; we know Lord Pembroke’s tousled—carefully tousled—hair; Kiligrew’s elegant locks.

From the head to the neck is but a step—a sad step in this reign—and here we find our friend the ruff utterly tamed; ‘pickadillies, now out of request,’ writes one, tamed into the falling band, the Vandyck collar, which form of neck-dress has never left the necks and shoulders of our modern youthful prodigies; indeed, at one time, no youthful genius dare be without one. The variations of this collar are too well known; of such lace as edged them and of the manner of their tying, it would waste time to tell, except that in some instances the strings are secured by a ring.

Such a change has come over the doublet as to make it hardly the same garment; the little slashes have become two or three wide cuts, the sleeves are wide and loose with, as a rule, one big opening on the inside of the arm, with this opening embroidered round. The cuffs are like little collars, turned back with point-lace edges. The actual cut of the doublet has not altered a great deal, the ordinary run of doublet has the pointed front, it is tied round the waist with a little narrow sash; but there has arrived a new jacket, cut round, left open from the middle of the breast, sometimes cut so short as to show the shirt below bulged out over the breeches. Sometimes you will see one of these new short jackets with a slit in the back, and under this the man will be wearing the round trunks of his father’s time.

The breeches are mostly in two classes—the long breeches the shape of bellows, tied at the knee with a number of points or a bunch of coloured ribbons; or the breeches cut the same width all the way down, loose at the knee and there ornamented with a row of points (ribbons tied in bows with tags on them).

A new method of ornamentation was this notion of coloured ribbons in bunches, on the breeches, in front, at the sides, at the knees—almost anywhere—and also upon the coats.

For some time the older fashioned short round cape or cloak prevailed, but later, large silk cloaks used as wraps thrown across the shoulders were used as well. The other cloaks had straps, like the modern golf cape, by which the cloak might be allowed to fall from the shoulders.

A custom arrived of wearing boots more frequently, and there was the tall, square-toed, high-heeled boot, fitting up the leg to just below the knee, without a turnover; the stiff, thick leather, blacking boot with broad, stiff tops, also not turned back; and there was also the result of the extraordinary melting, crumpled dismissal of all previous stiffness, whereby the old tall boot drooped down until it turned over and fell into a wide cup, all creases and wrinkles, nearly over the foot, while across the instep was a wide, shaped flap of leather. This last falling boot-top was [!-- original location - full page illustration of boots --] turned in all manner of ways by those who cared to give thought to it.

A MAN OF THE TIME OF CHARLES I. (1625-1649)

He has wrapped his blue cloak over his arm, a usual method of carrying the cloak. He is simply dressed, without bunches of ribbons or points.

The insides of the tops of these boots were lined with lace or silk, and the dandy turned them down to give full show to the lining—this turning of broad tops was such an inconvenience that he was forced to use a straddled walk when he wore his boots thus.

Canes were carried with gold, silver, or bone heads, and were ornamented further by bunches of ribbon.

Coming again to the head, we find ribbon also in use to tie up locks of hair; delicate shades of ribbon belonging to some fair lady were used to tie up locks to show delicate shades of love. Some men wore two long love-locks on either side of the face, others wore two elaborately-curled locks on one side only.

The hats, as the drawings will show, are broad in the brim and of an average height in the crown, but a dandy, here and there, wore a hat with next to no brim and a high crown. Most hats were feathered.

There is a washing tally in existence of this time belonging, I think, to the Duke of Rutland, which is very interesting. It is made of beech-wood covered with linen, and is divided into fifteen squares. In the centre of each square there is a circle cut, and in the circle are numbers. Over the number is a plate with a pin for pivot in the centre, a handle to turn, and a hole to expose a number. Above each circle are the names of the articles in this order:

Ruffs.	Bandes.	Cuffes.	Handkercher.	Cappes.
Shirtes.	Halfshirts.	Boote Hose.	Topps.	Sockes.
Sheetes.	Pillowberes.	Table Clothes.	Napkins.	Towells.

Topps are linen boot-frills, and halfshirts are stomachers.

There remains little to be said except that black was a favourite dress for men, also light blue and cream-coloured satin. Bristol paste diamonds were in great demand, and turquoise rings were very fashionable.

For the rest, Vandyck’s pictures are available to most people, or good reproductions of them, and those, with a knowledge of how such dress came into being, are all that can be needed.