Enjoy Your Fashion Cycle

Everyone knows fashion is cyclical. But the key to understanding its enduring appeal is that people don’t live through that many cycles.

Slim trousers have been in the ascendancy in men’s fashion for almost a decade now. From their first daring suggestion on the catwalk, through gradual acceptance as the norm in high-end tailoring, to the point now where it is hard to find anything other than straight or skinny jeans in high-street stores.

This is the end point: as soon as your mate Dave (who knows as much about fashion as he does about French literature – Beckham and the three musketeers is about it) is wearing narrow jeans, the trend is finished. The high street is saturated and the designers are searching for something new.

That was the cycle. The next cycle will see a different shape dominate – bootcut is the current favourite. But because the cycle is so long, it could last the whole of your twenties. You will identify slim trousers with your youth, and bootcut will seem like a breath of fresh air – a more mature, flattering shape. It will seem like an original trend since, even though it was popular in the past, you weren’t around to wear it.

The same would be true of baggy jeans or flairs. They may not be original, but that hardly matters. You didn’t get to wear them before.

You really only get two of these cycles, possibly three. By the time you are into your thirties, you may stop noticing anything about trends or fashion. And even if you end up wearing the dominant shape of the times (by default, like Dave), you will hardly notice. You may even keep the same pair of jeans for decades – many men do.

In my teenage years, bootcut jeans were probably the most fashionable. Hip-hop baggy jeans also had a slightly embarrassing following among white, middle-class kids. For me, therefore, the past decade and its narrow trouser aesthetic has seemed like a maturing time – one where straight, slim trousers with suits seemed like the obvious choice. The seemed timeless. Surely they are simply a realisation every man comes to after the follies of youth?

In another five years I will probably be proved wrong. But by then I won’t care. Because baby carriers and combination boilers will be taking up much of my retail time; but also because I will have formed this attachment to slim, straight trousers at a formative age – one where I had a certain amount of time and disposal income to spend on clothes. It will probably be ingrained in me forever by then.

So don’t criticise fashion cycles for being unoriginal. You only get two or three – enjoy them while they last.

Bookmark, Share or Email this article   •  Leave a Comment

One Thing: The Blue Blazer

Over the past year or so I have occasionally highlighted essential pieces of a man’s wardrobe. The “One Thing” columns have covered a variety of items, but today I want to get back to basics with the blue blazer.

A blue blazer is the backbone of any serious wardrobe. The ever popular Preppy Handbook even dubbed it the male exoskeleton. Preppy or not, a blue blazer is the one article of dress clothing all men should have hanging in the closet. It is universally useful and chameleon-like when it comes to meeting your needs in a sartorial pinch.

When they hear “blue blazer” people tend to think of the classic brass button type found on the bridge of a yacht in a Ralph Lauren advertisement. Of course that version is the most traditional, but blue blazers come in a range of fabrics and styles; from lightweight linens to beefy flannels. As the king of odd jackets, a blue blazer can fill the gap when you need to dress somewhere between a suit and a sweater, regardless of the season.

Styles vary as much as materials. Some blazers have horn or resin buttons instead of shipshape brass ones. They can come with single, double or no vents; notched or peaked lapels. Other design variations can change the overall feel of the garment. A double breasted blazer, with its nipped waist and dramatic massing of buttons can impart formality. A single breasted sack jacket with no darting can give you a more casual “drinks at the club” New England persona.

When it comes to shoulders, there are some cultural variations as well. American blazers often have a soft natural shoulder, while English tailors tend to prefer them padded and more structured. This is particularly true with double breasted jackets. American makers like Brooks Bothers and J. Press are arbiters of the natural shoulder; a style I tend prefer.

When shopping for a blue blazer, approach it as a major investment. This should be a jacket that can carry you for years to come and something that you are happy to reach for in the morning. A well constructed blazer made from good fabric will be as comfortable as your favorite sweatshirt and its classic styling will conquer the vagaries of many fashion cycles.

The core benefit of the blue blazer is its inherent versatility. It can make jeans, Chuck Taylors and an old polo shirt look city cool or give khakis, boat shoes and an oxford some un-stuffy dressiness. The blue blazer works because of its balance between formal and comfortable. It’s one of those rare garments that has both stood the test of time and evolved to meet the needs of each generation.

Bookmark, Share or Email this article   •  Leave a Comment

Banana Republic, Monogram and the Compromise of “Affordable Luxury”

Banana Republic has always filled me with a mix of hope, despair and dread.

Hope because the cool, crisp, modern, and attractive people in their ads work as intended: they attract. Whether engaged in happy plans in sunlit meeting rooms or harmonizing with contemporary artworks in white box museums, they suggest a happy world of productive teamwork in creative professions and culturally sophisticated socializing.

