habillé comme la chienne à Jacques

to be very badly dressed

A very Quebec way to say someone looks a proper mess, dressed any old how.

Avec ce vieux manteau troué, il est habillé comme la chienne à Jacques.

With that old coat full of holes, he's dressed like Jacques's dog.

According to Quebec linguist Claude Poirier, this comes from jaque, a 16th-century leather coat put on hunting dogs for protection, which made them look faintly ridiculous. The word later got mixed up with the first name Jacques, itself long used as a byword for a fool.

Quebec