The parka comes in from the cold this winter
There’s little that can be added to the peak military credentials of the parka than can be found in the production stills for the 1968 film adaptation of Alistair MacLean’s Ice Station Zebra.
Starring Ernest Borgnine, Patrick McGoohan and Rock Hudson, its tale of British, American and Soviet forces locked in a Cold War-era superpower stand-off is made chillier still by it supposed arctic location (although blessedly for the cast and crew it is clearly a set-bound production).
But the clincher to all this sub-zero, zero-sum wargaming is surely the sheer number of military grade greatcoats on display, and, in particular, the hyperthermia-preventing properties of Hudson’s royal blue, waist-cinched beauty – surely Best In [fake] Snow.
Stone Island parka, ￡825, Farfetch
Fifty years later, it’s as if nothing – well, apart from some elements of the geopolitical plotline – has changed. The parka is once again enjoying its place in the pantheon of battle-hardened outerwear, a profile it’s not enjoyed since Mod was in full flood and scooteristas required something a little more redoubtable than a flimsy trench to make their Brighton-bound runs.
Granted, it’s in step with the trend for military-wear generally, offering an autumn-winter alternative to the olive-green field jacket for which other, hardier “shackets” have had to stand aside in deference to its unchallenged cool.
And in accordance with field-wear’s ability to jump the species from the choice of Robert “Travis Bickle” DeNiro’s gun-swinging psychopath to stalwart of streetwear fashionistas the world over, so the parka has more recently crept into luxury market, newly evidenced by a clutch of de-humbled parkas on parade at the first London store of Yves Salomon.
Parka with shearling lining, ￡1,700, Yves Salomon
This third-generation family-owned furrier has designed its own line of outwear since the Eighties, but more recently added an “Army” line to its main collection of cropped, mid-length and full length mens’ leather coats, including a fur-trimmed cohort of resized and stylised parkas
In deference to its military forebears these are made from khaki cotton, but of an altogether higher order to that found in the surplus stores of Jimmy Cooper’s day. Deserving special mention is a long cotton parka with shearling lining (￡1,700), but all represent the last word in upgraded utilitarian chic – the last man standing when the mercury plummets.
Bill Prince is the deputy editor of British GQ
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