I want a coatfrock!

Share your memories and stories from the Hertford Christ's Hospital School, which closed in 1985, when the two schools integrated to the Horsham site....

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Katharine
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I want a coatfrock!

Post by Katharine »

I have to find a 1920s outfit to wear to a dinner next month. I don't want to go dressed as a flapper, I don't have the legs for it. Last night I realised I was looking for a coatfrock! This was during the middle of the night and I knew just where they were kept!

Sadly with the light of day, I no longer know where the coatfrocks are, nor where to find a suitable outfit!

My iPad really doesn't like the word coatfrock!
Katharine Dobson (Hills) 6.14, 1959 - 1965
Fjgrogan
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Re: I want a coatfrock!

Post by Fjgrogan »

Katharine - with a month to spare, and all those years of CH needlework behind you, I know you have the skills to produce a replica!
Frances Grogan (Haley) 6's 1956 - 62

'A clean house is a sign of a broken computer.'
Katharine
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Re: I want a coatfrock!

Post by Katharine »

Sadly pattern drafting wasn't included at CH. That is a skill I would love to have.

At the last OG Day I attended at Hertford, (while still a school) someone said to me that they couldn't see a single home-made outfit being worn, so it had all been a waste of time. I just looked down at my Jean Muir outfit and said she shouldn't jump to conclusions! (That one was an offer from a newspaper!)
Katharine Dobson (Hills) 6.14, 1959 - 1965
Angela Pratt
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Re: I want a coatfrock!

Post by Angela Pratt »

The skills we acquired were useful when it came to leaving outfits and wedding and bridesmaid dresses!
Fjgrogan
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Re: I want a coatfrock!

Post by Fjgrogan »

....... and I managed to keep my girls in school tunics, skirts, trousers, summer dresses, but not myself because I was never a standard size! I also made my own wedding dress, just to prove that I could. I still have it and most of it is not bad, but I did the hem in a hurry and made a dreadful mess of it. Sadly I now weigh more than twice as much as I did then! Perhaps by the time one of my skinny grand-daughters get married (if indeed marriage has not gone totally out of fashion by then) it might be welcome as a vintage heirloom?! I doubt it though! These days I have difficulty remembering how to use a sewing machine!
Frances Grogan (Haley) 6's 1956 - 62

'A clean house is a sign of a broken computer.'
Katharine
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Re: I want a coatfrock!

Post by Katharine »

Thanks to my memory of our coatfrocks, my outfit is now sorted! While describing a coatfrock to a friend, I suddenly remembered a dress I have not worn for about 15 years! It is very striking, Malaysian hand-painted batik, in green silk with large orange tropical flowers. It is absolutely straight and loose, with a cheongsam neck, mandarin collar and little buttons. With long pearl necklaces and a cream and gold stole it looks great. A friend who is very knowledgeable on history of costumes is very enthusiastic about it! She says that while many may be wearing flapper outfits, mine will be more typical of the whole decade. I'm very pleased to have got that sorted, even more so that it is sorted at no cost!
Katharine Dobson (Hills) 6.14, 1959 - 1965
Angela Woodford
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Re: I want a coatfrock!

Post by Angela Woodford »

The dress sounds absolutely lovely, Katharine - I'm sure you'll look gorgeous! And a coatfrock (going on my memories of Old Girl pictures) might have been a bit hot to wear to a dinner? What about your hair?

Somewhere there exists a photo of my mother in the twenties with "earphones". She looked so pretty, with hair coiled into a bun each side of her head and a little plait round each bun. Then ISTR her saying she had her hair shingled!

Back in the seventies, I remember a fabulous very old lady saying what a chore it was to bind and flatten ones bosom with pink satin ribbon to achieve a tubular shape... ow!
"Baldrick, you wouldn't recognise a cunning plan if it painted itself purple, and danced naked on top of a harpsichord singing "Cunning plans are here again.""
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