Articles Of Clothing That Are Named After Places

Most people wear clothes on a daily basis without stopping to consider why their ascot, jersey and tuxedo aren't called a silky scarf, athletic tank top or fancy suit.

But if you're curious they're all named after places where they originated- Ascot is a town outside London where men wore fancy neckties to an annual horserace attended by the Royal Family.

Tuxedos are named after Tuxedo Park in New York, where fancy men began wearing fancy jackets to an elite country club circa 1886.

And jerseys are named after Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands, where the locals "knitted a close-fitting garment that, by the mid-1850s, was morphing into the jerseys athletes".

But what about the less obviously named Denim, the fabric of our casual lives?

Denim is named after Nîmes, where a twilled wool fabric called serge de Nîmes was manufactured starting in the 17th century. Serge de Nîmes was later shortened to de Nîmes, then Americans  reduced it to "denim" in the 19th century when jeans became popular among the working class.

See 14 Articles of Clothing Named After Places at mental_floss


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