Lining?

[Guest]

Lining on coats? What do we need it for ?

Is it to keep the inside cloth clean? Make the coat warmer? Help us slip our arms into the sleeves.? Support structure?

The unlined Summer coats gets much kudos....can we do without lining on the Winter coats as well without ill-effect?

[Guest]

Yes, you can have an unlined winter coat. However, I do not see its use.

Lining produces some added weight which is desired in fall/winter clothes. Also, it can provide extra body to soft cloths, such as cashmere and flannel.

A lining also provides a finished and attractive look.

My Savile Row tailor sees the unlined coat as a gimmick of customers who think that they are tailors. I agree.

[Guest]

Have a look at old winter coats made in he 1950s or earlier. Not only is the coat heavy, I mean really heavy, most of the time the coat is unlined, or partially lined. The sleeves are always lined and there is frequently a lining across the shoulders going down to above the waist. That shoulder lining is sometimes attached to a single layer of the outer fabric. So you have a double layer of fabric, plus lining, to give extra warmth across the shoulders, just like a blanket draped across the shoulders.

A traditional Duffle coat, another heavy duty winter coat, is always unlined. In general, it is more work to produce an unlined garment, as the lining can hide a multitude of sins. Nicely bound edges need a high degree of accuracy, that’s probably the reason why the above mentioned Savile Row tailor doesn’t like to do them.

Rolf

[Guest]

My Savile Row tailor sees the unlined coat as a gimmick of customers who think that they are tailors. I agree.

I just received from a Savile Row tailor a very lightweight kid mohair blend suit that I requested “buggy lined”. It was, buggy lined, but, perhaps to drive home their contempt for my request, a portion of the interior of the overlapping “wings” that make up the yoke lining contained fusing to give the lining (and thus also the coat back) some body. I received at the same time a similarly finished tweed suitcoat. The interior of the wings had no such fusing presumably because the cloth didn’t need any.

[Guest]

AS just finished a Winter weight coat 1/2 lined with no complaint and actually the quality of their finishing on the inside was very neat and nicely done.

I think I will stick with the 1/2 lined coat for both Winter and Summer; the interior is a pleasure to look at, more elegant than a fully lined version.

[Guest]

mmm - my jackets are full lined but I do like to look of half lined. is it possible to change a jacket from being full lined to being half lined?

[Guest]

Yes, it can be done. However, half lining is not about good looks, it only makes sense on summer coats made in a porous weave cloth that lets the air pass through.

Costi