32 Facts About Beau Brummell

George Bryan "Beau" Brummell was an important figure in Regency England, and for many years he was the arbiter of British men's fashion.

Beau Brummell was remembered afterwards as the preeminent example of the dandy, and a whole literature was founded upon his manner and witty sayings, which have persisted until today.

Beau Brummell's name is still associated with style and good looks and has been given to a variety of modern products to suggest their high quality.

The family had achieved middle class status, but William Beau Brummell was ambitious for his son George to become a gentleman, and he was raised with that understanding.

Beau Brummell was educated at Eton College and made his precocious mark on fashion when he not only modernised the white stock, or cravat, that was the mark of the "Eton boy", but added a gold buckle to it.

Beau Brummell progressed to Oxford University, where, by his own example, he made cotton stockings and dingy cravats fall out of favour.

Beau Brummell left the university after only a year at age sixteen.

Beau Brummell's father died in 1795, by which time Brummell had been promoted to lieutenant.

For such a junior officer, Beau Brummell took the regiment by storm, fascinating the Prince,.

Beau Brummell was allowed to miss parade, shirk his duties and, in essence, do just as he pleased.

Beau Brummell became a noted figure in fashion and adopted a habit of dress that rejected overly ornate clothes in favour of understated but perfectly fitted and tailored bespoke garments.

Above all, Beau Brummell favoured immaculate shirt linen and an elaborately knotted cravat.

Beau Brummell put into practice the principles of harmony of shape and contrast of colours with such a pleasing result that men of superior rank sought his opinion on their own dress.

Beau Brummell examined his Grace with the cool impertinence which was his Grace's due.

Enthralled, the Prince would spend hours in Beau Brummell's dressing room, witnessing the progress of his friend's lengthy morning toilette.

Beau Brummell did play a single first-class match for Hampshire at Lord's Old Ground in 1807 against an early all-England cricket team.

Beau Brummell made scores of 23 and 3 on that occasion, leaving him with a career batting average of 13.00.

Beau Brummell found it increasingly difficult to maintain his lifestyle as his spending continued over time, but his prominent position in society allowed him to float a line of credit.

Beau Brummell became an anomalous favourite, flourishing without a patron, influencing fashion and courted by a large segment of society.

In 1816, Beau Brummell, owing thousands of pounds, fled to France to escape debtor's prison.

Beau Brummell was ostracized from his social circle and soon found refuge in France.

Beau Brummell lived the remainder of his life in French exile, spending ten years in Calais without an official passport, before acquiring an appointment to the consulate at Caen in 1830 through the influence of Lord Alvanley and the Duke of Beaufort.

Beau Brummell had made it in the hope of being appointed to a more remunerative position elsewhere to regain some influence, but no new position was forthcoming, much to his detriment.

In 1840, Beau Brummell died at the age of 61, penniless and insane from syphilis, at Le Bon Sauveur Asylum on the outskirts of Caen.

Beau Brummell appears at length in The Memoirs of Harriette Wilson, Written by Herself, as a former suitor of Harriette Wilson's friend Julia.

Beau Brummell possessed a sort of quaint, dry humour, not amounting to anything like wit; indeed, he said nothing which would bear repetition; but his affected manners and little absurdities amused for the moment.

In France, there was the influential essay of Jules Amedee Barbey d'Aurevilly, "On Dandyism and George Beau Brummell", which seeks to define the essence of dandyism through a study of his career and opinions.

Beau Brummell's character served as foundation for depiction of fictional dandies.

Beau Brummell appeared under his own name as a character in Arthur Conan Doyle's 1896 historical novel Rodney Stone.

Beau Brummell is referred to, or figures as a minor character, in the work of later writers of this genre.

In 1931, there was a French three-act operetta, Beau Brummell, composed by Reynaldo Hahn to a libretto by Rip and Robert Dieudonne.

Beau Brummell's name became associated with style and good looks, and was therefore borrowed for a variety of products or alluded to in songs and poetry.