A Short History of Suspenders
From ribbons buttoned into 18th-century breeches to Wall Street power dressing, suspenders have spent three centuries going in and out of style. Here is how they got here.
- 1700s
The first suspenders appear in 18th-century France as strips of ribbon attached to the buttonholes of trousers. They are underwear, worn out of sight.
- 1820s
London haberdasher Albert Thurston begins making braces, attached with leather loops, and turns them into a gentleman’s accessory. High-waisted trousers make belts impractical, so braces spread across Europe and North America. The Thurston name is still in business.
- Mid-1800s
In the United States, suspenders are often called galluses. Britain keeps the word braces, which it still uses today.
- 1871
On December 19, Samuel Clemens, better known as Mark Twain, receives US patent 121,992 for an “Improvement in Adjustable and Detachable Straps for Garments”: an elastic strap with buttonholes at each end that could be moved from one garment to another. It is often described as his answer to suspenders he found uncomfortable.
- 1894
David Roth of Cleveland patents a garment clasp (US patent 527,887) for garter webbing and suspender ends, an early step toward the clip-on suspenders that work without buttons.
- Early 1900s
Trousers start to sit lower on the hips and belts take over. Suspenders never disappear, but they become a choice rather than a necessity.
- 1970s
Women adopt suspenders as part of the unisex “Annie Hall” look, and they return as fashion rather than function.
- 1987
Michael Douglas wears bold braces as Gordon Gekko in Wall Street, and suspenders become shorthand for 1980s finance.
- Today
Suspenders cover everything from black tie and weddings to job sites and costumes. Button-on braces stay the formal choice, clip-ons dominate everyday wear, and heavy-duty X-backs carry tool belts.
Why the names differ
In American and Canadian English, suspenders hold up trousers. In British, Australian and New Zealand English the same straps are braces, and “suspenders” are the straps that hold up stockings. That is why a British shop and an American shop can sell identical items under different names.
Sources
More suspender tools
Size calculators, a color matcher, a button template and more, all free. See every tool.