Despair because the clothing itself makes the ads look like more of a Potemkin village than most clothing ads. Plus sized fits are the second thing that bring me down to earth; BR’s mind may be in Soho, but its body is in Omaha. An American ‘medium’ is sized for the largest group of men who may dream that they fit into it, and the BR standard is no different. The ‘slim fit’ is little better. (Disclaimer: a well fitting garment is, of course, one that well-fits me. I’m about a 39R.) Despair, however, begins even before I try anything on because very often, especially with stripes and patterns, patterns are a little too small, colors a little too muted, and stripes signal “don’t look at me too long, or too much.”

Dread comes in when I take all these signals to mean that BR is not about wanting to dress well as much as the fear of dressing badly. “Please, just don’t make me look like an idiot,” says the modern man to BR, which tailors a Soho dream to order. The BR man’s life is not his own. He is not in charge, like the Brioni man confidently striding out of a limousine or private jet, solo. The BR man’s liberty is severely curtailed, a fate he shares with the sad citizens of the fruit-company controlled Central American nations from which the brand drew its name. In other words, Banana Republic is for me, the Republic of Fear. Once men escape from the work situation that requires BR, they cast it off like a shackle, which is why thrift stores are always full of excellent condition pieces from past seasons.

And yet BR has better taste than almost any other large chain in the United States, so when I learned that they had a more expensive line, “Monogram,” that had just been given its own store, I took a visit. The results were mixed but hopeful enough to give the brand a second look.

The store itself is on a triangular lot where Minetta hits Bleecker and Sixth, in New York’s West Village. While the standard BR interior design mixes white walls with dark wood, Monogram has gray walls with banks of floor to ceiling taupe drapes, which hide among other things, the in-house tailor (a first for BR) and the cash registers. In one alcove bordered by folding screens of mirrors, one can browse coffee table books of Richard Serra sculptures or Capri views while one waits for a fitting room. The staff was beaming: just happy to be there, but also genuinely attentive. They knew this was a plum position, and this was the first day.

The clothes themselves go some way to bring the BR dream of “affordable luxury” into focus. Take the shirts for instance: For half again as much as BR 98 USD, compared to 68, one gets a shirt with a textured stripe of red or blue, with white collar and cuffs. The fabric is genuinely superior, but the fit was perplexing: a chest of over 47 inches and a neck of 16.5, for a medium. A blue blazer (325 USD) had smart, almost eccentric touches like hacking pockets and a flapped breast pocket, a shorter length and a more fitted body than any BR coat I had ever encountered. But the would-be 3/2 lapel roll was still akward, my arms swam in the sleeves, and the lightweight worsted twill magically attracted of stray bits of fluff. The cuff buttons were sewn through but not cut through. If you’re going to do the sewing and make the alterations that more difficult in the currently fashionable style, why not just go all the way. This compromise is the BR mantra of ‘affordable luxury’ in a nutshell.

Other signs were more positive. The small and well edited collection had clear and strong colors – lightweight cashmere-silk sweaters of red and blue, for example. Patterned as well as striped shirtings were clear and focused, showing the Zara-like confidence that mainline BR so often lacks. Ties were the same.

Why can’t all of BR be this way? I wish I had asked Simon Kneen, when I saw him in the store and buttonholed him. If the name is familiar, it’s because he was, until BR’s parent company The Gap hired him in January, one of the people responsible for turning around the style of Brooks Brothers. For Monogram, he was wearing a white and black Monogram nailhead coat, a white shirt and gray trousers. Can Monogram shirts be monogrammed in store, was all I thought to say. He said they were working on it. This collection is not his work, of course (collections are designed about a year in advance, and presented half a year after that), but BR’s interest in the one year old Monogram is one reason they took him on. Kneen’s own work will debut in the Spring 09 line that BR debuts in the fall. Can he turn this great ship in a more confident and stylish direction? I’m sure he knows how. But will they let him?

Bookmark, Share or Email this article   •  Leave a Comment

The Italian Background

The generalisation that the English experiment with their shirts and the Italians with their jackets broadly holds, particularly in business wear. While the English tradition of checked and plaid wools is a fine one, it was always largely restricted to the country (or at least the weekend) and has died out slowly as fewer English men wore suits casually.

The Italians are more willing to experiment with suit cloth at every occasion. This necessitates a shirt and tie combination that makes no attempt to compete with that cloth – the Italian Background.

The Italian Background is simple: a plain blue or black tie on a plain blue shirt. (Occasionally the shirt will be white, but this can look a little funereal.)

