The Tailor of Gloucester

Written by Beatrix Potter

Narrated by B. J. Harrison

Who will help the tailor of Gloucester to finish the Mayor’s elegant coat? For the tailor has fallen ill, and the Mayor is to be married in it tomorrow – on Christmas Day in the morning?

Written and illustrated by Beatrix Potter in 1901, this story was written as a Christmas gift to ten-year-old Freda Moore, the daughter of her former governess. Potter based the story on a real-world incident involving John Prichard, a Gloucester tailor who had a commission to make a new suit for the new mayor. But it’s Potter’s charming touch of adding impish, mischievous animals to move the story along that make this children’s classic. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: B.J. Harrison
• Release date: Dec 10, 2021
• ISBN: 9781950524945

Beatrix Potter

Helen Beatrix Potter (1866-1943) was an English writer, illustrator, scientist, and conservationist best known for her children's books featuring animals. Written as a gift for the son of her former governess, The Tale of Peter Rabbit was published in 1901. Its success enabled her to commit to full-time writing and illustrating. Potter wrote about 30 books; the best known being her 24 children's tales.

Reviews for The Tailor of Gloucester

[john257hopper · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This delightful story was the author's own favourite, and is the only one whose central character is a human being rather than an animal. I was prompted to read this following a visit to Gloucester for its annual history festival, which included a short Beatrix Potter walk round the city centre. The story is based on the life of a real Gloucester tailor, John Prichard, but the house now occupied by the Beatrix Potter museum and touted in the book as the tailor's shop in College Court is not the historical Prichard's shop, which was in nearby Westgate and is now the (very unassuming) Sword Inn. Anyway, it is of course a charming story.

[mrslee_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Sort of a take on The Elves and the Shoemaker, this little drama involves a tailor, a cat and numerous mice. I say drama because it covers the human traits of resentment, vengeance, kindness, charity and repentance, all without one word of preaching.The illustrations are charming, and the cat is perfectly in character. There is a museum in England which has the waistcoat which Potter used as inspiration for her lovely pictures with the "cherry-coloured twist." A sweet little insight into the fashion lives of history.

[lisa.isselee · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Wonderful little book !

[gold_gato-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I wish they still had these types of industrious mice nowadays. Mice who will hear your frantic plea for help to complete a deadline at work...and then they'll come running to complete your powerpoint presentation or spreadsheet. Maybe because they're from Gloucester?

Allen Atkinson's lovely illustrations make the Beatrix Potter classic even better. The tailor and his helpful mice made such an impression on me when I was small that I actually visited Gloucester. I never found the little rodents, but I did find one of those wonderful alleys full of shops. Certainly, the little ones were busy at work in one of those stores.

"And then I bought
A pipkin and a popkin,
A slipkin and a slopkin,
All for one farthing"

Book Season = Year Round

[tbspa · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Simply adorable tale by Beatrix Potter. Ageless.

[benuathanasia · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A cute adaption of the Elves and the Shoemaker. The illustrations were the best part of this book.

[t1bclasslibrary · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The tailor is too sick to work, but he has left snippings for clothes for the mice. To thank him, they finish his work. Simpkin, his cat, has hidden the thread he got on an errand, but seeing the mice work so hard, he gives it to his master.