The trench coat is one of those rare pieces whose story deserves to be told. Born in the mud of the trenches of the First World War, it has survived the century to become a must-have in the elegant wardrobe, worn by both men and women.
Its origins date back to the 1850s, when Thomas Burberry developed gabardine, a cotton fabric with a tight weave, breathable and waterproof. But it was in 1914 that the trench coat found its true reason for existence: British officers needed a functional coat, capable of withstanding bad weather while allowing freedom of movement. The piece is then designed with precision: shoulder pads for rank insignia, D-rings for hanging equipment, storm flap on the chest, rear slot for riding horses. Every detail has a function.
After the war, the trench coat did not disappear. It migrates from battlefields to cinema screens. Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca, Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's, Alain Delon in The Samurai — the trench coat becomes the costume of magnetic antiheroes, elegant spies, free women. He embodies a form of sophisticated nonchalance that cinema immortalizes.
Today, the trench coat is a key piece of the contemporary wardrobe. It is available in cotton, linen, silk, but it is in cashmere that it finds its highest expression. A cashmere gabardine retains the practical spirit of the original model - the protection against the wind, the loose cut that can be belted with a gesture - while adding a softness and nobility that the officers of 1914 would never have imagined.
To wear a trench coat today is to wear a century of history. A piece that has experienced war and peace, military rigor and the insolence of cinema, function and form. The trench coat doesn't go out of fashion because it doesn't tell the story of one era: it tells them all.