Figure 1.--Kilt suits were also made in the Fauntleroy style, both in the single and double-breasted style. |
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A kilt suit was a natural transition for boys who had grown to old for dresses. It was still a skirted garment which for some unfathomable reason, appears to have appealed to contemporary mothers. There were considerable variations in kilt/skirt suits popular in the late-19th century. Kilt suits had some of the outward appearances of a Scottish kilt, but in many ways were quite different. Several different garments were used with the kikt suit, including blouses, vests, bodices, vests, and kilt/skirts. The suit varied depending on the actual garments chosen. The most common was a suit-like appearance--kilt suits made with a suit jacket that matched the kilt-sklirt material. Some kilt suits consisted of three pices--ahnd added vest (waistcoat. Other kilt suits consisted of blouses rather than jackets. The kilt suit while not popular with the boys outfitted in them, was more popular than the dresses they wore as little boys. The kilt suits lacked many of the frills and girlish touches that boys objected to in dresses. Kilt suits were made out of a wide variety of materials, including wool, mixed suiting, cheviot, serge, broadcloth, and many other materials. Mothers rarely selected a bold Scottish plaid. Often the materials were muted colors, in some cases very plain color plaids. In many cases not even a muted plaid was selected, but a solid color material. Many kilt suits were dark, muted plaids. They were not worn with bright red and other colored plaids often associated with Scotland. Muted plaids, however, were common. This is probably in part due to a general inclinaion to consider the kilt suit a kilted garment, rather than a skirted garment. IHBC believes that the use of tartan fabrics in kilt suits was much more common than in the kneepants suits worn by older boys. The black and white photography of the day makes it difficult to fully assess the colors of the kilt suits worn. Available photographic images do, however, show that kilt suits were mostly darker colors.
There were considerable variations in kilt/skirt suits popular in the late-19th century. Kilt suits had some of the outward appearances of a Scottish kilt, but in many ways were quite different. Several different garments were used with the kilt suit, including blouses, vests, bodices, vests, and kilt/skirts. The suit varied depending on the actual garments chosen. The most common was a suit-like appearance--kilt suits made with a suit jacket that matched the kilt-sklirt material. Some kilt suits consisted of three pices--ahnd added vest (waistcoat. Other kilt suits consisted of blouses rather than jackets. All the different possible combinations make for quite a variety of different outfit types.
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Kilt suits were made out of a wide variety of materials, including wool, mixed suiting, cheviot, serge, broadcloth, and many other materials. Mothers rarely selected a bold Scottish plaid. Often the materials were muted colors, in some cases very plain color plaids. In many cases not even a muted plaid was selected, but a solid color material. Many kilt suits were dark, muted plaids. They were not worn with bright red and other colored plaids often associated with Scotland. Muted plaids, however, were common. This is probably in part due to a general inclinaion to consider the kiltsuit a kilted garment, rather than a skirted garment. IHBC believes that the use of tartan fabrics in kiltsuits was much more common than in the kneepants suits worn by older boys. The black and white photography of the day makes it difficult to fully assess the colors of the kilt suits worn. Available photographic images do, however, show that kilt suits were mostly darker colors. There were some done in lighter colors or even white, but they were much less common than the darker colors. The lighter colored suits were presumably made of lighter materials for summer wear. HBC is unsure as to just what colors the lighter-colored suits were.
Kilt suits were made out of a wide variety of materials, including wool, mixed suiting, cheviot, serge, broadcloth, and many other materials. Mothers rarely selected a bold Scottish plaid. Often the materials were muted colors, in some cases very plain color plaids. In many cases not even a muted plaid was selected, but a solid color material.
Many kilt suits were dark, muted plaids. They were not worn with bright red and other colored plaids often associated with Scotland. Muted plaids, however, were common. This is probably in part due to a general inclinaion to consider the kiltsuit a kilted garment, rather than a skirted garment. IHBC believes that the use of tartan fabrics in kiltsuits was much more common than in the kneepants suits worn by older boys. HBC can not confirm this yet, but this is our initial assessment. A substantial number of kilts suits, however, were also made in variety of solid colors. The solid color kiltsuits, like the plaids, were generally dark, muted colors.
The black and white photography of the day makes it difficult to fully assess the colors of the kilt suits worn. Available photographic images do, however, show that kilt suits were mostly darker colors. There were some done in lighter colors or even white, but they were much less common than the darker colors. The lighter colored suits were presumably made of lighter materials for summer wear. HBC is unsure as to just what colors the lighter-colored suits were.
One popular style for kilt suits was to apply piping around the hems, lapels, and pocvkets. This appears to be a style adopted from the sporty blazers that boys at English public schools had begun wearing. The piping was generally in a contrasting style to the kiltsuit material. It appears to have been a particularly popular style in the 1870s.
