British Workwear

[Two Types]

The film was 'Floodtide'.

I went through it again and there wasn't anything notable that was easily grabbed.

 

[herringbonekid]

...and here's a still from it:

 

[Cobden]

In this image
http://i1086.photobucket.com/albums/j457/twotypes22/Workwear/SongofFreedom2.jpg

I wonder if the shirt is an military greyback?

 

[Two Types]

British Workwear from the Kays Catalogue:

1920

1927

1930

1933

1937

1943

1950

 

[Warden]

Love this thread, I want to watch those great films again

 

[Two Types]

The classic combination of scarf and collarless work shirt:

from 'Bitter Springs' (1950).

 

[Rudie]

...and here's a still from it:

I have a very similar belt from Juke-Jive.

 

[Edward]

Great set of images - both for the details, and some indication of how they were worn.

i wear shop coats quite a lot indoors if it's chilly, or if i'm painting.

I have one somewhere that I used to wear during my undergraduate years, when I was a Saturday boy in an old family-run DIY/Building Supplies/woodyard business. Not a vintage piece - it was bought new for me when I started there in 1994 - but not dissimilar in style to some of the jackets here. Burgundy, three-button, three-patch pocket, blazer style. Remarkably practical. Still have it somewhere, I think. I can definitely vouch for how practical it was.

(As an aside, on reading your mention of painting, I've just remembered something I'd forgotten for years... I had a couple of boilersuits that were worn working in the garage at home. When I first took up painting wargaming miniatures at about fifteen, I actually wore a boilersuit sitting at the kitchen table, working on them, in order to avoid spillage on clothes. Kinda overkill, in retrospect...).

 

[esteban68]

I remember clearly as an engineering apprentice in 1984 seeing loads of the 'old fellas' wearing shirts and ties to work on the shop floor, usually with bib and brace or heavy cotton 2 pieces, how they kept clean I'll never know, on hot days the sleeves would be rolled up and the top button undone many of them were ex WW2 veterans.
Many of them dfid indeed wear berets, neckerchiefs and on occasion ex army blouses, they once bought a pallet of unissued ex WD leather jerkins for the site gang ( the chaps who worked outside and away from the workshops) but being on holiday at the time I never got one...I have one now though and it's great for standing vintage events in the autumn /winter.
Our 'Ovvies' were heavy cotton one piece jobs with rubber buttons which we tied around our waists when it was hot, we wore generally ex German moleskin shirts which were £1 at Yeaomans army stores usually with the German blue military tracksuit bottoms and tops in winter, jeans tended to split in the crotch but the stretchy 'trackie' bottoms were great when climbing on scaffolds etc! boots were steel toe caps, ex WD 'ammo boots' or latterly 'rigger' boots.

I used my school metalwork apron when painting my wargames or toy soldiers figures Edward usually using the back of a fingernail as a mixing palet, I often forgot to remove it before school getting odd looks when turning up for school the next day with a single coloured fingernail!!!

 

[Two Types]

White cotton flying suits from the 1937 film Brief Ecstasy:

 

[Two Types]

From 'Death Drives Through' (1935)

The collar of his overalls is interesting - it appears to be stitched down:

Flying suits

Overalls

This character being a mechanic whose face is constantly black with oil, and it being a 1930s British film, his character goes by the name of 'Nigger'.

 

[Metatron]

From oxford bags and tennis shirts to flying suits: why white? it's obviously a nightmare to keep clean...

 

[Baron Kurtz]

Cheaper than dying the cloth.

 

[Fastuni]

And easy to clean and bleach (when cotton).

 

[Cobden]

These two chaps

Both look like they might be wearing army surplus "grey back" wool shirts

 

[esteban68]

Great shirt but the thought of wearing one next to my skin sends me into a fit of itching...even the viyella Woolrich shirts are a no no for me without an undershirt and it looks like these are being worn as a base layer! Once again great stills TT.

 

[Two Types]

From oxford bags and tennis shirts to flying suits: why white? it's obviously a nightmare to keep clean...

That's why, circa 1925, there was a fashion for pinkish hued tennis trousers: people who had played on French clay courts wanted the colour to prevent obvious marks. They then brought the fashion back to the UK, reportedly leading to pinks being a popular colour for Oxford Bags.

 

[Two Types]

These two chaps

Both look like they might be wearing army surplus "grey back" wool shirts

They certainly do. I suppose it would have been an obvious choice for a workshirt. And no doubt rather plentiful especially since that style of shirt was probably being phased out in the thirties (I know that the uniforms were changed in the thirties, so was that when these were got rid of?)

 

[Cobden]

The greybacks were replaced in the early 1930s. However, whether this meant that they became an obvious choice for workwear, or whether it simply meant that they were the sort of thing film companies would have a lot of in stock, I couldn't say.

Estaban - one gets used to the wool - I can confirm that!

 

[Two Types]

From 'The Lamp Still Burns' (1943)

Stewart Granger in a short work jacket, complete with buckles at the waist and no collar:

boiler suit - this one is incredibly plain: