Horse’s Decorative Headdress - Eight Hour Parade Horse drawn Floats

By Neale Towart

Competition was fierce amongst unions and employers for best float in the large parades. The draught horses - Draught horse are bred to perform heavy tasks that require their great strength, usually in farming drawing ploughs, were dressed in their best livery and this part of the collar decoration was handmade by members of the Wicker Workers Union and entwined with rope that matched the harness, horse blankets and reins. The symbolism of the eight hour day flowed through all of the parade elements with 8 carefully constructed in cane and 888 embroidered on blankets.

Shown here are the horses with this regalia of a horse drawn float at the Sydney parade near what is now Fox Studios in 1905