Zoot suit occasionally with a long feather as decoration, and pointy, French-style shoes. A young Malcolm X, who wore zoot suits in his youth, described the zoot suit as: "a killer-diller coat with a drape shape, reet pleats, and shoulders padded like a lunatic's cell". Zoot suits usually featured a watch chain dangling from the belt to the knee or below, then back to a side pocket. A woman accompanying a man wearing a zoot suit commonly would herself wear a flared skirt and a long coat. The amount of material and tailoring required made them luxury items, so much so that
Trousers of Russia issued a decree in 1701 commanding every Russian man, other than clergy and peasant farmers, to wear trousers. During the French Revolution of 1789 and following, male citizens of France adopted a working-class costume including ankle-length trousers, or pantaloons (named from a Commedia dell'Arte character named "Pantalone") in place of the aristocratic knee-breeches ("culottes"). (Compare "sans-culottes".) The new garment of the revolutionaries differed from that of the "ancien regime" upper classes in three ways: Pantaloons became fashionable in early 19th-century England and the Regency era. The style was introduced by Beau Brummell (1778-1840) and by mid-century had supplanted