Knee Breeches: why aren’t we all wearing them?
The fall and fall of this practical and attractive form of legwear [750 words, 3 min
It’s January 2019, and along comes a bloke in a hiking boots, a woolly hat, and an orange padded jacket made by some Swiss gear people called Mammut. So what’s so surprising about that?
The surprise is simply that we’re not on Cat Bells here – we’re on the cat walk. Specifically we’re in Paris, at the Louis Vuitton fashion show. Because, as everybody knows, technical outdoor gear is eventually going to hit high fashion and after that the high street. Even the cheap, utilitarian and seriously ugly shell suit, those clumpy training shoes, and the unsightly bulge of the bumbag – they’ve all had their day among the smart and the stylish.
And now, what’s been designer-labelled as ‘Gorpcore’ is such a “specific cultural niche” that the V&A has a Gorpcore superfan on the payroll along with their other consultants on Lego, Pokemon cards and Taylor Swift. Meanwhile, according to The Observer, Veilance from Arc’teryx offers a business suit made of technical Gore-Tex, just right for those executive meet-ups held in blizzards at the summit of Beinn a’ Bhuird.1
The Observer 14 Jan 2024: jacket at Pitti Immagine Uomo; Frank Ocean; SS Daley outfit; Hailey Bieber; Pharrell Williams
As keen fashion-watchers already know, this tendency’s been going on for centuries. The so-called sports jacket: the reason it’s got that slit down the back is to make it more handy for when you’re riding on your horse. The ordinary business suit of nowadays was once the comfortable outdoor wear of the eighteenth century, so much more appropriate for cantering across a muddy field than the more formal top hat and tails.
Country outfits for townies, Royal Mile Edinburgh
Which brings us to the breeches. Back in the 1810s, when such half-way legwear was the flower of fashion for every elegant gent, there was one serious issue. What if you didn’t happen to be a husky hillwalker with becomingly muscular legs? The answer was obvious enough. After lacing up your corsets, and stuffing your bum with crumpled paper to make it super sexy, you slid some fake calves inside your stockings.
‘Dandies dressing’ by Thomas Cruikshank: Tom, centre, wears corset, shoulder pads and one false calf. “Pon honor Tom you are a charming figure! You’ll captivate the girls to a nicety!!” “Do you think so Charles? I shall look more the thing when I get my other calf on!”
But if you’re a mountain man with a lovely set of legs, why wouldn’t you want to show them off? Which could be why George Mallory the Everest man’s first girlfriend, Miss Cottie Sanders, sends him a pair of climbing breeches as a thank-you for taking her and her brother up some exciting climbs in Snowdonia.2 Because although the climber’s knees don’t, in theory at least, ever touch the rock, the breeches do tend to wear out there rather quickly, as well as on the seat.
My Grandpa on the Eskdale Harter Fell in his best set of plus-fours
And in the early days of Alpinism, even the women couldn’t wait to get into a pair of breeches. There’s a story, which I’ve been unable to track to its source, of a lady who slipped out of her skirts at the base of the Zinal Rothorn and concealed them underneath a boulder – but after traversing the mountain descended by a different ridge, and so was obliged to stride down the main street of Zermatt with her lower limbs brazenly displayed in her knickerbockers.
In 1895 Annie Peck risked arrest by climbing the Matterhorn while ‘improperly dressed’
The fact is: for all forms of mountain activity this form of legwear is just ideal. Crossing the Carneddau on a nasty afternoon? The rain drips from the bottom edges of your thigh-length waterproof jacket and bounces straight off your lanolin-rich woollen socks. Rock climbing? Full freedom of movement, and so easy to see your feet. A high Alpine ridgeline? Well, what could be more tempting than the shapely legs of a dashing young mountaineer? Nor is this gender-specific. In Frison-Roche’s classic First on the Rope, (Premier de Cordée 1942) the single most alluring feature of Pierre’s fiancée Aline is her gorgeous, snow white, knitted stockings.
First on the Rope, cover from the Pan paperback edition of the English translation
All of which is why, back in the 1970s, I confidently expected that within a year or two I’d be seeing the classic, close-fitted, mountain person’s knee-britches back on the street again. Instead of which, the opposite has happened. After a brief flirtation with Lycra leggings, even us hillwalkers are all back into our soggy trouser bottoms. And then, to make your trousers function slightly more the way they would if they’d been breeches, you strap on a pair of mildly grotesque-looking gaiters.
Meanwhile the only one still in his breeches is a bloke called Black Rod in the House of Commons. And I have to say the current holder of the office, Sarah Clarke, certainly looks very stylish in her ones.
Showing off my elegant legs on the Great Aletsch Glacier
Did you spot the Gaelic pun? Beinn a’ Bhuird is the Board(room) hill.
More on George Mallory next Wednesday: it’s his centenary this year.
I remember having a rather dashing pair of red corduroy pedal-pushers (as we called them) when I was 13. They were my favourite trousers for a while, but I’m pretty sure they never saw a mountain.
An interesting read, thank you. My winter knee breeches were dark green corduroy. They were my first walking trousers in the early 1980s and later I had some grey summer-weight ones. They were usually worn with woolly red socks and a check shirt. By the mid-1990s we had given them up. We still favour what we call 3/4 length trousers for mid-season wear, as wet trouser bottoms are no fun.