Vintage, 1970s, Herringbone Tweed, Pastel Striping

A women’s two-button blazer blending British textile idioms with French softness; multicolor stripes over herringbone for subtle visual rhythm.

Marked only by its “Fabriqué en France” label, the blazer offers no overt branding but unmistakably reflects the hallmarks of upper-tier French outerwear production from the late 1970s to early 1980s. Its construction quality, textile architecture, and visual composition position it within a lineage of tailored womenswear produced for department stores and regional boutiques during an era when French manufacturers frequently reinterpreted classic British textile idioms through softened silhouettes and chromatic experimentation. It belongs to a wider movement within French ready-to-wear tailoring that, in the decades following the 1960s, integrated Anglo-influenced pattern vocabularies with feminized proportions and expressive woven surfaces—designed to support a new generation of professional women navigating both officewear and urban environments. The garment is a single-breasted, two-button blazer jacket featuring notched lapels, patch pockets with rounded corners, and a collar with a stepped return. Cut for transitional use within casual to business-casual contexts, it was intended to layer cleanly over blouses or knitwear during cooler months. Its textile—a multicolor stripe over a vertically oriented herringbone base—serves not only as visual focal point but as conceptual infrastructure, projecting personality, intellect, and approachability. The jacket’s silhouette, grounded in the menswear blazer archetype, is recalibrated with a shorter body, softened waist shaping, and brightly modulated coloration. It encapsulates the late-20th-century evolution of tailored garments for women, drawing from post-liberation traditions that subverted masculine codes through textile agency rather than overt deconstruction. Structurally, the garment employs a four-panel block: two front panels shaped with vertical bust darts and a two-piece back without a vent. The body construction is calibrated for proportional clarity and layering compatibility. The lapel is sharply notched, cleanly fused, and maintains dimensionality at the break point, while the collar stand is cleanly constructed with interfaced support and neckline tape stabilization. Sleeves are single-piece, set-in, with low sleeve heads and gentle taper—allowing mobility without disrupting the tailored form. Sewing assembly is industrial and deliberate, with straight-stitched seams throughout, pad-stitched or fused lapels, crisply turned seam allowances, and flush shoulder insertion. Pocket application is performed via edge-topstitched patch insertion; stripe matching at key visual points such as the lapel break and center front is tightly controlled, though full matching at the pocket line reflects a balance between stripe rhythm and material constraints. The textile itself is a vertically aligned herringbone twill weave composed of 60% wool, 30% polyester, 5% acrylic, and 5% unspecified “AF” fibers—possibly anti-felting or fire-retardant additives. Constructed using a 2/2 broken twill reversal, the weave forms a classic chevron structure modulated at medium pitch, with multicolored dyed yarns in blue, red, lavender, and tan spaced vertically across a marled, heathered ground. Estimated at 340–380 g/m², the fabric delivers substantial thermal capacity while retaining breathable structure. The wool component, likely semi-worsted or woolen-spun, contributes tactile loft and lanolin-induced warmth, while the synthetic elements lend wrinkle resistance, dimensional retention, and seam stability under tailoring pressures. The tactile quality is softened by carded fiber halos and controlled weave compression, yielding a cloth both structurally disciplined and visually textured. This textile construction parallels several historical woven structures, notably classic herringbone, striped Donegal variants, Saxony district checks, and worsted striped herringbones used in mid-century transitional outerwear. Its execution resonates with fabrics from mills such as Abraham Moon & Sons, known for British tweeds incorporating color overchecks; Lovat Mill, which produces woolen-spun herringbones with vertical striping; Tessitura di Novara, whose worsteds often explore chromatic accents; and Tissage d’Autun, which produces rustic French coatings with complex fiber blends and coloration. The result is a fabric that balances tradition with visual modulation, engineered to retain silhouette integrity while accommodating layered wear and expressive styling. The blazer’s internal construction reveals technical precision across all visible seams and joins. Main seams are likely lockstitched at a standard 3.0–3.5mm stitch length, with strong press discipline preserving herringbone alignment across structural curves. The hem is blind-stitched to a full twill acetate or polyester lining, and edge reinforcements are likely applied with fusible tape or selvedge interfacing along lapels, hems, and armholes to prevent fraying in this dense weave. Rounded patch pocket corners reduce fabric stress, and button reinforcement—though not externally visible—is assumed to follow standard fusible or backing techniques. The shoulder shows a slight roll, suggestive of soft padding or sleeve head support without roping. From a drafting standpoint, the garment reflects elevated tailoring practice. The front panels feature a modified princess seam that transitions into an armhole dart, a method allowing bust contouring without interrupting vertical stripe alignment. The back, though not visible, is inferred to mirror this shaping logic for balance. The lapel is short, high-set, and displays a moderate gorge height; its roll is shaped through interfacing and bias undercollar construction for clean behavior in a fabric of this density. Collar and lapel transitions are cut with grain logic in mind—evident in the uninterrupted herringbone flow at the collar seam. Conceptually, the garment channels dualities: technical structure versus chromatic softness, masculine textile traditions versus feminized silhouette calibration. It offers a psychological architecture wherein the herringbone weave—traditionally a symbol of British aristocratic formality—is destabilized by pastel tonality and tactile modulation, producing a wearable code of comfort, professionalism, and creative self-expression. Its chromatic rhythm suggests academic or artistic affiliations, a subtle signal that references, rather than asserts, identity within professional environments. Artistically, the garment engages with the traditions of textile modernism, where pattern repetition and structural weaving serve as aesthetic rather than merely functional elements. It avoids avant-garde gestures, favoring a philosophy of visual coherence where rhythm, line, and material memory intersect. The piece functions not as ornament, but as a material essay in textile articulation—where the directional herringbone and contrasting stripe system create visual cadence through mathematical regularity and chromatic contrast. Produced most likely between the late 1970s and early 1980s, the blazer belongs to a period in which women’s tailoring embraced blended fabrics, acetate linings, and structured silhouettes recalibrated for comfort and expression. The prevalence of wool-poly blends and four-hole plastic buttons during this time reflects a transitional phase in garment manufacturing where industrialization met visual experimentation. Its proportions and materials place it firmly within the wardrobe of the working woman navigating the evolving professional landscape of late 20th-century France. In a contemporary context, this piece parallels the design philosophies of Margaret Howell, Sézane, Vanessa Seward, and A.P.C., brands that revisit heritage fabrics through contemporary silhouettes. It would be well-positioned within curated vintage resale, editorial styling, or capsule wardrobes that foreground textile storytelling and gendered tailoring evolution. Its enduring value lies not only in its wearability but in its fidelity to transitional traditions—merging industrial sewing logic with artisanal textile sensibility, and historical tailoring frameworks with contemporary chromatic discourse.

Measurements (cm):
Chest: 46
Length: 65
Shoulder: 38
Sleeve: 58



Size Conversion (approximate)
US Women’s Size: M-L
EU Women’s Size: 38-40


SKU: 015033