A weatherproof material from a country draper
In 1879, Thomas Burberry invented gabardine in Basingstoke, Hampshire.1 Burberry had opened a country draper's shop on Winchester Street in 1856 at the age of twenty-one and had spent more than two decades observing how local farmers, gamekeepers and shepherds protected themselves against rain and wind.1 The smock and the cape were the working garments of the period, treated with rubber, oils or wax to repel water. Each method created problems. Rubberised material became heavy, restricted movement and trapped sweat. Waxed cotton was warmer but stiff and prone to cracking. Burberry set out to design a fabric that would be lightweight, breathable, hard-wearing and naturally weatherproof, without surface treatment.1, 2
An innovation built into the yarn
The breakthrough sat in the yarn rather than in the finish. Burberry developed a process in which long-staple Egyptian cotton or worsted wool yarns were waterproofed before weaving rather than after.3 The fibres were tightly twisted, treated to repel water and then woven into a dense, twill construction.3 The resulting cloth shed rainwater along the diagonal of the weave, allowed perspiration to evaporate and held its shape under load. Burberry registered the name gabardine in 1888 and trademarked the term shortly afterwards.1, 2 The word itself was drawn from a Middle English term for a long, loose travelling cloak, used by Shakespeare in The Merchant of Venice.3 The choice of name positioned the new fabric within an older English tradition of protective garments rather than as a purely industrial invention.
Adoption by exploration and expedition
Through the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, gabardine moved out of country wear and into expedition equipment. Burberry produced gabardine outerwear for the British Army, for early aviation pioneers and for polar explorers.2 Roald Amundsen's expedition to the South Pole in 1911 used Burberry gabardine garments and tents.2, 4 Ernest Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1914 carried Burberry equipment, including the gabardine layers used during the loss of the Endurance and the open-boat journey to South Georgia.2, 3, 4 George Mallory wore Burberry gabardine on his 1924 Mount Everest attempt.3, 4 Each association reinforced the same message. Gabardine was a working fabric for severe conditions, validated by people who depended on it.
The structural foundation of the trench coat
Gabardine became the structural foundation for what would later be called the trench coat.5 During the First World War, the British War Office issued specifications for an officers' raincoat that was lightweight, breathable, easy to move in and weatherproof. Burberry's gabardine met those requirements directly. The Tielocken, an earlier Burberry design from 1912, had already established the silhouette, with its overlapping front, belt and storm flaps.1, 2 The wartime garment refined that pattern with epaulettes, D-rings, gun flap and storm yoke.5 The military origin of the trench coat is well documented in fashion history, but the precondition for that garment to exist at scale was the gabardine fabric Burberry had introduced thirty-five years earlier.
A material that became a brand promise
Gabardine functioned as more than a fabric. It became the material expression of Burberry's brand promise. Long before the Equestrian Knight Design was registered as a trademark in 1909 and long before the Burberry Check tartan was used as an interior lining for the trench coat in 1924, the house was identified with gabardine.2, 4, 6, 7 The fabric provided the brand with a distinctive, ownable claim that no competing draper could replicate without infringing the patent. It also tied the house to a clear functional benefit, weather protection, that did not depend on fashion cycles. That foundation explains why Burberry can return repeatedly to outerwear, weather and the trench coat without those references becoming exhausted. The category was built on a material innovation that preceded almost every other element of the brand.
A starting point for a 141-year identity
The 1879 invention of gabardine is the strongest single technical event in Burberry's history. Every later identity decision, the Equestrian Knight, the registered Check, the trench coat, the Brand Burberry repositioning of the early 2000s, the Tisci sans-serif of 2018 and the Daniel Lee restoration of 2023, sits on top of the original fabric story.4 Without gabardine, the trench coat does not exist in the form the public knows it. Without the trench coat, Burberry does not occupy its current position in heritage outerwear. The Hampshire shop opening of 1856 set the conditions for the brand. The gabardine invention of 1879 set its enduring proposition.
Written with AI assistance, edited by a human. Find out more about our Use of AI.