The combination works well because a blue shirt suits most people more than white, and it fades more into the background; because a dark tie fades more into the background than a pale tie; and because the dark blue tie is the most similar in tone and harmonious combination with a blue shirt – without being too similar and evoking tone on tone.

But this is analysing the obvious. It works as the plainest and yet most sophisticated of supports to an otherwise daring suit pattern – or indeed odd jacket. It equally supports an adventurous pocket-handkerchief, gloves, hat or jacket. When trying to balance an outfit, the Italian would much rather tone down a tie than go without one.

Four examples are displayed here, all courtesy of The Sartorialist. The first is possibly the most extreme. The high contrast, double-breasted jacket stands out, but is supported effectively by an Italian Background and dark trousers. It even makes it possible to add a pointed handkerchief without appearing over the top.

The second example marries an Italian Background with a hat and bright coat, while number three includes a faintly ridiculous coat that needs all the help it can get. Notice the uniformity of dress in this second combination as well – with odd double-breasted jacket and spread collar. While this may be because they are both associated with the same clothing outlet, it shows the versatility of the Background.

Example number four brings out a particular aspect of the Background – its fruitful combination with beige or tan (yellow, essentially). It is no coincidence that every one of these pictures involves a jacket in some shade of tan. And the gentleman on the left in this example shows that the Background is the best choice for what could otherwise be a very hard suit to find combinations for.

If in doubt, go for the Italian Background. (Oh, and buy yourself a nice, plain blue tie.)

Bookmark, Share or Email this article   •  Leave a Comment

Commuter & Dad Bag Test: Timbuk2

Timbuk2 Cross Classic Messenger ($150.00) & Cross Wiki ($60.00) / www.Timbuk2.com

If there is one company that’s the proverbial 800 pound gorilla of the messenger bag industry, it’s Timbuk2. The San Francisco based company’s three paneled bags have become somewhat iconic, just like its curly-cue logo. Though owners can customize those panels to almost any color combination, the bags are still instantly identifiable.

From its founding in 1989, Timbuk2’s goal was to create a bag rugged enough to serve the street pounding bicycle messengers of San Francisco yet stylish enough to appeal to a broader market.

Unlike other messenger bag companies, whose bags were co-opted by people looking to emulate bike messengers, the epitome of cool, Timbuk2’s designs were created with potential suburban commuters in mind. In 1994, the three panel design was perfected and customers were encouraged to customize their bag designs.

This gave birth to the particularly unique Timbuk2 style wave, now seen from San Francisco to New York, Memphis to Denver. Produced in different sizes and with various functionalities, their bags all share a common look and distinctive personality that can go city slick or biker artsy based on the owner’s preferences.

The Timbuk2 web site is a combination retail portal and street art venue. You can customize your bag right down to the color of the swirling logo. The site also has an interesting history of messenger bags.

Background

The company sent me two bags, a medium classic messenger bag and Wiki laptop sleeve. Both are in the new Cross fabric that is somewhat akin to a heavy duty hounds tooth. The wide woven pattern at first looks loose and potentially weak. In fact, it is a tight weave that is totally waterproof. The Cross fabric is part of a textile experiment that has the company designers re-imagining their products with more high-end materials and treatments.

The Results

Both bags are great in their own ways. The Cross fabric is different enough to be innovative, but practical enough for daily use. In terms of bags’ functionality, they are each well designed and do what you want them to do.

Cross Classic Messenger (M)

The Timbuk2 medium classic messenger bag is in many ways the perfect commuter messenger bag. It’s large enough to hold what you need but small enough not to turn into a sack of stuff. Unlike purpose built bags that were later put to use by office dwellers, Timbuk2 messenger bags were built with that very constituency in mind.

That translates to the unique pocket panel fitted into every Timbuk 2 messenger bag. There are slots for pens, a clear window of business cards, a cell phone sleeve and a variety of other pocket in varying sizes. There are also two zippered pockets – one large and one small – for securing your valuables and loose items.

Other options like a body stabilizing strap and shoulder strap pad come with this particular model. Small but meaningful features include bag buckles constructed from metal rather and plastic and a key tether located in an outer pocket instead of the normal in-bag location.

Cross Wiki

The Wiki is a laptop commuter sleeve with a carrying handle. Other than an outside pocket that can hold a few sheets of paper, that’s it. The thickly padded corduroy lining cradles and protects your machine and the limited features keep its purpose clear and simple.

I found this to be a great bag for moving around the laptop and keeping it simple. I am a convert to keeping my laptop in its own slim and trim bag. I may not get everything into one bag, but this is a sensible and handy alternative.

Bookmark, Share or Email this article   •  Leave a Comment