Hello, I was wondering if anyone could tell me what period AERO zippers date to? As well as for future reference I'd like to know because I have a rather attractive Morocco leather wallet with a skinny metal zip and a Newey's press stud and can't date it. The wallet itself looks (and smells) quite old and is lined in coarse champag ne coloured lining.
You see them a lot in 60's 70's garments but they are surfing board shaped and I know they are around a long time before then, the square ended ones such as yours tend to be earlier, 40's 50's. You can't date it just from the zip however as each style were used for a long time and could have been replaced. It might help to see the lining and the Newey press studs (whose designs did change with the years - now there's an old company!)
Thanks Pinkcoke, The zip looks original, there are no signs of alteration, the wallet is in excellent condition. I tried researching Neweys but found no conclusive way of dating the press studs. I have two items with Neweys press studs so being able to date each type of press studd would really help. I've attached a close-up.
If the zip or press studd is original it just means that the wallet can't be older than the zip, but it could be much much newer. People stored zips for ages and carried on using them, e.g it's not impossible that the zip could have been made in the 50s, purchased in some shop in the 60s and then sewn into the wallet in the 70s.
Oh, here we go, more pictures! It looks much older than 70s to me, but then without knowing more I can't be more specific.
Hi Magpie, I agree with Melanie in that your wallet could be '40s or '50s. As she said, it's hard to pin these down on dates.
Isn't that a name and address on the card? if you googled it with speech marks around the phrase you should be able to find some census records or the like, giving you a date when it was last used probably.
Yeah, thanks Melanie. There were details on the card but unfortunately no amount of googling would uncover her identity. So I went back to the person I got the wallet from to see if she new anything. I learned the lady who owned the calling card was born around 1925. The wallet now has a loving new home.
Aero Zipp (sic) was established in the UK in the 1930s by my grandmother's second husband Joachim Koppel, a refugee from Nazi Germany. It went on to secure 40% of the UK zip market. The company went public in the late 60s and was later taken over by an American multinational, and closed down probably due to overwhelming competition from the Far East. The trade mark and name were later purchased and are currently in use by a new company with no connections to the original family. Gaby Koppel
Thanks Gaby for giving us this information, a lot of the time things like this are simply lost to history if they are not passed on.
just another little snippet, the number of the patent on the back of the newey press stud dates to 1943. so although the wallet could have been made later with that press stud it couldn't have been made earlier than that! lorraine
I am looking for an AERO metal zip for the tonneau cover of my Austin Sprite. Finally the zip broke after 48 years and replacing it with a YKK or Opti would be a sacrileg.
Hi Wolfy please can you post your request in a new thread here: http://forums.vintagefashionguild.org/forums/public-most-wanted-looking-for-something.44/ with the length and colour if you would like to see if anyone can help you.
For anyone still interested. Aero Zippers was originally a Zipper manufacture based in South Wales UK. In 1955 a factory was set up in Bankstown New South Wales and they began manufacturing in Australia. My father was sent over here to set up the Toolshop to make all the Die cast tooling and jigs.