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Kilt suits were worn with a variety of accessories. These accessories differeed from the accesories worn with Highland kilts.
Proper kilts were always worn with sporrans, a bag worn in front of a kilt to store coins and other valuables. As a kilt had no pockets, sporrans were needed by older boys. Younger boys in kilt suits often did not have sporrans. As they would be at their mother's side, especially when dressed in their party suit, they had little needs for a place to put their coins. Thus kilt suits were often worn without sporrans.
Quite a variety of looks were possible because of the different collars that could be worn with the jacket. Collars varied from the rather sever looking Eton collar to frilly lace and ruffled collars. Some mothers might vary the collar as a boy got older rather then buying him a kneepants suit.
The collars and bows worn with kiltsuits were highly variable. Kilt suits began to become popular in the late 1860s and early 1870s before boys began wearing large bows. Most boys in kilt suits wore collar bows, but during this earlier period they could be quite small. After the mid-1870s, boys in kilt suits as ell as other outfits began wearing much larger bows which by the 1880s and 90s could almost enc\gulf the boy. Generally speaking, however, the bows worn with kilt suits were smaller than the ones orn with Fauntleroy suits.
Klit suits were almost always worn with long stockings. This is particularly true during the 1870s and 80s. The most common type were dark colored long stockings. Some boys in the 1870s might have wornn stripped stockings. These became, however, less popular in the 1880s. Other suit styles for boys appeared in the mid-1890s were worn with three-quarter length socks. Boys who continued wearing kiltsuits in the 1890s continued to wear mostly long stockings.
The kilt suit emerged as an important style in the late 1860s and 1870s. Pantalettes had declined in popularity, but were still worn. The fashion of wearing pantalettes to cober the legs below the hem of the dress had passed by te 1870s. Thus boys wearing pantalettes with kiltsuits generally did not wear them much below the hem of the kilt-skirt. This was particularrly true by the mid-1870s and 1880s.
While short hair was the most common, quite a number of boys wore their kilt suits with long hair. In American at the time that kilt suits were popular, the fashion of long ringlet curls were popular, thus some American boys wore ringlets with their kilt suit.
Kilt suits were offered in a wide variety of themes.
Some fittingly had Scottish themes, emphasized with caps and Sporran's like young Franklin Roosevelt's outfit above. Some mothers selected
sailor kilts, sailor suits with middy
blouses or a dress with a sailor collar. Some of these outfits looked
just like normal sailor suits, but were in effect sailor dresses with a kilt skirt instead of knee pants.
Others were actual dresses with sailor collars. (As the kilt was of the
same material as the blouse and not plaid it was more of a dress than a kilt.) Another popular theme was the
Fauntleroy look. The main distinguish feature of the
Fauntleroy kilt suit was of course the lace
collar. Often Fauntleroy dresses and kilt suits were made of velvet.
Most kilt suits were not purchased a ready wear outfits. Rather a mother generally selected a pattern and then chose the material. She might have the suit made at home or order it made by a seamstress.
One bodice Fauntleroy kilt suit was described in a 1897 fashion magazine:
Green fancy suiting and white pique' with embroidered edging for the frills form the stylish combination shown in this costume. Boys from 2 to 5 years of age will look well in this ensemble. The skirt, which is deeply hemmed at the bottom, is laid in box plaits all round and buttoned to a sleeveless underwaist that is shaped with shoulder and underarm seams and closed at the back.
The vest is fitted by shoulder and underarm seams and a center seam and is closed to the throat with buttons and buttonholes. Openings to side pockets in the fronts are finished with welts. Straps stitched to the back and fastened together with buckle regulate the width at the waist. The neck is completed with a turn-down collar that has rounding front corners.
The jacket is shaped by center and side seams which are terminated a short distance above the lower edge to form the back in tabs; the fronts almost meet at the neck and flare sharply. The edges of the jacket are finished with machine-stitching. The large fancy collar and pointed cuffs, which are removable, are made of pique' and bordered with wide frills of embroidery; the collar is trimmed with rows of insertion arranged to flare toward the lower edge. The cuffs are mounted on bands that are turned under the close fitting sleeves. Pocket laps cover openings to side pockets in the fronts and a welt finishes a left breast pocket.
Mixed suiting, cheviot, serge, broadcloth and so forth combined with piqué and handsome embroidered edging will be appropriate for this little costume; silk braid and insertion will trim it daintily. In a very dressy suit brown velveteen and red silk were united, the silk being used for the vest, collars and cuffs. Pearl ball buttons were used for making the closing and fine Swiss embroidered edging contributed the frills. Insertions could have been arranged on the fancy collar as in the illustrations and the effect would have been especially dainty if the silk was cut away from beneath the insertion. Pattern No. 9053. The Delineator. May 1897.
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