Wainscotting

Wainscotting first came to light in th 1920's, after a global trend in waistcoats. Tailors, giddy with their new-found popularity* began inventing all manner of waistcoat related parapheranlia, culminating in W.G. Bromms waistcoats for skirting-boards. The idea took off like the proverbial lead balloon, and Bromms declared that it was a typographical error, and that he meant "wainscotting" - a new term coined for what was ostensibly no different from run of the mill skirting.

*The times rich list of 1921 reveals that 56 of the top 100 richest men in England were tailors - 37 of them being based in Saville Row.

_{All content copyright Tom Crowley}