#britpicking

click the link above and answer the questions if you feel you would find a britpicking resource for good omens fic writing useful!

the survey is short and only two questions are required. neither of these involve typing. the optional parts of the form are there for people who have specific questions they want answered via this project, or people who want to contribute to it themselves. this is the main question:

please reblog this for reach and share the link in your discord servers or on bluesky if you have a spare minute! it would be great to get as much info as possible on this. thank you in advance!

British Menswear Formal Wear

Anytime I am reading a fic about Sherlock Holmes and I run across the word "tuxedo" it's a sign that the writer is most likely American.

The word Tuxedo originates from the USA; it refers to a man's evening dress for semiformal occasions, first used in print in 1889, named for Tuxedo Park, N.Y., then the chief "pretentious rural resort" for wealthy New Yorkers and site of a country club where it first was worn, supposedly in 1886.

It was specifically designed to be a more informal suit than the English equivalent- the white tie and tailcoat.

You will notice a few interesting things about this photo above- the white shirt is stiff with starch and fastened not with buttons but with studs. The waistcoat has lapels. The collar of the shirt is stiff and upright and the bow tie is always tied by the wearer's hand, not a pre-tied clip-on.

The tail coat is always black. The cut should not reveal the white waistcoat unless the person is in motion (unlike the bloke behind BC). The pocket square is always white and should only reveal a slim line.

Below is the standard set in the 30s; the only change these days is that the tails can be a bit shorter- knee length and the trousers don't have to have 4 pleats; two is more usual.

White tie is the most formal of British men's wear for evening functions; black tie is the next level down.

Black tie is also referred to as the Dinner Jacket. The first British dinner jacket is traditionally traced to 1865 on the then Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII (1841–1910), traditionally worn to functions after 6pm.

After World War I, the dinner jacket became more popular than white tie, especially in the US, and informal variations sprang up, like the soft, turn-down collar shirt and later the double-breasted jacket. Dinner jacket is what the Brits call it, often abbreviated to DJ. American's use Tuxedo more often.

Then of course there is the WHITE DJ, which is actually ivory or off-white. Often worn at summer events; James Bond wore one when the stories involved the tropics. The cloth used is lighter in weight, making it appropriate for summer and for outdoor events.

It was Edward Prince of Wales who also created the Smoking Jacket, ordering it from his Savile Row tailor in midnight blue. This has become a thing in modern Britain, too.

This is an Armani made to measure navy blue smoking jacket suit.

Very few British men would ever wear a cummerbund; it's more an American thing. Waistcoats are more the British approach.

does anyone know if there is a tumblr group out there with possible beta readers? i am specifically looking for someone british so they can britpick a HUGE mycroft speech i'm writing. is it possible to have a beta reader solely for grammar purposes? i dont want to share my entire fic because i do it for fun and as a therapeutic mechanism lmao

From an English person

We have different medicines! Calpol is the main one for children though adults can have it too, paracetamol and anadin are painkillers, and these are the main ones that we use. For something more strong, co-codomol is a very strong painkiller that contains paracetamol amd codeine that you have to get from the doctors typically on prescription

Free healthcare is great and all but the NHS (National Health Service) is fucked, so if you want something specialised in the long-term like a surgery, its kinda common to go private - this does cost money though

Things like ambulances and fire engines - both separate services - do not cost money to call

Our emergency service line is 999

Something we learn about in school is a service called Childline - 0800 1111 - which is something you can call for help if you're under 18, and they'll help with anything you want (pretty much anyway)

The tea we typically have is called English Breakfast, or Builders Tea. We normally just call this "tea", but if we have to specify then we'll call it a shortening of one of the earlier names - "We've got Builders if you want it", for example.

We have tea with a splash of milk - anyone who doesn't is a heathen and will be shunned out the country. (I'm joking. But seriously, we all have milk in our tea.) Most people also have a couple of spoons of sugar, typically one or two, but this is a lot more free for people to decide - its a matter of taste.

If we're being fancy we might have Earl Grey - like Builders but a bit more floral? Still with milk and sugar though

We do also have fruit tea? But we have it a lot less. Builders is what we mean when we talk about Tea

We have kettles that you press a button and it boils water. Very simple to use, I don't know why so many other places don't have them as A Thing yet

Picky tea and picky bits are basically small picnic-y items that we have for dinner sometimes. M&S does great picky bits but they're fucking expensive

We always complain about the weather - too hot, too cold, too wet, too dry. And a classic phrase is that "it's the humidity that'll get you"

We don't have Walmart or Target or anything like that - we have Tesco (expensive), Lidl (cheap), and Aldi (it sure exists). These are the classics. Morrisons is shit, don't go there under any circumstances

We have a lot of culture around music, everywhere has a place showing live bands and we all know the chorus to the same 20 songs

Regional accents are definitely a thing, but quite hard to portray in writing, so just trust me on this

Static caravan holidays to shitty seaside towns seems to be something that everyone has done at some point

Pubs. There are three kinds. Arty pubs with nice beers and posh twats talking about the bouquet of the wine. Crappy pubs showing rugby in the corner with a perpetual stickiness to the tables. And weird chains, serving mediocre food and Guinness. (There's obviously more, but these are the main three.) "Locals" are probably the second or third kind, the first tends to be in the city centre. Everyone has a favourite kind of pub even if they never acknowledge it

Tear a packet of walkers in half and lay it in the centre of the table so everyone can share it

Taco bell and wendys never really made it over here - you don't go to them really, they don't really exist - but McDonalds definitely does. Love a maccies breakfast

Our final exams in High School are called GCSE's, and they're basically a test we take to see if we learnt anything from years 9-11. It's a fairly standard school system really, graded from 1-9. A grade 9 is the best you can get, a 4 is the lowest you can get and still pass.

The only GCSE's that really matter are English, Maths, and Science. Everything else is just sorta for fun

American politics really effect us, but in a way that's hard to put into words. We know a lot about what's happening in America but we don't know why it effects us, but it really does

Prices in London are enough to make your eyes bleed

Our school system is structured like this:

Reception - 4-5

Year One - 5-6

Year Two - 6-7

Year Three - 7-8

Year Four - 8-9

Year Five - 9-10

Year Six - 10-11

Year Seven (first year of high school) - 11-12

Year Eight - 12-13

Year Nine - 13-14

Year Ten - 14-15

Year Eleven - 15-16

A-Levels - 16-18

University - Changes depending on your course, typically three years

(Note: We do not have the ages memorised! We normally know what year we were in when something happened, but not how old we were. This changes from person to person though)

britpicking is a specific form of beta reading whereby a story which is set in the uk and/or featuring characters who are from the uk is checked to see that the language and cultural information is as accurate as possible for that part of the world, by someone who has the knowledge required to do so.

i thought it would be useful to have an open resource for britpicking for the good omens fandom, so people without their own britpicker on board for a fic they’re writing can find at least some of the answers they may need directly from one source.