Gabardine
Also searched as: wool gabardine, cotton gabardine, steep twill, gabardine twill, suiting gabardine
Gabardine is a firm, warp-faced steep twill cloth, long used for suits, trousers, uniforms and rainwear, and made in wool, cotton or blends.
In detail
In a classic gabardine, warp yarns dominate the face and the twill wale runs at a steep angle, often around 45 to 63 degrees depending on thread counts. The structure packs tightly, so the cloth sheds light rain better than an open plain weave and holds a crease for trousers and jackets. Wool gabardine is a staple of tailored suiting and trench-coat shells; cotton gabardine appears in chinos and workwear. The name identifies a construction family, not a sheep breed or a micron grade, and finishing (piece-dye, stretch, water-repellent coatings) further changes how the cloth behaves.
The science and numbers
Steep warp-faced twills such as 2/1 or 3/1 raise warp cover on the face, increasing abrasion resistance along the wearing surface while leaving the back weft-richer. High thread density and fine yarns sharpen the wale and produce the hard, dry hand associated with classic suiting gabardine. Thomas Burberry's late-nineteenth-century gabardine raincoats popularized a tightly woven, yarn-dyed or piece-finished cloth for weatherwear, and the construction later migrated widely into men's trousers and uniforms. Modern stretch gabardines insert elastane in warp or weft, which changes recovery and pressing behavior even when the visual twill remains. Weave notation and measured cover factor still explain more than the marketing noun alone.
A practical example
Look at the face of wool suit trousers labeled gabardine: fine diagonal wales climb steeply, the face looks smoother and more warp-rich than the back, and the cloth feels compact between the fingers. Compare that with a softer 2/2 wool twill jacket cloth, where the diagonal is shallower and both systems show more equally. The steep, warp-faced geometry is what mill language is naming, before fiber content or Super numbers enter the conversation.
What to distinguish
Gabardine describes weave and face character, not waterproofing, stretch or fiber quality. A cotton gabardine chino and a Super 120s wool gabardine trouser share a structural idea but not performance. Coatings and membranes, not the twill alone, create truly waterproof rainwear. Do not treat gabardine as a synonym for every twill, and do not read the word as proof of virgin wool or a particular origin.
Origins and history
Burberry dates Thomas Burberry’s development of its gabardine to 1879 and the patent to 1888. These dates belong to the producer’s history of its cloth. In contemporary textile descriptions, gabardine also names a closely constructed twill used in different fibers. A construction name therefore does not identify a Burberry product or establish the weather resistance of an unrelated fabric.
Related terms
Sources & further reading
- CottonWorks: Weaving basics
- Heliyon: Effect of cotton-Tencel siro yarn twist multipliers on stiffness of plain, twill and satin fabrics (Afroz et al., 2022)
- Encyclopaedia Britannica: Gabardine
- Burberry: company history (producer)
Technical references reviewed 2026-09-22. Examples are illustrative. Industry organizations and manufacturers describe their own fields; their references are not independent product endorsements. Figures are approximate and depend on the stated test conditions.