1. Burberry, "Our Story", undated brand heritage page consulted on 8 October 2026, listed in the article's sources as the Burberry Heritage page, for Thomas Burberry, a former draper's apprentice, opening his first shop in Basingstoke, Hampshire, in 1856 at 21 years old, at No. 20 Winchester Street, serving the local rural community, for his experiments with weaving in search of a fabric that keeps out the rain while remaining breathable, for gabardine "invented in 1879 and patented in 1888", and for the Tielocken coat patented by Thomas Burberry in 1912 and "widely regarded as the forerunner of the trench coat". The page describes the 1888 act as a patent and gives no date for registering or trademarking the name; it names the farmers, gamekeepers and shepherds of the body nowhere, and it describes the Tielocken as fastened with a single strap and buckle without listing an overlapping front or storm flaps. https://us.burberry.com/c/burberry-heritage/
2. Burberry plc, "History", undated corporate timeline consulted on 8 October 2026, added during the footnote retrofit, for gabardine as "a lightweight, breathable, weatherproof and tearproof cloth" invented in 1879 and patented in 1888, for the polar explorers who took Burberry gabardine to the poles from Fridtjof Nansen in 1893 onwards and the aviator Claude Grahame-White wearing it in 1910, for Roald Amundsen's team reaching the South Pole in 1911 "with a Burberry gabardine tent and clothing", for Ernest Shackleton wearing Burberry gabardine for three expeditions, listed under the years 1914 to 1917, for Burberry providing apparel and equipment to the Armed Forces during the First World War, for the Tielocken coat invented by Thomas Burberry and patented in 1912 as "the predecessor to the trench coat", and for the Burberry Check introduced as a lining to rainwear in the 1920s. The timeline does not mention the loss of the Endurance or the open boat journey. https://www.burberryplc.com/company/history
3. Wikipedia, articles "Gabardine" and "Gaberdine", consulted on 8 October 2026, a reference source under the Brandvelle whitelist: "Gabardine" for the original fabric of worsted wool, sometimes in combination with cotton, "waterproofed using lanolin before weaving", for its weave as a warp-faced steep or regular twill with a prominent diagonal rib, for Shackleton using the material "for clothing, tents, and even engine covers during a 1914 expedition to cross Antarctica", and for the jacket and plus-fours of gabardine worn by George Mallory on his attempt on Mount Everest in 1924; "Gaberdine" for the word as the name of "a long, loose gown or cloak with wide sleeves, worn by men in the later Middle Ages", for Shakespeare's "Jewish gaberdine" worn by Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, and for Thomas Burberry applying the name to the waterproofed twill he developed in 1879. Egyptian cotton and long staple yarn are not named there, and the article traces the word to Spanish and Old French without calling it Middle English. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabardine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaberdine
4. Wikipedia, "Burberry", consulted on 8 October 2026, a reference source under the Brandvelle whitelist, for the company becoming outfitters for Roald Amundsen in 1911 and supplying Ernest Shackleton's 1914 expedition to cross Antarctica, for the Burberry gabardine jacket worn by George Mallory on Everest in 1924, for the Equestrian Knight logo developed in 1901 and registered as a trademark in 1909, for the check in use since at least the 1920s, primarily as a lining in trench coats, for the turnaround of the brand's reputation under Angela Ahrendts and Christopher Bailey in the 2000s, for the new logo and monogram designed by Peter Saville and presented by Riccardo Tisci a few months after his appointment in March 2018, and for the new branding of February 2023 under Daniel Lee that brought back the Equestrian Knight. The article gives the 1920s, not 1924, for the check lining and does not describe the 2018 wordmark as sans serif. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burberry
5. Wikipedia, "Trench coat", consulted on 8 October 2026, a reference source under the Brandvelle whitelist, for Burberry's claim to the invention of the trench coat resting on the gabardine Thomas Burberry invented in 1879, for the name trench coat given to the design by soldiers at the front, and for epaulettes and D-rings added to the design during the First World War. Gun flap and storm yoke are not named there; the article also records Aquascutum's competing claim and Burberry's submission of an officer's raincoat design to the War Office in 1901. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trench_coat
6. Burberry, "The Equestrian Knight", undated brand page consulted on 8 October 2026, listed in the article's sources, for the Equestrian Knight named in the body as the winning entry of a public competition to create a new emblem for Burberry, circa 1901. The page gives no trademark year and does not mention gabardine. https://us.burberry.com/c/burberry-world/heritage/equestrian-knight/
7. Burberry plc, "The EKD", undated corporate page consulted on 8 October 2026, listed as the article's brand newsroom source, for the Equestrian Knight Design having been crowd sourced from a public competition circa 1901. The page gives no trademark year and does not mention gabardine. https://www.burberryplc.com/company/unmistakably-burberry/the-equestrian-knight
