The chevron was by far the most common heraldic division the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume (IBAC) employed to divide the two or three colors in an institution’s hood, but beginning in 1895 the “double chevron” was also used quite frequently. The typical width of a normal chevron was between four and five inches, but the double chevron pattern used two chevrons of about 1½ to two inches in width placed approximately one inch apart so that the color of the hood lining showed between them.

Western Carolina University did not appear in early IBAC lists from 1927 or 1948, so the IBAC might not have assigned the college a hood lining until the late 1940s or 1950s. A list compiled by Kevin Sheard in Academic Heraldry in America (1962) described the university’s hood lining as purple with two gold chevrons, but an IBAC list from 1972 more accurately stated that the hood lining was purple with two old gold chevrons.