A Bum Freezer from the Attic

During the Corona Virus lockdown, I did various jobs about the house. One was to sort out the attic. I found an old box that I had forgotten about entirely. It contained old clothes that had belonged to my father, but which were too small for me to fit into. They were too worn for sending to a charity shop, and I could never bring myself to throw them away as they were all top quality gear. So they went into the attic. I'll be posting about some of these as we go along.

The first to write about was what my father always referred to as his Bum Freezer Suit. Here it is, together with the tie that was wrapped around the hanger on which it had been when put away.

As you can see it is a two piece suit with a two button front and quite a deep V open front and medium width lapels. Standard collar and lapels for a single breasted suit like this. At first sight it looks charcoal grey, but when we look at the fabric we will see that is not quite right.

So, what is a "bum freezer suit". As the name implies, it was a suit with a very short jacket. Th polite term for this was a "Roman Jacket" as the style first came to prominence in Italy and the Roman fashion houses. Foreign films were shown more often in mainstream cinemas back in the 1950s and 1960s, so continental influences were more a part of the popular scene than they are now. Short jackets enjoyed a good run of fashion. When the Beatles first hit the big time, they wore short jacket suits.

Anyway, back to my father's suit from the attic. Here is the label inside the inner breast pocket. You can see that it was mde by H. Huntsman in August 1958. My father got his work suits from Huntsman. He said that they made the best jackets in the world.

Founded in 1849, Huntsman is a Savile Row tailor, producing traditional bespoke suits and other items for gentlemen and ladies. Huntsman has been granted several royal warrants bestowed by British and European monarchs, including The Prince of Wales, (later Edward VII) and Queen Victoria.  Huntsman is also one of the founders of the trade body responsible for protecting and promoting the working practices of Savile Row.

Here is the inside of the jacket. The arms have a cream satin lining, allowing the arms to slide easily into what seem to me to be rather slim sleeves. The lining of the body of the jacket, in contrast, is rough and thick. There is a lot of friction there. You can see the trousers in this picture. They are "drainpipes" - they are slim and taper to the ankles quite sharply. 

 The next photo shows the two button fastening. As you can see the front of the jacket slopes quite sharply back from the upper button. I remember that my father used to wear this suit with only the top button done up. The lower button was never fastened. Looking at this, I suspect that it was not supposed to do up at all.

 This photo of the pocket flap shows that they flap is horizontal, a fairly formal look for a business suit. You can see that up close the fabric is actually a textured mix of pale grey and black threads, not a charcoal grey at all.

 Here is the back of the jacket. Sorry about the rumples, but it has been in a box for about 30 years. Note that there are no vents at all. It was possible to do this as the jacket is so short. If it were longer, vents would be needed to allow the legs to move freely and to prevent the jacket rucking when you sit down. But it is so short neither is a real problem.

So there you go. The first of the garments to come out of the box from the attic. More later.