From Drawing Room dens to Greeters' Guild! | How Smoking Jackets found fresh air - and Smashed It with Sanguine Style!

'Troy Hawke' bestows perfect poise and exquisite manners upon bewildered British shoppers - whatever the occasion. 

In splendid attire, Milo McCabe's "non-consensual employment" antics have salvaged the Smoking Jacket from stag party shenanigans. And tawdry Hugh Hefner homage! 

The Smoking Jacket suffered a calamitous decline over the past century. Yet it survives... with subtle grace and red-carpet character. Moreso, when sported outside the entrance of B&Q and other august retail outlets.

So how did the Smoking Jacket become so strident and stylish a garment in the first place?

Origins of the Smoking Jacket 

The delights of partaking a pinch of snuff gave way to the dour ritual of actually smoking tobacco by the Victorian era. 

This brought with it the hazards of ash smudges, singed fabric, acrid odours and other unbearable insults to evening wear. 

Indeed, Smoking Caps even became part of an ensemble to ensure a whiff-free head of hair. 

Existing robes, and gowns, simply couldn't cope with cigar-level onslaughts. Smoking had become a devout after-dinner ritual among gentlemen. So more robust fabrics were required - whilst in keeping with evening wear elegance.

And here's where smoking jackets depart from dressing gowns, oriental banyans, and even the Victorian housecoat beloved of Sherlock Holmes.

Could the Housecoat return to thwart abhorrent heating bills?

Designs embraced resilience, with their own distinct tailoring features. Such as wide, silky lapels; often quilted with matching cuffs. 

Heavy silks and velvet became the preferred fabric for their ability to protect suits from smoke. While the shawl style of many lapels ushered cascading ash away from the wearer.

Buttons, or toggles, were added: often with 'frog' shaped braided adornments. While many styles assumed a mid-thigh length with sashes retained for fastening at the waist. 

Frog braided toggles adorn the best of Smoking Jackets

And yet the Smoking Jacket remained a dingy after-dinner affair for most of the Victorian era.

Good King Edward VII

Well, good for bringing Smoking Jackets out of the billowy shadows at least. 

In 1865, as Prince of Wales, he commissioned his tailor to design a dinner jacket without tails. And with the more comfortable appearance of a smoking jacket.

And so, the Smoking Jacket began to make relatively public appearances while evolving as evening dress. Among Edward's confidantes was James Brown Potter, an American banker who simplified the style and introduced his version to friends... at the Tuxedo Park Country Club in 1886.

The traditional Smoking Jacket kept coughing its way into the wider world. And abundant charm arose to flaunt its majesty! 

Oscar cuts a dash sans ash in 1880s America

Private Lives and Public Propinquity

Noel Coward's plays refer to dressing gowns for languid smoking scenes. However, to all but a tailor's eyes (with theatre binoculars) the distinct impression of smoking jacket costume flowed from the stage.

Effectively, Noel Coward plays broke the fourth wall of intimacy for Smoking Jacket sophistication.

And yet curiously, the theatre legend dispensed with smoking jackets for his cigaretting interviews over the years. 

Eventually, Sir Noel's chain smoking and collection of silk dressing gowns melded into a brand motif that simply declared 'smoking jacket' to most observers.

Smoking Jackets saunter onto the Big Screen

As a hard-partying set in trademark tuxedos, the Hollywood Rat Pack were spared the scrutiny of modern paparazzi - thus preserving their style!

Actual Smoking Jackets were an obvious accessory for suave stars, such as Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jnr. And of course, Cary Grant who was something of a separate Anglo-American style icon.

By the early 1960s, elegance had become enviable but affordable. However, the Rat Pack look was soon swept away when the Beatles and the Rolling Stones showed up.

Those whose bosom had been embraced by the Smoking Jacket remained faithful unto death. And beyond... in the case of Fred Astaire who was reputedly buried in a particular favourite.

Astaire - the dancing dandy - was a good friend of the staid but charming David Niven: pivotal source of chappish influence for Milo McCabe's enchanting Troy Hawke.

The Niven Effect

Actor and military man - 'Shoulders Back' - with chutzpah like no other! David Niven began his career in the British Army - conquered Hollywood - and re-enlisted for the duration of World War II. 

This despite pleas from the British Embassy in the U.S. to preserve his tash and tipple-glass gesturing skills at all costs.

Of course, Mr. Niven (shockingly, never Sir David) smashed it: becoming a Captain while maintaining modest affability in the decades afterwards.  

Among latter dandified roles, David Niven starred in 'The Elusive Pimpernel' (1950), 'Around the World in 80 Days' (1956) and 'Casino Royale' (1967) to name a few... and of course Smoking Jackets were often expected of the wardrobe departments. 

Neither shaken nor nerd: as James Bond in the spoof Casino Royale

"That's 100% the influence of the character. I wanted to do a posh character with a twist and I was fascinated by David Niven" Milo McCabe recently revealed. 

Troy is very much his own man nonetheless. 

While the stature of the Smoking Jacket is only now recovering from more shady British comedic invention.

A nadir was set in the early 1990s with 'Jarvis' - Rob Newman's "aristocratic roue" - who regaled audiences with louche anecdotes from excursions in Soho.

Jarvis appeared in all too few Rob Newman sketches but his look was highly memorable:

We'll say nothing of a certain series of adverts presented by a Russian meerkat in recent times.

Or even the affectations of your humble writer.

Well, why not

Not while venues are swiftly selling out of ticket allocations for the Troy Hawke Tour. 

And little surprise, when the novelty of "off the cuff compliments" has stunned even the most symmetrical of public faces: 

So as Troy would say, "Have at it!" - fasten those toggles, cast a knot on that sash and relish the revival of silk and velvet! 

Troy Hawke takes psycho-twaddle to task this Autumn

John M. Gilheany is a freelance Copywriter at: A dash of Tonic!

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