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Blazers had several destinctive design features that differentiated them from suit jackets. They were not just colorful suit jackets. British school blazers were always made with lapels. These were important because the schools often issued various kinds of pins which the boys proudly wore in their lapels. Blazers were generally made with a patch pocket. This was not always the case, but it was fairly standard because it was a useful place to put the schoiol crest. The destinctive crest or school badge was a very important part of the unigorm. It was sewn on here. There were a wide range of crest designs. Blazers also usually had two side pockets. Suit jackets normally had flap pockets at the side. Blazers usually did not have flaps at the side. Many were patch pockets.
Blazers were made with lapels. We have seen blazers for younger children made without lapels. We have noted some continental schools with these blazers. We have not noted such blazers at Britush prep schools. The lapels could vary in width, but generally speaking school uniform garments did not vary as much as regular clothing did. The lapels were important because a variety of pins issued by the school were pinned on here. These could be house pins or position pins like prefect, librarian, and many others. This varied from school to school. The boys were very proud of these pns and liked wearing them.
Blazers generally had three buttons, altthough we have seen some with two buttons. Hopefully some of our British readers will tell us more about buttons. Some schools enforced rules about how the blazer should be worn concerning the buttons. Through the 1950s this was still very common. Schools tended to want the boys to button all their buttons. It was generally the view that the boys looked smarter with their buttons buttoned. While there was some lattitude here, it was virtually aequirement that the middkd button be buttoned. A reader tells us, "I recall that, in the 1950s, we were encouraged to do up all three buttons until the age of 13 and that the middle button at least was done up as an absolute requirement. Failure
to do so was met with punishment. Being buttoned up like that did restrict movement and of course, in those days there were fewer opportunities to remove jackets during the course of a day at school.
Anoter reader writes, "For younger children school clothes tended not to follow fashion that closely so, while teenagers might expect looser jackets and a single vent or double vents by the post-war era, the very buttoned up look for them continued. Those pictures seemed to illustrate how they were tightly fitted." The schools we visited in the 1980s tended to have a more relaxed view regarding buttoning the blazers. This was probably a part of the generally more relaxed attitude, but also because most boarding schools had the boys pit away their bnlazers and not wear them during a normal school day. Day schools differed here. At day schools wearing the blazer was more common.
A patch pocket was popular and provided a convenient place to sew on the school badge or crest. This was a very important part of the school uniform. A breast patch pocket was virtually a requirement for a school blazer. There was a wide range of such crests. They were done in many different styles such as tradituional crests or just a solitary letter.
Blazers also usually had two side pockets. Suit jackets normally had flap pockets at the side. Blazers usually did not have the flaps here. Boys being boys, these pockets tended to get a lot more use than suit jackets normally do. Some times we recall seeing boys litterally cram themn full of an endessly variable asortment of items.
Another important characteric of an English school blazer is the absence of a back vent. Suit jackets had these vents, but blazers did not. With the front burrons buttoned this could make for a tight fit. A reader writes, "Your recent postings about prep school blazers reminded me of how the style must have emerged. The lack of a vent at the rear would seem to be a hangover from the Edwardian era, when jackets fitted very closely round the backside and were buttoned up with numerous buttons. Whilst the blazers (like the jackets of the grey flannel suits I had at school) had only the three buttons, the hem arrangements remained."
