Help me find a new beloved leather coat?

October 15, 2009 5:56 PM

I am looking to replace my beloved leather coat, which was stolen last spring. So now it's fall, and the stores are full of coats, but I've found that nothing even remotely comparable seems to be in style at the moment. Am I missing the secret source for classic, fashionable, longer-length leather coats? Do I need a fashion lesson and some nudging?

Mine was Kenneth Cole from 2001ish, black leather, lambskin, very soft and smooth and gently glossy. Longer, but not full-length – about 36" from shoulder. It zipped all the way up to a simple collar. Lightly lined. It had a belt, but wasn't a trenchcoat style at all, the cut of the coat was sleek, sleek, sleek.

I loved it. It made me feel sexy and put-together; it suited my style and flattered me. It was my perfect city coat. It reached nearly to my knees, giving me some protection from the wind-tunnel gusts, but it wasn't so long that it was a heavy nuisance to carry around or drape over the back of a chair, or cumbersome for this fast-walker while walking home.

The sleek short leather jackets I'm seeing in department stores (like Macy's) and online (Zappo's, Amazon, Bluefly) are cute, but not something I need – they're too casual and they don't fill the desired warmth/season/dressiness gap left behind by my old coat. Plus, I have a warm, lovingly-tortured biker jacket. Parkas are also too casual. I have a lightweight thrift-store leather blazer and don't want another. The longer leather coats I see in the stores are A-line sort of cut with buttons like this, but I've got a small frame and I look decidedly frumpy in this style.

I'm willing to consider other styles of coats beyond an exact replica of my old coat, but would like it to be long enough to hit me at least mid-thigh, and I'd like it to be leather. Dammit.

My company has offered to replace my coat, which is why I'm getting a little antsy. I don't want to hold up resolving this too long, for fear that this will start to get politically and financially complicated -- it seems impolite to dither around forever in taking them up on their offer.

I live in Philadelphia. If suggested stores are online, I'd need a pretty reasonable return policy in case I have to do some considerable trying-on-and-returning. I'm shooting for something in the $200-$500 range.

posted by desuetude to shopping (11 comments total)

Are any of these coats in the ballpark? One, two, three.
posted by ocherdraco at 6:18 PM on October 15

...and four.
posted by ocherdraco at 6:20 PM on October 15

Have you tried Burlington Coat Factory yet? The online site doesn't list much leather, but I found a great selection of leather there when I was shopping for one a few years ago.
posted by saffry at 6:22 PM on October 15

What about this? Or this? eBay might be a good place to look, if you remember the brand name of the coat you had.

What, exactly, was too casual about some of the coats you've seen?
posted by runningwithscissors at 6:23 PM on October 15

This is about the closest I have been able to find. Unfortunately, from a retailer I have never heard of.
posted by biggity at 6:59 PM on October 15

I think the term you want is "walking coat." Is this more what you had in mind? (Scroll down.)
posted by MonkeyToes at 7:02 PM on October 15

ocherdraco: Oh, Wilson's never even occurred to me. If only that Calvin Klein coat were longer, that'd be perfect. Perhaps I will schlep out to the 'burbs and try some stuff on.

biggity, oooh, that UK shop is worth checking out. I like the top two coats in that list.

MonkeyToes: It's got the tailored lines and the gleam, but I worry about how "A-line" it will fit in real life. I don't want to look like my mom.

(Srlsly would it kill most of these retailers to list a coat length?)

ZOMG I have hope. Thanks, everyone so far. Anyone else with knowledge of sexy leather coats, please pipe up.
posted by desuetude at 10:13 PM on October 15

Check out Danier Leather. It's a Canadian company with brick and mortar stores. It doesn't look like they have online shopping just yet, but they do appear to take phone orders. Lots of variety in a range of prices. Plus, they're Canadian, so they know about keeping warm!
posted by yawper at 7:42 AM on October 16

Burlington Coat Factory Fail. Weak inventory in anything leather. (Weak selection in general, actually.)
posted by desuetude at 4:37 PM on October 16

I rather doubt that Metafilter remains transfixed by my coat-shopping woes, but I thought I'd report back:

Oof. It's not pretty out there, kids. Lots of cheap and shoddy stuff.

The super-nice chick at the Wilson's scoured the clearance racks for me and found the coat linked by ocherdraco as "four," miraculously in my size. I did in fact come home with it after trying on everything else in the store.

"Walking coat" styles hang on me like I'm borrowing my mom's coat. Trenches tend to be too big in the shoulders and the stores have no extra-smalls. (My super-nice Wilson's chick also confidentially pointed out that the quality of leather coats carried at Wilson's has gone down the tubes in the last few years since they no longer maintain their own brand, and that it was best to stick with the "known" name brands and common sense; we had a nice bonding moment over a shared interest in actual garment quality.)

I'm still keeping my eyes peeled for something more akin to a true replacement -- a sleek, slim-fitting, 3/4-length, zip-front lambskin coat. (Available in the US or w/online shopping.)
posted by desuetude at 11:52 PM on October 17

Thanks for the update. If you ever get out to Lancaster County, try Domaki Leathers, 85 W Main St, Leola, PA 17540 [phone]. No website, unfortunately, as they're a small shop, so you might want to give them a call. I haven't been there for years, but I remember them having lovely coats and skirts.
posted by MonkeyToes at 10:11 AM on October 18