Meeting with the 30's chore coat
I've wanted to make a new chore coat for the coming spring and started to search for vintage chore coats from the early summer last year. I was able to narrow down the targeted vintage jackets but didn't have luck to grab any of it. One day, I happened to have a random chat with Ryo who always works in the same room saying, "I find this 30's Duck Head chore coat the cutest and I've been trying hard to get this exact jacket. Don't you think it's a good idea?"
And he replied, "Ah, I have the exact jacket I bought when I lived in Amsterdam and gave it to my dad as a present." I couldn't believe it but a good luck was just lying in the same office where we always worked together.
Tags & Buttons
I've always admired the presence of animal-motif mascot characters when I look at American companies and brands.So from an early stage when starting the TCB brand, I had the image of making a cat logo. Of course, at the time, it was just a pipe dream but I just thought it'd be cool if the kids in the neighborhood call us a cat & jeans company
Among the vintage workwear brands, I love the animal-motif ones.
The bulldog from Boss of the Road, the rooster from Can't Bust'em, the bear from Black Bear, the pig from Finks, etc. are all fascinating.
Among them, the one TCB chose to reproduce was the 1930's Duck Head.
It was very difficult to recreate the slightly silly duck face into a cat, but I think we have done a good job on this. On this one jacket, 3 different buttons are used and it strikes me that it's kinda luxurious for a mere chore jacket from100 years ago, haha.
The 19mm buttons on the placket are characterized by their vintage matte texture.
Surprisingly, the rough texture is a distinctive feature and helps prevent slipping, so I think it's a design feature to improve ease of use.
The sleeves have adjustable double buttons.
There are dot buttons on each side of the chest, so there are a total of three types of buttons on one garment, so the development costs alone were high, but I think we have created a very adorable tag and buttons. Another thing that I found attractive was the green bar tacks and buttonholes. There are many vintage jackets with colorful bar tacks, and at TCB we have had fun using colors that remind us of vintage style and colors that seem familiar but are not really in the clothes of today. However, the only jackets I can remember with colorful buttonholes are Duck Head and Oshkosh. Of course, the green looks vivid at first, but the green fades as you continue to wear it, which may be one of the joys of this jacket.
Details & Sewing
The vintage chore coat we referred to this time has an unique detail, which is the chain-stitched neckband. When applying a chain stitch, we usually do it in the way that the chain part comes on the back side but this one has the chain stitch on the front/outer side. Maybe people back then thought it might be uncomfortable around the neck if the chain stitch sits on the inner side. But if you want to do this, we need a special attachment for the Union Special used for waistbands. While I was racking my brains over how to sew it, I suddenly remembered and consulted with Tateno-san from "Workers", which I think is one of the most hard-core JP repro brands .
Tateno-san then said, "I made the attachment when I made the PAYDAY homage product two years ago, so I'll bring it to you," and kindly agreed to lend it to me.
I immediately attached it to the UNION SPECIAL 51800G and tried sewing it, and I was able to create a stand collar with the same specifications as the vintage one.
For me, it's just no use if we reproduce this jacket without the chain stitched neckband, I can't thank him enough for this!
It is not rare that a detail that is often thought to be a "cool design!" is actually the result of an innovation to improve efficiency at the time. The chain stitch on the stand collar this time was probably like this. "Let's do it with the chain stitch machineso that we can skip the ironing. If we sew it from the backside, the chain stitch will appear on the outer side so you won't have itchy neck."
Fabric
We have disassembled a vintage chore coat of Duck Head, and have analyzed the shapes of the threads, the color, and the dyeing method to make this fabric.
・Yarns
For the warps, we have mixed count 8 straight yarns & count 9 short/slubby yarns in a 1:1 ratio.
For the wefts, we've used count 12 naturally made-irregular yarns & the same yarn count neppy yarns in a 1:1 ratio. We have used 4 different yarns to pull out the true vintage feel on this special fabric. It's rope dyed so you can enjoy the vintage-like fade for sure.
・Dyeing for wefts：reaction dyed in grey
The wefts looked more grey than undyed and we assume that the grey color might have been transferred from the indigo on the warps over times but in order to get this grey-ish color on the whole, we have dyed the wefts in grey.
・ No anti-twisting/ No sanforizing/ No burning the fluffs on the surface of the fabric.
The neppy look is important for the true reproduction so we have done no processing of fabrics. It's true unsanforized denim!
