Belstaff 'Ironhyde' coat

[Aviakid]

Godfry Lewis

Hi Alan,
nice to make your acquaintance.
Godfrey Lewis became a director of D Lewis sometime in the early 1950's, he was the D Lewis Ltd Company Secretary in 1951 and died around 1973/4.
D Lewis the company was originally set up by three brothers called Isaacs (Nathan, Michael & David), the company started life as a Clothiers and became a Ltd company in May 1929. D Lewis Ltd made all manner of great clothing, flying, motorcycling, motoring and military as well as casual items.
Getting back to Godfrey, I think he married into the Isaacs family and it was just a coincidence that his surname was Lewis.

 

[Alan Eardley]

Hi Alan,
nice to make your acquaintance.
Godfrey Lewis became a director of D Lewis sometime in the early 1950's, he was the D Lewis Ltd Company Secretary in 1951 and died around 1973/4.
D Lewis the company was originally set up by three brothers called Isaacs (Nathan, Michael & David), the company started life as a Clothiers and became a Ltd company in May 1929. D Lewis Ltd made all manner of great clothing, flying, motorcycling, motoring and military as well as casual items.
Getting back to Godfrey, I think he married into the Isaacs family and it was just a coincidence that his surname was Lewis.

Good to 'meet' you too. Yes, that's what I understand. The thing that interests me about D G Lewis is that one of the wartime contractors for RAF sheepskin flying clothing to the Irvin Airchute design was a company called D.G.L (London) Ltd. No-one seems to know much about the company or what the initials stand for, but as D Lewis were contractors for cloth RAF flying suits throughout most of the 30's, it seems odd that they didn't get a contract for the sheepskin stuff.

One theory (and it is just that, in the sense that it needs testing) is that by wartime D Lewis was occupied to full capacity making cloth suits, so they formed another company under the managership of G Lewis to produce the sheepskin and called it D&G Lewis or DGL for short. This would imply that he joined the board of D Lewis after the war when DGL was wound up. Have you heard anything about this?

Alan

 

[Aviakid]

DGL

Hi Alan,

I hadn't heard of DGL before and couldn't guess if they were anything to do with D Lewis Ltd or not. D Lewis Ltd continued to advertise their civilian flying wares in magazines such as FLIGHT during WW2 and offered discounts to officers in the RAF as well as a bespoke service on boots, gloves. helmets etc. Some adverts even advertise for used Irvin jackets (generous price paid of course), which I assume were in demand by members of the general public during the wintertime. Curiously, company records seem to dry-up between 1938-1951, possibly a wartime Govt contractor did not publish accounts and company details etc if involved in the war effort?
D Lewis Ltd only published one catalogue during the war years and presumably just the pricelist was updated as & when, the company were still supplying casual and motorcycle clothing during WW2. The war years catalogue was superseded in 1952 by a much more comprehensive one which included "Irvine" jackets (see illo). Leather garments have always been the main products of D Lewis since at least 1926 so, as you point out, it would seem natural that they would produce leather items and possibly Irvin jackets during a time of need. Does anyone else on the forum know of DGL?

 

[hkhang666]

Hi,

I recently bought a Belstaff Black Prince PVC jacket on eBay. Later on during my search on the internet, I came across a very similar jacket from Barbour called the Black Streak (1964).

http://www2.barbour.com/us/all-about-wax

The description says it was a popular jacket...etc. However, I've never seen the Black Streak on eBay or the internet (other than the Barbour website above). Can someone tell me more about the this jacket and how it compares to the Black Prince? (Both are styled almost identical and made of heavyweight PVC.)