| The above article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smock-frock ) 8/5/05 |
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A smock-frock or smock is an outer garment worn by rural workers in England and Wales from at least the early eighteenth century.
The traditional smock-frock is made of heavy linen or wool and varies from thigh-length to mid-calf length. Characteristic features of the smock-frock are fullness across the back, breast, and sleeves folded into "tubes" (narrow unpressed pleats) held in place and decorated by smocking, a type of surface embroidery in a honeycomb pattern across the pleats that controls the fullness while allowing a degree of stretch.
Origins
It is uncertain whether
smock-frocks are "frocks
made like smocks" or "smocks
made like frocks"
that is,
whether the garment evolved
from the
smock,
the shirt or underdress of
the medieval period, or from
the
frock, an overgarment of
equally ancient origin. What
is certain is that the
fully-developed smock-frock
resembles a melding of the
two older garments.
Types of smock-frocks
- The round smock is a pullover style with an open neckline and a flat, round collar. This smock is reversible front-to-back.
- The shirt smock is styled like a man's shirt, with a collar and a short placket opening in the front. It is not reversible.
- The coat smock worn by Welsh shepherds is long and buttons up the front in the manner of a coat.
Flowering and decay
Embroidery styles for
smock-frocks varied by
region, and a number of
motifs became traditional
for various occupations:
wheel-shapes for carters and
wagoners, sheep and crooks
for shepherds, and so on.
Most of this embroidery was
done in heavy linen thread,
often in the same color as
the smock.
By the mid-nineteenth century, wearing of traditional smock-frocks by country laborers was dying out. Romantic nostalgia for England's rural past over the next decades, as epitomized by the illustrations of Kate Greenaway, led to a fashion for women's and children's dresses and blouses loosely styled after smock-frocks. These garments are generally of very fine linen or cotton and feature delicate smocking embroidery done in cotton floss in contrasting colors; smocked garments with pastel-colored embroidery remain popular for babies.
See also
Socks - rhymes with smocks...
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