Why The Trench Coat Is Always In Style
In Milan, in February 2020, I sat waiting for the Bottega Veneta show to start when, suddenly, the room hushed – and Sigourney actual Weaver sat down, next to Dev Hynes and Tessa Thompson. Once I’d retrieved my jaw from the floor, I idly noticed she was wearing a trench coat. Then I noticed that so were Hynes and Thompson, and, in fact, so were lots of the people like me, the ones there to work. No, it wasn’t raining that day. Instead, this was a sign the trench was indisputably a staple of fashionable dressing in our modern era. Again. As a Racked headline put it in 2017: “This Coat Never Goes Out of Style but Really We Mean Never.”
The trench isn’t the only item of civilian clothing to come from the military – there’s also the Wellington boot, the blazer and even the wristwatch – but it may be the only one whose name still divulges its army origins to a modern audience. As it suggests, the coat was worn in the trenches in World War I. But, unlike those other items, the design predates its purpose during war. Charles Macintosh, a Scottish chemist, first popularised waterproofing. He experimented with dissolving rubber and sandwiching it between two layers of fabric. Patenting this idea in 1823, he began to make coats, opening a factory in Manchester in 1824.
Others started to see the potential of rainwear for the well-heeled. John Emary set up his company Aquascutum – Latin for “water shield” – in London in 1851. Two years later, the brand created what they call “the first waterproof wool”, and it was used by the British army in the Crimean War.
Thomas Burberry, a 21-year-old draper’s apprentice in Basingstoke, set up his eponymous company – or Burberry’s, as it was then known – in 1856. It was, as the brand’s website puts it, “founded on the principle that clothing should be designed to protect people from the British weather”. Aquascutum, meanwhile, had the unlikely combination of both the Prince of Wales and the suffragettes as clientele.
By the 1930s, the elegant practicality of the trench began to appeal to women. Burberry, Mackintosh and more produced glossy ads, courting the female market, while women such as Katharine Hepburn, Marlene Dietrich and Joan Crawford wore them on film.
The ’50s fashion for a cinched-in waist played to the trench’s advantage with women. The cinema again was key here – and again began with images of women in war. Marlene Dietrich in A Foreign Affair in 1948, despite playing essentially a Nazi sympathiser, became a trench coat trailblazer. Audrey Hepburn, from Funny Face on, was the poster girl. Defiantly non-conformist Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s is the peak of this idea.
In the 1980s yuppie culture properly hit. Michael Douglas wears a trench as Gordon Gekko in 1987’s Wall Street. In Working Girl, Tess McGill switches from leather jacket to trench coat, as a sign of going up in the world. And then there is Prince in 1980, on the cover of third album Dirty Mind, dressed in an open trench coat, skimpy black underwear, thigh-high stockings and heeled boots – the furthest away from the office-ready trench you could get.
Prince’s sound evolved, but the trademark studded trench remained in one form or another: it was black for the Controversy video, sparkly for 1999, and finally, purple taffeta for Purple Rain. “I chose this fabric because it was attention-grabbing,” said costume designer Louis Wells to Billboard in 2016. “And a trench because he loved the drama and fit. You never knew what it would reveal when it blew open.”
In 1997, the ailing [Burberry’s] company appointed Rose Marie Bravo from Saks, as chief executive. Burberry grew from a value of £200 million to £1.5 billion in 2002 and the trench became the rebooted brand’s calling card. Foregrounding Burberry’s well-heeled heritage, it projected what The Guardian called “an RP kind of Britishness”. Even beyond Burberry, the RP trench dominated for over a decade. It was Kate Middleton, buttoned up and all smart. It was Kerry Washington’s Olivia Pope getting things handled in Scandal. It was Olivia Palermo doing her best Audrey Hepburn impression. It was also, as Linda Grant writes, the item appropriate for people of a certain age – along with the white shirt and low-heeled shoes, “those styles despondently known as classic”.
Its position in fashion is solid. Meghan Markle wore one to announce her engagement to Prince Harry in 2017, Arsenal player Héctor Bellerín wore one to announce his general fashion prowess in 2019. And there’s Sigourney and friends at the Bottega Veneta show – the ones who convinced me dig out my trench coat, to style it open and add a bit of a twirl. I’m not quite as brave as Prince, but I like to think I pay tribute to him just a little bit every time I wear it.
How To Wear The Trench Now
Keep it open | We’re not in a moment where smartness equals style. Wearing a trench open means you get an edge of nonchalance that chimes with the zeitgeist. As seen on street-style blogs and, well, the street for the past few years.
“Irreverence” is a key adjective | In the past, the trench would have been worn over office-ready clothes. But to keep it updated is to keep it casual. Jeans and trainers are a sort of “up-yours” to convention – and they’re much more comfortable, too.
Go beyond khaki | A coloured trench is a way to wear the classic, while also pushing things a bit further. Think pink, green or bright red. Ochre, rust, grey and navy blue don’t count as experimenting, sorry.
Wear with your own take | Meghan Markle’s polished trench-dress. Kim Kardashian’s trench-corset. Héctor Bellerín’s nod to terrace style while watching a game from the terraces during an injury spell ... The best way to wear a trench, such an item of anonymity, is by adding a hefty dose of you.
This is an edited extract from The Ten by Lauren Cochrane, published by Welbeck, $29.99.
Want more Tonic delivered straight to your inbox? Subscribe here