I’m a bit of a sucker for those items of clothing that cunningly combine two items together to look like you’re more smartly dressed than you actually are. I think it started with Graeme Garden’s one piece suit in the Goodies, where I think he pretty much invented the onesie.
Recently, I tried to buy the Top Shop top that Clara Oswald wore to Face the Raven in Doctor Who. It had sadly sold out by the time the episode went out, but I discovered that Top Shop called it a “hybrid top”, a top designed to look like a shirt under a jumper. I was pleased to see that it was actually a unmentioned costume department in-joke, seeing as the over-arching hook for the series was the puzzle over what something called the “hybrid” was actually referring to.
So here’s the earliest example I’ve seen, although I’m sure the invention-crazy Victorians were all over this too. From 1927, the gaiter and shoe in one. A kind of welly designed to look like a ladies court shoe and stocking. Predictably, I want them.
