Hogwarts Uniform

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 117312


K wrote: 
> > but this is contradicted both by the flashback pensieve scene in 
> OoP and the shopping list they get at the start of PS. 
> > 
> > The school uniform consists of robes and nothing else. I suspect 
> muggleborns are more likely to wear stuff underneath. plus it's a
large castle in Scotland - castles are drafty.
> > 
> > K
> 
 Meri:
> I always pictured them like they are on the covers of the American 
> hardcovers, with Muggle jeans and sneakers and sweaters underneath 
> robes. I believe that the reason they chose to do uniform like 
> outfits in the films was to make the kids look less like they were 
> wearing lame Halloween costumes. 
>
Carol responds:
I think K is right. We know that Snape wore only underwear under his
robes as a schoolboy, and even that seems to be a concession to Muggle
customs, as old Archie wears nothing under his nightgown. I can't
imagine either of them wearing an open robe.

I don't think that a pureblood like Draco would be caught dead in
Muggle clothes, except *possibly* at King's Cross on the way to and
from school. Like the young Snape, he probably wears only underwear
(if that). I certainly don't think that pureblood adults, some of whom
have only the vaguest notion of how Muggles dress, wear Muggle clothes
under their robes, nor would they expect their children to do so at
school.

I picture the robes as resembling a priest's cassock or judge's gown
rather than a bathrobe in being closed all around rather than open in
front. I think the Hogwarts uniform would reflect the academic dress
of a much earlier period, for example the cappa clausa, a *closed*
full-length gown that was adopted at Oxford University in 1222.

A cloak, OTOH, is open and sleeveless like a cape--highly effective if
you're sweeping out of a room, though I suppose it would be worn
indoors only if it's very cold, as in Snape's dungeons in winter.

Carol, thinking that perhaps an American illustrator is not the best
source of information on British academic traditions