Italo-American Style

I like what many consider to be traditional American (particularly East Coast American) clothing. I find it flattering and easy to wear, and having grown up in Boston, I know it well. I also appreciate the kind of  roguish style worn by well dressed Italians. Being an American, and somewhat larger than thin, this style is a bit less forgiving on me. However, being of Italian descent and having seen enough old Italian movies, its attraction is not altogether lost on me. Good thing the two need not be mutually exclusive. i.e.:

At the beginning of Summer, I picked up a great pair of linen trousers. Never a big fan of solid navy trousers, these have changed my mind. They are replete with English and European details. The forward pleats are tres British, and the complicated but extremely well made system of closures and buckle tabs can only be Italian.  

Incotex, doesn't get much more Italian than that. Sold originally by Louis, Boston. The linen is thick and heavy, but breathes like gauze. The legs are cut full and comfortable. It's one thing to be all skinny and fashionable and wear clothes that are too tight, but it's kind of totally stupid to wear tight clothes in the heat. "Preppy" or "trad" as you may think I am,I have nothing but good things to say about clothes with a little room in them in Summertime.

The crazy orange jacket, as difficult as I once found it to wear, has become a regular player this Summer, more so even than the plaid madras. I never thought I'd see an orange jacket as an understated option, but somehow this one is. Seen here with a vintage 1980s Sero button down (as American as it gets) worn with two buttons open, no undershirt (pretty Italian, maybe even a pinch, dare we say, gauche?)

Made by Hickey Freeman for long gone F.R. Tripler in the early 1960s. Vintage American, "Ivy" even.

Vintage and modern, Italian and American. No good reason why they can't all play together. In fact, I think it's because the separate items don't really "belong" together that I enjoy an outfit like this so much. Men's clothing can be easy, because good stuff tends to go with other good stuff. Save the period dress up for Halloween parties, and remember, pigeon holes are for pigeons.

p.s. Many thanks to everyone who dropped by the soft opening last Saturday. I think I can safely put that one down in the success column. I look forward to seeing you all again when the Shop open full steam sometime within the coming weeks.

p.p.s. while there will inevitably Shop news and business talk here on the blog, I will try to keep to a minimum. It is my sincere intention to keep this blog focused on its original mission: offering advice to men of modest means as to how to dress well, and indeed live well, on a tight penny. Penury is not now, nor ever has been, and excuse.

In The Mix (a minor rant)

Its been said so many times that the earmarks of a well dressed man are all in the details, and its true. With what may seem a fairly limited arsenal of items to choose from (jacket, trousers, shirt, tie, shoes) all the punctuating differences are in the details. Pleats or no pleats, collar style, cut of jacket, shape of the shoulder and so on are just some of the bits that differentiate one style form another. Its worth knowing these things, but it can lead to fetishism and the rise of a clothing police force.

I think of this frequently when  I look around the internet at the men's clothing scene, particularly among devotees of the traditional American look. So many of them adhere so strictly to a set of rules as thought they were carved in stone and handed down from on high. No where is this truer than with the so called "Ivy" or "Trad" crowd. These are the guys who take style to be an exact replication of what an archetypal college man might have worn in 1962-67. Coats are three button and un-darted, with two button cuffs, trousers have flat fronts, and shirts have button down collars. All details must be in place at all times, and no one detail may be combined with details form any other school of style. While I do in fact enjoy that style myself and draw from its influence frequently, I find it highly limiting and anything but stylish to dismiss all else out of hand. I used to encounter this same strictness among the Rockabilly scene in the old days, guys who would measure the roll of your jeans cuff and chemically test the make up of your pomade for correctness. It's the difference between wearing cool old stuff and dressing in what amounts to a Halloween costume.

In the photo above, I've combined a continental style blazer with roped shoulders, darts, side vents and a ticket pocket with forward pleated side tab trousers and a button shirt and rep tie, both from Brooks Brothers. The coat, though made in New York, is European in style. The trousers, from the Andover Shop, are replete with British details, and the shirt and tie are as American as it gets. And yet I see no reason why these things can't all work together, In fact, by mixing them, the severity of any of them is diminished and a more interesting whole is created.

One of the hallmarks o what we call American style always was the combination of sporting and formal elements in this way. As I recall, it's actually as traditional to do this, if not more so, than to adhere strictly to a self imposed set of Ivy League standards. Charlie Davidson has been dressing this way for half his long life. My old boss Harold Simon was notorious for wearing 6x2 double breasted suits with forward pleats  with a button down collar, repp tie  and tassel loafers. The High Holy Fred was doing it in the 1930s, and he's one of the big shots.

It looks good. It looks more like you know about good clothing than simply that you've been reading the blogs the last couple of years. It looks more like you enjoy dressing and less like you enjoy being a crotchety old man obsessed with "the good old days". And anyway, those good old days weren't necessarily so good anyway. Just ask any woman or minority if they wish things were more like 1962.

This isn't to say that this is the only way either. My point is there is no "only way" and that "correctness" will only take you so far. Finding personal style lies in learning all this and then making bits and pieces of all of it your own. Putting it all together is where we find individuality while basically wearing the same thing. Use your freedom of choice.

For the strict types out there, Devo said it best:

Freedom of choice

is what you got 

Freedom from choice 

is what you want

Addendum: I wrote this in the morning using a photo from a week before. The very same day this was written, I wore this:

Kelly green 3/2 sack blazer by Brooks Brothers, with military khakis, ribbon belt and striped button down, both Brooks Brothers, and a plain navy tie, Andover Shop. I dig this too, I just see no reason to be one dimensional. Right?

Nothing New Under The Sun

The older I get, the more outright obnoxious I tend to find most men's designer clothing. With women's  clothes, there is an endless variety if exploration of shape, color, proportion and even asymmetry allowed that will keep things at least interesting and at best downright artistic. In men's clothes, however, "design" is frequently little more than stealing, re-packaging and marketing. I like to poke fun at phrases like "well curated authentic heritage Americana" when discussing 19th century poor peoples clothes being sold as high design, but a close second is "classic with a twist", or worse "preppy with a twist" when used to describe proper menswear made disproportionately small or worse, some kind of f*cked up. Alas, there is nothing new under the sun...

Note the penny loafer sandal (?!?!) by  none other than Bass, purveyor of the rule book thumping Weejun itself, in 1967, the very height of the heyday of true Prep/Ivy/Trad style. Even the veritable "with a twist" turns out to be stolen goods.

When we reach the point of there being nothing new under the sun, it may just be that the best new things are in fact old things.