Good Wear Leather Coat Company — Sale Vintage Car Coat Horsehide Jacket

This item has been sold.
1940s Car Coat Horsehide Jacket
Price: $300.00 (used condition) — note shipping costs below
Fit: this pattern is very comfortable in the correct size
Leather: vintage light russet horsehide
Lining: tan rayon
Buttons: bakelite all originals
Thread: brown cotton
Zipper: brass WWII Conmar zipper, M-44, blackened, great condition
Size: 46

This jacket is a very large vintage Car Coat we've had in our collection for years. We thought that a pattern would be done of it, but the demand for such a jacket is just too low. As a wearable original, this jacket is superb, and has many years of wear left in it.

The design is typical of post-WWII horsehide jackets that are about three inches longer than a typical leather jacket. In catalogs, they're called Coats, Car Coats, Patrol Coats, and 32 Inch Coats (in Sears-Roebuck catalogs we own from the period before and after WWII).

The horsehide is heavy, has a pigmented finish, and shows age from the years of use it received. The leather is plenty robust, though, and hefty. The lining is rayon, and has some small stains and signs of wear (and some holes along the neck). The lining should stay with the jacket, though. We replaced about 5" of the lining sleeve ends, as they were frayed enough to replace. There are a few small areas of thread break in the leather, too, but not worth additional sewing.

The buttons are all fine, and the vintage Conmar zipper it was made with works great. One can see that surplus Conmars were used on coats like these, as it's typical of a blackened WWII Conmar zipper. The white material seen on the teeth of the Conmar is candle wax, which has smoothened the zipper glide just a bit. The chest zippers are blackend as well.

The jacket would ideally fit someone in the range of 5'11" to 6'2" with a chest of 43-45", and a weight of about 190-210 pounds.