A half chap is a protective garment, worn below the knee that has an elastic piece that passes under the boot to hold them in place on your calves. Half chaps can be worn with ant type of pants.  Equestrians love half chaps because you can throw them on over jeans and then pull them off after riding and head out to the grocery store and not look like you just stepped off of a horse. They can also be worn over riding breeches, either schooling breeches or show breeches. They have become very popular for wearing before you put on your tall field boots at a horse show.  You see them in the warm up ring at hunter and jumper horse shows as well. Half chaps also protect the rider from leg rubs caused by the stirrup leathers on an English saddle.  Many people wear the half chaps in place of struggling with tall riding boots every day.

Half chaps can be made of suede, top grain leather and even synthetic leathers.  Top grain or top hide leather is the most expensive of the three choices.  It has distinct advantages over suede. Top grain leather can be saddle soaped and the corrosive horse sweat can be then cleaned off.  Top grain is the hair side of the cow hide.  Suede is a hide that is spit below the top hide.  The hides are cut in layers at different widths depending on what the suede will be used for.  Garment suede used for pants and skirts are very thin, where half chap suede will be thicker. Suede half chap leather will absorb the sweat and dirt and the only way to clean them is to launder them.  We suggest only using Leather Laundry Solution by Leather Therapy.

The synthetic half chaps can be thrown right into the wash and they clean up in a snap! Be sure to rinse off the elastic that is under your boot.  It will fray and rot off your half chap if you do not take care of it.

English half chaps are measured by calf height and width.  Use a cloth tape measure. Measure your calf, while wearing a paddock boot, from the back of your bent knee to the top of the boot heel.  This will give you the height of the half chap.  The width is measured by finding the widest part of your calf and taking that measurement.  Most adult calf heights are between 15” and 19”.  Calf widths can be anywhere between 12” - 22”

Half chaps can have a zipper closure down the back of your calf or strips of Velcro as the closure.  The zipper ones have stretch built in either an accordion leather panel or a plain elastic panel. The stretch allows the chap to form fit around the calf muscle. The Velcro half chaps have three adjustable tabs the also allow you to tighten the half chap around your calf.