Nap or knap coat

I too remember swagger coats and also a coat I had as a child in a material my mother described as "navy blue nap" - I hadn't heard the term in decades!

You needed very high heels to look good in a swagger coat. Duster coats were quite Jacqui Kennedy. Foam lined coats, Carnaby Street and that Pattie somebody who was married to George Harrison.

Liberty bodices remind me of the cold winters of the early forties.

I had a nap coat the winter I had pneumonia (plus liberty bodice, thick lisle stockings, the lot). Just after the war such things were hard to come by so this was inherited from my 10-years older cousin. My mother had a red swagger coat which, at the time, was fashionable but even then I thought it was pretty gross.

I always wondered why they had rubber buttons! Thanks, Hunt

liberty bodices had rubber buttons so they would go through the mangle without getting broken. I still have a liberty bodice. They live on in the fleece gilet although this is worn as outerwear not underwear.

I remember my mother having a swagger coat in the 50s. It was a style which was very flared hanging from the shoulders - they had much more fabric than had been allowed in the war. I believe the style referred to the swagger coats worn by dandies in the 18 C.

Nap. The word refers to the woolly surface raised on woven cloth during the finishing process (i.e. not part of the weaving).

I've not heard of swagger coats before, but I remember all the others.