From Jenny West
Dear Lorraine,
Firstly, congratulations on your fantastic website. I don't have access to e-mail myself hence this letter as opposed to an e-mail. My sister showed me the website recently when I was in search of a replacement for my mac. Before I could get round to ordering, my boyfriend returned from New York having bought me a new one from a Department Store there.
There's a few points I'd like to make. The first one is how hard it is to buy what I was looking for - in the U.K. at any rate - at the moment. Traditional macs seem to have "died the death". Very few ladies and fewer men (sadly!) can be found wearing a double-breasted, button-fastening, stone coloured raincoat of a reasonable length. There are lots of cheap (and don't they look it!) short versions around. I have my own theory about why the kind I have hankered after, the kind that my boyfriend brought back, are not about.
They are not readily available!
I imagine that
the "fashion experts" who doubtless advise the buyers at the big retail
chains are saying that: "Nobody wears these things anymore. Just look outside
and see how few people there are with one on, compared to, say, 10, 15, or 20
years ago."
My theory is different. What the shops haven't got, people won't wear. If they were more readily available we girls would be in with a good chance of attracting men for a start, judging by some of the "male" stories on your site.
The decline in numbers of traditional trench coats is sad indeed. I have worked in the same place since leaving school at 16 some 18 years ago. There are four of us working on the same floor who started at about the same time. Within 6 months in 1984 all of us were wearing a typical example. Remarkably, we are all still there, but I am now the only one who goes to work in a mac.
The other three have all admired my latest present & want to know where it came from. Numerous other ladies of my generation (and younger. ..and older..) want to know where I found it.
You say that you want to remain a small business. I don't blame you for that. But why don't you tell some of the High Street retailers about potential demand? My colleagues & I represent a snapshot of the "thirty something" population boom. Everyone loves my coat! There's an opportunity for someone out there.
Since everyone else has given you detailed history in their letters here's my own dedication to the not so humble mac. The first one I bought in 1984 lasted until 1989 when I replaced it with what was awfully common at that time. It came from a House of Fraser store. Double-breasted with those little brown buttons. The trouble was everyone seemed to have one of these at the time! The amazing thing is that it has worn so well that the only reason I needed the replacement mentioned above is because I have moved up from a size 10 to a size 14 in the last 13 years. Yes, that's right. It has lasted 13 years & if it were not for my passion for chocolate leading to my growth I would still be going to work in it today.
My sister - mentioned above - also used to own a mac. She thinks there aren't so many about because they are difficult to drive in. Not my experience actually. I spent most of my driving lessons stalling and swearing in mine. Apparently most driving instructors encourage you to learn "coatless". The girl who taught me actively encouraged me to keep mine on, so that, once qualified to drive I wouldn't have to stand outside the car, in the rain, with my shopping, taking off gloves & fumbling with buttons before driving away. She was right. How many times have you come back to your car in the pouring rain ?
This leads nicely to the final section of my long (sorry) letter. Macs and cars. Not only that, macs and cars with stalled engines! I remember my Mum - another mac wearer - owning an early Ford Fiesta in the late 1970 s while 1 was growing up. I had a theory that the car didn't like her coat because every time she drove in her mac the car used to stall at every junction until the engine got warm. It wasn't the mac of course. The engine just didn't like being wet!
Stalling in macsThat having been said I have two more stories relating to people in macs appearing in the media. Both of them have a stalling story. The first one relates to Princess Diana of all people. In 1980, before the wedding, the press were desperately trying to trip her up. One wet evening they did just that! This clip was shown on T. V. Diana got into her car on a London Street wearing a mac. She looked very sexy in it. She came to a junction and her Austin Metro cut out on her. You could see her annoyance through the car window and she said something inaudible. Some of the gutter press thought she said the "f' word. Being a skilled lip reader I can promise you she simply said. "Oh blast!"
