The Y cardigan

Here's one from fable and legend, the Y cardigan. Popular in the early eighties and all but extinct by about 1987. I had one, I remember it well, I cut the sleeves off it (don't ask) and eventually gave it away to someone whose need for it I perceived to be greater than mine.

Let me describe the legendary Y cardigan. Made from a soft open weave acrylic, some were made in a waffle texture, they came in various colours. I had one in black, I seem to recall they had contrasting colour piping to the edges but this may be my cardigan clairvoyance misleading me. They had four plastic leather football-looking buttons and a large Y in a contrasting colour on the left hand side. This was not a patch but a pattern incorporated in the weave. Their kinship with American letter cardigans was apparent and the Y I think may have referred to Yale, though I think this was lost on us back then.

Their stylistic nod in the direction of the then Popular Fred Perry cardigans was obvious in their letter cardigan heritage and the football style buttons. What they had going for them over the Fred Perry is they were cheaper.

The fable and legend I refer to come from the fact that you don't see them anywhere now, not EBay, not retro fashion outlets, nowhere. This is very surprising considering their ubiquity at a time from which much other fashion survives, including some fine vintage cardigans. And here may lie the explanation; that word fine. Y cardigans were never expensive and were the sort of garment one might find on a market stall or at a discount clothing outlet. I think nobody hung on to them because nobody valued them.

Sadly, I can find no pictures of them, though there are several fond reminiscences of them on nostalgia message boards here and there on the web. Do get in touch if you find one, or even a picture of one. If you had the good fortune to have sex in one, please present yourself in person.

Another day, another post. I thought I'd expand a little on yesterday's topic, the letter or letterman cardigan.
These are a uniquely American phenomenon and intended basically as billboards to display one's school award letters. Chenille letters were awarded by schools for participation in sporting activities; this was later extended to other activities such as music or drama. One can only speculate what the one which illustrates yesterday's post was awarded for!*

They seem to date back, in cardigan form, to the thirties or perhaps a little earlier, before that they were pullover style. The older ones are made of wool, quite thick and cleverly combining all the weight, suppleness and sheer erotic allure of the trench coat (in the case of the last of these qualities, none at all; sorry trench coat fanciers, this is a cardigan blog). They were succeeded by the letterman jacket, which we would probably call the baseball jacket.

I gather it was considered a mark of some intimacy for a boy to give his letter cardigan to his girlfriend so that she might become a billboard for his sporting prowess. Are we getting any nearer to an idea of what the one illustrated above might have been  awarded for?**

Here in the UK our exposure to them will probably have been mostly through Happy Days when it made it to our television screens in the mid seventies. By this time wool was out and acrylic was in, for he most part with five buttons instead of six, made of shiny semi-translucent plastic (slobber..).

The acrylic ones are machine washable, though why I (or you) should find that interesting I can't imagine.

They're still available, though these days considered costume items rather than practical everyday wear. I don't think they were ever considered sleepwear or erotic, except by me.

http://www.bristolproducts.com/sweaters/Gallery%201/41.html

and

http://www.mountolympusawards.com/ph/lettermansweater.htm

among others. They can be found on EBay too.

I particularly like the white ones.

Thank you for your time, feel free to reread, there'll be a test next week.


*I don't think finishing a sentence with a preposition has ever warranted an award in America or anywhere else.
**Strike two as they would say in its country of origin.

Cold last night.

Here in the UK we've had it a bit cold of late. I like to sleep with a window open, so the temperature in my bedroom got down to 3°C. There was only one solution to keep warm, cardigan in bed, which is something I don't often do (except when... never mind, I'll leave it to your imagination). But which to choose, there are the golf cardigans in acrylic and alpaca, the more modern cardigans in lambswool and various artificial fibres, five button, six button, by this time I was loosing sensation in my toes and fingers, so chose this.

I like these, they fuel my fantasies about getting a good seeing to from a well built jock. Must go now.