Figure 1.--This photograph provides a good view of the smocks worn by French schoolboys at about the turn of the 20th century. Note how the boys wear belts outside their smocks. |
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HBC is attempting to assess French schoolwear trends. We have assembled a good deal of information on different types of garments, but an accurate assessment of trends over time and conventions remains elusive. Thus HBC is assembling images of invidual schools. One a number of schools have been assesmbled it will enable us to better understand trends over time and accepted conventions. Unfortunately often little information is available on the schools pictured in many available images. HBC will do its best to assess these images. Hopefully our French consultants will be able to add additional details.
The boys attend a French elementary school. As with most French schools at the time, the school was a single gender boys school.
I'm not positive about the date of this photograph, but would speculate about the turn of the century in the early 1900s.
The children in this class appear to be elementary school age boys, about 10 or 11 years old. As they are about the same age, one would assume they are from the same class at the school.
The teacher is in the middle of the photograph and looks like a typically imposing school master of the era. Most of the teachers at boys schools, both elementary and secondary, were men.
The three boys pictured here all wear smocks. I'm not sure if the rest of the class was also dressed in smocks. Each boy appears to be wearing knickers or kneepanys under their smocks.
None of the boys in the photograph wear headgear so it is not known what kind of caps they wore. Almost certainly there were caps, but probably not berets. To my knowledge the beret was not associated with uniforms until French Boy Scouts began wearing them in the 1910s. This is, however, only a preliminary asessment by HBC that requires confirmation.
The boys are wearing standard dark colored, back buttoning smocks. They extend to knee level. They looked to be virually identical with a plain yoke and extensive smocking. Theybare not worn with any destinctive collar. As a result of the back view, it is not known if the boys were wearing bows.
It is not possible to tell from such a small sample if all the boys wear smocks. Thus the smocks may have been required wear, but HBC can not determine this. Smocks were commonly worn at most French schools at the turn of the century. So boys of this age would commonly wear smocks. HBC is less sure just to what extet smocks were required wear rather than what the parents had chosen for the boys.
Notice the destinctive style of wearing belts over their smocks. Many older French boys wore their smocks like this, but some younger boys wore their smocks without belts. There was no practical reason for wearing a belt over as smock, it was purely stylistic.
As all three boys wear smocks, it is not known if the boys wore jackets and sweaters.
These three boys appear to be wearing knickers. The image is a little unclear, some of them may be wearing knee pants. This was probably not a school requirement. While the school may have required the boys to wear smocks, it was probably up to the parents to choose whether the boys wore knickers or long pants.
The boys wear both kneesocks or longstockings and short socks with their knicketrs. It can't be determined by this image wether the boy with long socks is wearing over-the-knee stockings or kneesocks. Many available photographic images of French boys from the turn of the century suggest that long socks were more common than short socks. In thisphotograph, however, two of the boys are wearing short socks. French fashion magazines from this era commonly picture boys in short socks.
It is difficult to tell precisely from this image what kind of shoes the boys are wearing. One boy appears to be wearing high-top shoes. None of the boys wear sandals.
All of the boys wear similar length hair styles. None wear hair over their ears, but none have especially short cuts.
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