Rainwear Central Rainwear Forum

Hi Everybody,

Happy to be a member at last – couldn’t do it before because of not having my own computer. I live in southern England and have been a life-long lover of plastic, pvc and rubber rainwear, although when I was little I didn’t know what all these things were and why they attracted me. I reckon I can trace my interest back to being around 4 years old when my mother bought me a dark red, double-breasted and belted raincoat which matched one she had. I don’t know exactly what the material was but I think it was some kind of stiff rubber-backed fabric. I don’t recall anything else about raincoats until I was around 11 or 12 in the early 1960s when every Woolworth’s had a huge rack of coloured plastic macs for the girls but just a smoky grey/black colour for the boys. These all had those moulded rubber buttons and a belt with a plastic buckle. I really wanted a light blue one like my mate’s sister’s mac but no-one would buy me one. Eventually, I managed to save enough pocket money and pluck up enough courage to go to my local Woolworths and hand the sales assistant a note supposedly written by my mother asking the assistant to sell me a light blue mac. In hindsight, the assistant probably didn’t believe the childish scrawl on that scrappy piece of paper was written by my mother but I didn’t care, I’d got my mac.

Of course, I couldn’t ever wear it outside so it only came out of its hiding place when I was alone in the house which, sadly, was not often. But it was a great feeling to wear it and, in time, it did things to a certain body part and I soon learnt how to relieve that feeling. In the end, when I was a little older, I got myself a smoky grey one and wore that when it was raining. Nobody ever thought anything odd about it because it was just what people wore at that time. Then came the late 60s and early 70s with a huge explosion in pvc coats for the teenage girls and young women. Oh, how I wanted to be able to have one of those – I can still recall some of the styles and colours and would still love to have one. That is my favourite period for macs.

Then, joy of joys, C&A started doing a black trench coat style pvc raincoat for men and my g/f at the time had no problems with me getting one and wearing it on almost every occasion. She wasn’t into it and just thought it was a trendy coat. Little did she know it was a lot more than that to me!

I’ll leave it there and post some more another time about my journey into rainwear.

All the best, great site, nice to be among like-minded folks at last

Plastic Max.

Welcome to the forum max.have fun here

Like you,my interest in pvc/plastic began in the sixties,around the middle for me, and it did things for me too! Enjoy the site.

I recall having more than one of those mac's with the molded buttons;I seem to remember they ripped very easily-nice though.
Yes-girls in belted PVC trenchcoats in the late 60's/early 70's-those who wore them at school were always my favourites!
Welcome Max.

I remember what used to be normal Saturday mornings having to go around loads of shops with my mother. There were two Woolworths stores which had about six rails of brightly coloured plastic macs but the thinner style and normal the translucent see through style. Then there would be C&A which would have rainwear in different parts of the store - Mens Grey, Black and Brown PVC very plain styled overcoats in one part of the shop then upstairs in the womens section very stylish PVC macs such as thick glossy White PVC with thick belts and Gold attachments and Buckles but not normally as bright colours as Woolworths.

In Famous Army stores they stocked the Thick Yellow PVC workmens slickers and macs normally long and heavy with moulded buttons especially Black. They also stocked ex Navy and government surplus mackintoshes normally.

In Wildings which was a more conservative style outfitters they had SBR and rubber mackintoshes which were very expensive but also sold patterned PVC raincoats for women - normally bright background with big sunflowers and that sort of design on.

In the market they sold lots of different styles and colours for children, men and women and I remember that they had a massive box filled with hundreds of PVC and vinyl Souwesters and rain hats. Next to that would be a stall that sold plastic workwear like the thick White PVC long trenchcoats that lollipop crossing men used to wear before terrible fluorescent Goretex!

Then there would be shops like M&S, Primark and BHS which sold trenchcoats, Barbour jackets and the new Drizabone heavy oilskin raincoats.

It was so normal to see so many raincoats around no wonder so many of us remember them from the 70's. I hope that brings back fond memories for you Plastic max, I don't think you're alone !!

*sigh* how I miss those days

All they sell now is Goretex or horrible thin nylon shit *deep sigh*

Thank God for the Internet ... but nothing beats seeing and trying everything on in person

Thanks for your post Jjai. Wow, sounds like you had loads more shopping fun than I did, even if it was only looking at the "eye-candy"!

Here's another memeory for some of you........... That black PVC trench coat I mentioned earlier I had purchased in C&A was in my car when it was stolen - I got the car back a week or so later but everything inside had been taken. Obviously, I needed a replacement mac but unfortunately my local C&A no longer did any PVC coats for men so I went looking elsewhere and found South Bucks Rainwear Company (when it was actually in South Bucks). Their catalogue had lots of pictures of different PVC and Rubber macs - worth getting just for the pictures. Lucky for me they were having a clear-out sale of old stock black SBR raincoats (the ones with the fawn backing) and so I bought one of those. Double-breasted, fastened either way, belt and button-on hood. I wore that almost every day I needed a coat regardless of whether it was raining or not. My g/f didn't think anything of it, to her it was just a coat. I have always had good memories of that coat.

Plastic Max, very nice memories. I grew up in the late 60s, early 70s in Germany, and we had many shiny, glossy vinyl macs at Woolies, especially for the teenage girls. They had the unlined vinyl raincoats with the matching southwester. They had it in colours like blue with white trims, white with blue trims, red with white trims, and white with red trims. The trims were on the southwester, the collar, the cuffs and the pockets. They had many sizes, but mainly for the younger girls and teenager girls. Many of my female classmates had that raincoat, in those colours. Can you remember, if your Woolworths store also had the same style of unlined vinyl long raincoats with matching southwesters ? I have never seen them again, unfortunately. I also never got them through ebay or other vintage stores. And I don't have a picture of them. But maybe some of you may recall them ?

Hello,
I have already told ''my '' PVC story.
In the fiftees ,I was in my teens ,I got a ''Big Ben " PVC raincoat from my parents ,to wear if it was raining on my biketour to or from school 12 km,s away.
Does someone remember those English coats ?
There was even a commercial on a Radiostation : (translated from my Dutch language) :
So small, so light , so water tight .
Does someone rember. ?
That was my first raincoat.
Many would follow.
Peter ,from a very dry Netherlands.

Hi Rainfash, I vaguely remember those girls macs you mentioned but I'm not sure if they were widley available in UK. I do remember Woollies having girls macs in light see-through pastel colours and also some less transparent colours like fuchsia and bright yellow. These ones had white plastic buttons that were shaped a bit like a small mushroom.

The other type of mac that became quite popular for teens and younger men was a cotton-back PVC jacket with a small collar, mainly in black. These were available in many shops. Of course, the ladies had a much better colour selection and another g/f had a red one. They were so regularly seen that no-one gave them a second thought. I quite enjoyed wearing that red one from time to time, heh, heh!