Figure 1.--These Swiss brothers are outfitted in their best clothes for a portrait probably taken in the 1870s. The two olest boys wear kneepants suits with white stockings. The younger boy wears a front-buttoning plaid dress and plain pantalettes. Note the destinctive hair style and while the younger boy wears a dress, his hair is style just like his older brother.

HBC knows of no specific Swiss style for Swiss boys suits. Presumably Swiss boys in the early 19th century wore skeleton suits like boys in other European countries. Swiss boys by the mi-19th century were wearing suits with more modern styling an long pants. Gradually by the 1870s, kneepants suits had become more common for boys. They were worn with long over the knee stockings. I'm not sure when knicker suits began to be worn. Short pants suits with modern styling appeared in the 1910s and were wiely worn by the 1920s. They were worn with kneesocks, but many boys wore long sabove the knee stockings with them during the winter. Other boys wore knickers. Gradually suits became less commonly worn and were much less common by the 1940s. Knicker suits isappeared in the 1950s and short pants suits became much less common in the 1960s. Today modern Swiss boys, as other European boys, do not commonly dress up, but when they do, they normally wear a single breasted, longpants suits.

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Created: January 7, 2001
Last updated: January 7, 2001