Then there was the French t.v. advert for sanitary towels. There was a whole series of these showing women having a frustrating time of things at THAT time of the month. They were on French t.v. throughout a whole week when I was out there on business a few years ago. One ad featured a mysterious mackintoshed young lady. The T .V. viewer sees two young hands, nails brightly painted holding a steering wheel in an old car. Her hands are protruding from two mac sleeves -with the buckle details showing. You see the view through the front windscreen with the rain pouring down and the wipers going. You can hear the engine going. The car comes to a junction and everything goes quiet, apart from the noise of the wipers still going. The camera cuts to the dashboard where the keys hang limp from the ignition. On either side of the keys a red light is illuminated. The car has stalled on our lady driver, much like Lady Di's experience. You hear the rustle of mackintosh sleeve & the ratchetty noise of a handbrake being applied in frustration! Then you see the right hand mac sleeve, with the buckle at the wrist, and the hand with the painted nails, grasp the keys in annoyance. The driver says, "Merde!" This is French for "Damn" I think. The keys jingle. She turns them to the left and the lights on the dashboard go off. She turns them to the right again and operates the starter. The engine fails to start and the lights come back on. A car hoots from behind. "Merde, merde, merde !" The keys jingle again. She switches the ignition off by turning them left and then tries to re-start the engine again by turning them right a few times in the pouring rain before the advert ends by making some quip about the time of the month.
The final stalling experience comes from another business trip. This time to Tokyo in the "rainy" season. I got into a taxi in a thunderstorm and was immediately conscious that the driver was female. Unusual in a Tokyo taxi. She, like me, was in her mac. We were crossing Tokyo's equivalent to Trafalgar Square I think, surrounded by cars. She sneezed, her foot jumped off the clutch & we lurched forward narrowly missing the car in front. Like the French car above the two red lights came on and she said something in Japanese which was probably the equivalent of Lady Di's "Blast!" or the French girls "Merde!" Her left mac sleeve rustled to the handbrake. Her right mac sleeve rustled to the ignition switch. She would have liked to turn the keys left & right just like the French girl but the keys weren't there! ! ! Apparently you can start a Japanese taxi and then take the keys out with the engine going so you can open the boot, or the glove box without switching it off again. After much more rustling and muttering she opened the glove box, where she found the keys. Then she put them into the ignition - more rustling again, and jingling. Then she turned them left and right and off we went. The queue of traffic must have stretched back to Osaka! !
Absolutely finally, like so many of your other correspondents I can confirm that when I'm in my own mac I definitely attract the men I hope that doesn't sound big-headed. It's probably the garment that does it for them, rather than me! Whilst I have never married - yet - I have been involved in 5 very serious relationships over the last 17 years. Four out of five of the men concerned admitted to finding my macs "sexy ." Perhaps the French producer of the advert above was typical. All 4 of my "lovers" who have been affected this way found the mystique of what might be hidden underneath a buttoned-up raincoat intriguing. All of them were fascinated with the rustling noises which I also mentioned above. They all thought that when buttoned and belted tightly, there is no better garment to display the female figure. One said it was better than nudity.
To add to the four I am certain about I found another impermeaphile at my local bus stop earlier this year. A man in his early twenties, gorgeous too - with his right hand bandaged. When I joined him at the bus stop he started trying to zip up his coat in the rain. A leather jacket and not a mac sadly! It became obvious quickly that he couldn't do it with one hand so he asked me to help. I think he may have been trying for some time poor chap. He had given up until he saw me there in my old mac (bursting at the bosom due to the size 14 girl buttoned into the size 10) & I think he felt turned on by the idea of an older lady, in a mac at that, helping him. I don't know if you've ever tried to zip up someone else's coat but it isn't easy - particularly in gloves! Everything is the wrong way round when you are facing the coat instead of wearing it. I think he rather enjoyed the fact that I had to take four or five swipes at the zip before I managed to join the two halves together. His trousers certainly got bigger while I was doing it it also gave him the opportunity to tell me that he thought my coat - with buttons - would have been a better bet for him that day. Ho, hum, another admirer! !
So come on then. Let's make it compulsory wear on a wet day. ...Or a dry one !
Yours Sincerely
Jenny West
SHOP | CLUB FOYER | CHILLOUT ROOM | ASK LORRAINE
