Some Interesting Articles On Fashion
The Quarter Zip
By Davis Robles
Gen Z is known for its fluid and comfortable style.
However, as they shift from adolescence to adulthood, their style must also reflect this change.
On November 5, 2025, popular TikTok influencer Jason Gyamfi announced that the Quarter Zip was officially in style, advertising the article of clothing as elevated and proper.
The video went viral on TikTok, garnering 3.5 million likes, causing Gen Z men to add Quarter Zips to their wardrobes.
This shift from streetwear to professional wear gives this generation a polished appearance and prepares them to dress for a professional setting.
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Mackinaw Coat
By Eric Langlois
Mackinac Island (pronounced Mackinaw), lies in the Straits of Mackinac where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron meet, between the Upper and Lower Peninsulas of Michigan.
Lying at the center of the region, Mackinac Island has lent its name to the nearby Mackinaw City, a few other towns, multiple vessels of the US Coast Guard and Revenue Service, and several companies.
Perhaps most prominently, at least for those of us who haven’t spent time in the Upper Midwest, is its namesake garment, the Mackinaw jacket.
Mackinaws and Stag Suits
The brutal cold and heavy snow of the Great Lakes area affected the winter clothing of fur traders and soldiers who lived in the area in the 18th and 19th Centuries.
The French coureurs des bois and the native peoples they traded with would often convert heavy wool blankets into thigh-length hooded coats known as capotes, while soldiers of Great Britain and the United States wore their ankle-length greatcoats in the driving wind and deep snow.
During the War of 1812, a British unit captured and occupied Fort Mackinac, and with supplies of ready-made coats running low, they placed an order with their government for a supply of heavy wool blankets to make greatcoats out of for the coming winter.
The blankets arrived in a black-on-red plaid pattern, and were made into thigh-length coats by local tailors on the advice of a despatch runner, who suggested that a shorter coat would make for easier movement in the forest and deep snow.
This short, belted, double-breasted design would become known as the Mackinaw, after the place of its creation.
Robert Mitchum on Track of the Cat (1954)
During the 19th Century, the Mackinaw jacket became inextricably linked with the logging industry in particular, with ads aimed directly at loggers and timber cruisers (men who would scout new forests for logging).
The warm, double-breasted design with its greatcoat-style notch collar proved ideal for working in the deep woods, with the thigh length cut and belt increasing ease of movement in tough conditions.
Modern lumberjacks may have shifted their daily wear to chainsaw-proof chaps and down parkas, but plaid shirts and jackets remain part of their image and appear at logging competitions.
Hunters and fishermen also relied on the Mackinaw, and the cross-pollination between outdoor workers and the military resulted in the Mackinaw returning as an Army-issue garment in the early 20th century.
In 1907, the US Army ordered a Mackinaw coat with a cotton duck shell and dark blue wool lining. This version still had the notched collar of the original.
Kingfisher Leatherworks Plantation Cut Belt
In 1912 Patrick Duluth Woollen Mills introduced a Mackinaw coat with a shawl collar, a detail which appears to have been copied by all of their competitors within a matter of months.
While the shawl lapel had previously appeared on smoking jackets in the 19th century, its appearance on outerwear seems to have been spearheaded by Patrick Duluth, and remains intertwined with the image of the Mackinaw coat.
This shawl collar Mackinaw design would be wildly popular for winter outerwear, particularly between the First and Second World Wars.
Douglas MacArthur
On entering the First World War in 1917, the US Army issued a regulation for “Mackinaw coats or a similar garment, [to] be issued to drivers” in place of the ankle-length overcoat, and it followed the same shawl collar design as Patrick Duluth.
While originally intended for car, truck, and motorcycle drivers, the wool Mackinaw would see wide-scale issue to soldiers in many specialties, from aviation to infantry.
The 1917 driver’s Mackinaw would be adopted by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s, and formed the basis of private-purchase coats made in finer materials for officers.
A famous photograph of Douglas MacArthur from 1918 shows him in a similar Mackinaw coat.
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In 1918, the Army’s all-wool Mackinaw was replaced by a design with cotton duck shell and wool Mackinaw cloth lining.
This design would be revisited two decades later as the Army’s M38 “Jeep Jacket,” a very similar cotton shell Mackinaw design that would see extensive use during the Second World War, while the Navy and Marine Corps appear to have procured their own similar Mackinaws in the 30s and 40s as well.
Mackinaw coats, particularly in the classic plaids, remained popular among hunters and outdoors enthusiasts well after the end of the Second World War.
Any portrayal of winter outdoor work in the 20th century will almost certainly depict heavy wool Mackinaw coats, from the cover illustrations of Hardy Boys books to the Montana cowboys of the recent tv series “1923.”
Over time, the shawl collar and notch collar designs largely faded, replaced with the single-breasted shirt style collar that you can see on Cruiser model jackets from Filson or Johnson Woolen Mills.
While Gore-Tex shells and quilted linings have superseded Mackinaw cloth in some settings, the dense wool still holds up as a fall/winter protective layer, and remains part of the issue uniform for the United States Forest Service today.
The short length and belted design of the Mackinaw make it a practical winter garment, especially for those of us who are getting in and out of vehicles like the drivers of the First World War.
The shawl collar pattern, which has become synonymous with the name Mackinaw, has a handsome vintage look that adds some charm to the garment.
It has a military background but is not strictly a military garment, which opens it up to be worn by people from all walks of life who want to add some classic details to their winter wardrobe.
I’m no hunter, but I spend enough time outside in New England winters that I can vouch for the ability of the windproof wool and wide collar of my Mackinaw coat to keep me warm.
A.F. Wallace wrote in the 1912 article Proper Clothing for the Outdoor Man: "I will say right here that the man who invented the Mackinaw jacket or coat should have a medal if alive and if dead a monument; for in no other garment is there so much all-around common sense for outdoor work in cold weather."
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