Victorian yachting attire

Seagreen

Seagreen

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All this talk of Rippingille No.3's has sparked a casual musing.

So, you classic fashionistas out there, what would the victorian yachtsman about town have worn? All this effort on making the boat look the part, yet completely forgetting my own rig. I can study Childers, and see the DVD (yes, Riddle is available on DVD, but is only worth it for the opening scenes, sorry. Fine cast let down by a small budget and poor direction) but what should I wear? Do I choose to emulate Carruthers (all blazer and flannels) or Davies - much more me, in old Guernsey and a Pea Jacket. I don't think Musto cuts the same dash on an old boat.

Suggestions please.
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It reminds me of Peter Heaton's advice about wearing a yachting cap:

Don't wear a yachting cap in an 8 foot dinghy.
Don't wear a yachting cap in a 30 foot sailing cruiser.
Don't wear a yachting cap in a 60 foot motor yacht.
Don't wear a yachting cap.
 
For casual wear boffing about the sandbanks, a Norfolk jacket with full length trisers (not plus fours) in a restrained heavyweight tweed seems to be the thing, or a fully tailored yotting rig in heavy wool serge. Heavy brown brogues with the former, black Derbys with the latter, obv.

Do make sure the vessel's MOB recovery method can handle about a quarter of a ton, as that's what a wet Victorian yottie must have weighed!

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Carruthers

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Funny how you never hear names like Carruthers, Featherstonehaugh and Cholmondeley nowadays. Did people with such names ever exist, or were these names reserved for characters in Victorian/Edwardian novels? Maybe they are all now Lord Somebody-or-other, or perhaps they have all died out due to some genetic disorder resulting from in-breeding.
 
Think I'll dig out Peter Heaton - I know he's on one of my shelves. As for dressing as Edwardian, D&C were, and did. I just fancies being a bit more "period". Perhaps the Blazer and flannels would be too restrictive?

I have an old Navy Arctic fearnought white smock, which I wore before fleece was fashionable, and I may wera this again. Very windproof with the right undergarment, but it makes me look a bit like Tom Crean. I think "Davies" would approve.

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As for dressing as Edwardian, D&C were, and did. I just fancies being a bit more "period". Perhaps the Blazer and flannels would be too restrictive?

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Surely the appropriate period attire depends on the craft you sail. The owner of a J-class would not dress the same as his crew, or as the crew of a fishing smack.

Arthur Ransome sailed in a tie and what looked a bit like a Norfolk jacket and a tweed hat.

Musto can be avoided (except in foul weather) by wearing such practical garments as guernsey pullovers, smocks (readily available) etc. One friend has a lovely navy jumper, knitted by his mother, with his boat's name in large red letters across the front.

Personally I favour smocks. They are fairly windproof, and one of mine has a teflon type coating making it a bit water resistant.
 
I'm smocked up to the eyeballs - can't stop collecting the darn things. Yet to find one thats proper windproof, but I've bought a thick one from Yarmouth Stores which is going to be dyed rusty brown (so the stains won't show) when I get the chance.

Still musing about a Yottin' cap, despite Peter Heaton's comment. Can't find the quote, either.
 
I think the trick with period clothing is not to overdue it. A second world war submariners jersey with a pair of old cord trousers and a pair of wellies with the top of the socks over the wellie tops. If you are very confident an old pipe jamed into the corner of your mouth, but its hard to make that look natural and not for the beginner.
I have found that the chaps who wear yachting caps are trying too hard, the cardinal sin for an Englishman. The understated look is always best.
As a general rule don't wear anything American either. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
 
The few pictures I have seen of H.W.Tilman show him dressed as if for a spot of gardening.

Probably costs a lot of money to achieve that sort of look, and the upper-classes would soon spot some frightful cad trying to imitate it.
 
We are fortunate in Australia in that the equestrian people favour long coats of genuine oilskin, so these are easy to buy - just expensive. I was wearing one with a matching sou'wester while helming a local topsail schooner which is a reproduction of the ship which brought settlers to establish Melbourne in 1835. I found passengers were taking my photograph! It was windproof and very warm, but would be too restrictive on a smaller yacht. Sou'westers are the superior headgear in my book. Forget the poncy yachting caps!
Peter.
 
I'm glad Heatons book has been mentioned, since I shall now read it again.
My paperback 5th edition 1978 has the quote on page 89 under " Odds and Ends of Salty Wisedom Culled from Many Sources"

>>.. Don't wear white flannels and a peaked cap when sailing a 14 foot dinghy.
>>.. Don't wear white flannels and a peaked cap when sailing an Ocean Racer.
>>.. Don't wear white flannels and a peaked cap.


The one I like is

>>.. Never think that any form of sailing is superior to another, unless it's your own.
 
For many years in my late teens and early 20s, I kept warm with said Navy white submariners jumper, yet I cannot find one to fit me, and I need a generous 46" chest these days. I can still fit the fearnought smock. I used a pair of black waterproof and shiny "rexene"(?) trousers from a surplus store last seen on newsreel footage of the 1960's outbreak of Foot and Mouth. (Don't blame me for this years outbreak!) They were too stiff to bend my legs, though. Currently use old Guy Cotten Jacket and Gill trousers in Yellow - as I think wearing any other colours to stay dry in make sailors look like hairdressers.

Seaboot socks won't fit in modern deck wellies, (tried it - my calves are too big). I have sailed with an old wool balaclava and continue to do so, but finding a nice woolen one is difficult, and a ski mask makes me look like a burgler.

I always wear a peaked baseball cap, as my Dad copied the fashion from Sir Francis Chichester, so it has some provenance - I even remember going out into Plymouth Sound in a 10' seagull powered rowing boat one dark night to welcome him home, along with hundreds of others. Dark, overloaded boat, no lifejacket or torch. Social services would have a field day on that these days...

I digress. I'm not trying to look like Shackleton, but that can be the effect. I think it might be fun to look like the mark 1 Carruthers, just for a laugh. Where do I obtain Yottin' caps these days? Don't want to be mistook for the Dockmaster, or the Revenue, but I feel some period charm is in order.

And yes, you are right - I did have a weird childhood...
 
Well, if you must have a cap go for a pre-war Naval Officers cap. You probably know but the current Officers Cap used to be used with tropical rig, for home waters the white cover was not used. I think it had a better shape than the current one. I nearly bought a German 2nd war submariners cap as these really are the biz but they are very expensive to get a genuine one ( over £200) so I didn't.
Anything from the Swiss Navy would be good.
Happy hat hunting.
 
Funny enough my mate and I were only saying this summer that we should get some late 20s and 30s attire to wear aboard when at a festival or gathering. My boat was built in 1930 by Cliff and Son, Castleford, Yorkshire, 34foot motor yacht. So would it be cloth cap or something a bit more eye catching??? Have an old postcard from the Norfolk Broads showing a similar craft and a chap sporting a white cheese cutter cap, checked shirt, white trousers and shoes11 very fetching.
Now my mates boat is an ex navy Pinnace so I think a fine cut officers rig would be good for him.???????Those below decks would no doubt have bell bottom and white shirts with the square flappy thing hanging down their backs.
 
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