Dame Margaret Barbour designed the Beaufort in 1983 with a French shooting jacket in mind. Longer body than the Bedale to cover the seat, roomier through the shoulders to layer over a thick knit, deep bellow pockets low on the front and a hare pocket sewn across the back to carry the day home. Queen Elizabeth II wore hers for twenty-five years. This is the jacket we mean when we tell a Canadian customer to expect to wear one piece of outerwear for the next twenty.
Cut from 6oz Sylkoil waxed cotton and finished on the same production line in Simonside, South Shields, where Barbour has been making wax jackets since 1894. Two-way brass zip with studded storm fly, moleskin-lined handwarmer pockets, big bellows for gloves and a phone, corduroy collar studded to take an optional hood, Velcro storm cuffs, the Original Classic Tartan lining behind the zip. Interactive zip system inside so a quilted liner can zip in for winter.
Sizing is the conversation. The Beaufort was designed to layer over a thick country knit worn open with the jacket rolled at the cuff, and the original block was famously roomy. Barbour modernized the fit on the 40th anniversary edition in 2023 with a longer, slimmer body, but the Classic Beaufort still runs generous. Size to your true menswear chest for a modern fit that layers a shirt and a light knit. Size down if you want it closer to the body. Size up half a step if you are running heavy sweaters and a shirt underneath.
A waxed cotton jacket is an heirloom that walks into the shop with you at year one and walks out with your grandkid at year forty. The wax will patina at the elbows and cuffs first, deep dry patches will need a rewax somewhere between year two and year four depending on how hard you wear it, and the corduroy collar is the first piece the Simonside repair line will replace on a jacket sent back. That whole process, the aging and the repair, is the point. This is not a jacket that gets replaced. This is a jacket that gets rewaxed.