Clothing Definitions — definitions of garments and clothing terms from Apparel Search
Confusingly, what was once called a coat is now commonly referred to as a jacket, as in a dinner jacket — although in tailoring the word coat still means the upper part of a suit. And what is now commonly called a coat, an outer layer of clothing such as a trench coat, is in tailoring terms correctly called an overcoat, since it is worn over the coat. This page untangles the two usages: the tailor's coat that pairs with trousers and waistcoat as a suit, and the everyday coat worn outdoors against the weather, with the long family of named coat types — trench coat, peacoat, tailcoat, frock coat, parka and more — that sit between them.
What is now commonly called a coat an outer layer of clothing such as a trench coat is, in tailoring terms, correctly called an overcoat, since it is worn over the coat.
Do you know the difference between a coat & jacket? Well, you may want to visit the fashion questions & answers section to learn more. Visit the difference between coats & jackets page for an explanation.
| The above article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/coat_%28clothing%29). Modified by Apparel Search 5/2/05 |
The named coats each answer a specific job. The trench coat is a rain coat with military roots, belted and storm-flapped; the peacoat is the sailor's short, heavy double-breasted coat; the parka is a hooded cold-weather coat; the tailcoat and morning coat are formal coats whose fronts are cut away at the waist; and the frock coat, knee-length and fitted, was the standard formal day coat of the 19th century. Blazers and sports coats keep the tailored shape without matching trousers, which is why they sit at the jacket end of the family in modern speech.
Choosing a coat starts from the layer beneath it. A true overcoat is cut with enough room to fit over a suit coat without pulling, its length covering the jacket and usually reaching the knee or below. A coat worn as the top layer over knitwear can be closer in fit. That layering logic — coat over coat, in the tailor's old sense — is the practical heart of the terminology this page explains.
In tailoring, a coat is the upper part of a suit — the tailored upper garment worn with matching trousers, and optionally a waistcoat. Everyday speech now usually calls this garment a jacket, as in a dinner jacket, but the tailoring term survives in words like tailcoat, frock coat and morning coat.
An overcoat is the outer layer worn over the suit coat for weather, such as a trench coat. Because it is worn over the coat, tailoring gives it its own name; everyday speech collapses the two layers and simply calls the outdoor garment a coat.
In modern everyday use the words overlap, but the working distinction is that a jacket is the shorter, lighter upper garment — including the suit's upper piece in casual speech — while a coat suggests the longer, heavier outdoor garment. Tailoring keeps the older usage, in which the suit's upper part is the coat.