Loro Piana Dresses Italians At The Weekend

Recent acquisitions at Loro Piana have led me into a deeper investigation of the brand. Expect a full-length piece on its history, production and craft sometime next year.

In the meantime, the good people at LP sent me over the look book of images for Spring/Summer 2010. I’ve often picked this up in the store in previous seasons, as they have a good eye for colour combinations and layering. It is a little, professional glimpse into the ‘How Italians Dress at the Weekend’ aesthetic that so much of the Anglo-Saxon world aspires to.

(Indeed, one of my favourite-ever fashion shoots was one with just that title in the Spring/Summer 2009 edition of US Esquire’s Big Black Book – those that got the issue, you know what I mean.)

The first picture I have highlighted here is very simple. Pale grey/green, unlined linen/cashmere jacket,  grey silk/cashmere cardigan with hounds-tooth detail, cream silk shirt and white cotton trousers. Plus brown suede belt and shoes, and white linen handkerchief. Very light and summery, only to be worn on a bright day.

But I love the use of different greys – particularly the touch of green in the jacket – and the way the simplicity of tone makes the whole outfit crisp. The cardigan suggests a waistcoat (and as such looks far better with the jacket than without) and the brown suede provides perfectly neutral shadow, sucking light in.

Wearing both white shirt and trousers is dangerous – if worn on their own they can wash you out or make you look like a hospital orderly. Here the cardigan, belt and jacket break them up enough.

The second image I have chosen succeeds in the same way. The peach of the jacket, cream of the cardigan and khaki of the trousers are all from the same colour wheel – each with more or less saturation, more or less brightness. So the simple, summery shades work together well. And as before the shirt and handkerchief are bright accents, while the belt and shoes are deep shadow.

There is little difference in the materials, save that the jacket is linen and silk, and the shirt is now linen.

My final choice demonstrates the power of adding one bright tone to the outfit. The burnt orange cardigan is connected to the creams that surround it, while being far brighter and stronger. Take away the cardigan in your mind’s eye and the outfit is bleached and lifeless. It needs that colour to bring it to life (as well as to separate the shirt and trousers, as before).

The tricky thing about wearing bright colours like this, of course, is that if you are ever too hot to wear the jacket the orange is too strong on its own, cheap even. So when layering, make sure the layers are thin.

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Luxury Is Always In Flux

Luxury is not defined by price, quality or comfort. Luxury is simply what you don’t have. Or, more precisely, what you aspire to. Generally, it is that which others have or you once had.

So, obviously, what is considered luxurious is always changing. After the Second World War, material was rationed. So it was luxurious to have a waistcoat or cuffs on your trousers. The aspirations in quality of cloth would seem very low to us today. But then, manmade cloths were aspirational in the 1970s. Today the opposite is true: everything must be natural.

A couple of weeks ago I was talking to Guy Hills, of Dashing Tweeds fame, at his flat in north London. Guy is an avid collector, and showed me a pair of old hunting britches he had bought in a charity shop in Hay-on-Wye. The quality of their construction was astounding: rugged, stiff cloth, taped at the edges and handsewn, with buttons that stood out on thick stalks. I swear those stalks were half the width of the buttons themselves – they weren’t ever coming off.

Compare that to the volume of cheap, poorly made clothing that young girls buy today from Primark, New Look and the rest. It is a mistake to think that the past 50 years has necessarily seen a progression in clothing.

The luxury we have chosen there is choice. We demanded more choice and the ability to amass clothing. More clothing than we could need. Capitalism is an efficient, amoral machine and it provided that luxury.

In recent years, luxury has come to mean something else. It means branding and exclusivity. So it is luxurious to have pieces that are rare, and it doesn’t matter if that rarity is a result of price. Luxury today is synonymous with that industry; it is indeed, often referred to as the luxury industry.

So first we demanded choice, freedom. It was a freedom for more people to wear more things more often. Then we demanded the opposite: scarcity; individual items and brands that we could aspire to. Capitalism obliged, producing something rarer and more expensive no matter what your budget. Desire and craving for all!

It is too early to tell, but we might be seeing luxury change again. It might tentatively be shifting to craft, quality and longevity.

Ignore the recession and those magazine features about ‘investment pieces’. If this trend is worth anything it will outlive the recession. If it is worth anything, it will take 10 years to peak – at which point there will be a worldwide competition to make the finest leather handbag with the finest hand-stitching. And the ultimate luxury will be to own that bag, and keep it.

You can’t pick a trend while you’re in it. But here’s hoping.

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Back To Bicester

It probably wasn’t hard to feel the excitement behind the words of my last post on Bicester Village. One friend’s favourite-ever quote from this blog says it all: “I am at heart a cheap man.” (From a post last year on buying luxury – specifically, very versatile Hermes ties.) The prices and luxury menswear on offer got my heart pounding, as they did many of you given the comments I have had.

Ever since I have been trying to think of an excuse to go back, and last week I found one. The good people at Chic Outlet Shopping, of which Bicester is part, invited me to a Blogger’s Day – essentially an excuse for them to tell us bloggers about the Village, what makes it so unique, and give us a discount card to get some Christmas presents. Not a bad deal.

Of the 20 or so bloggers there, four were men – and the others seemed to be tacked onto other groups rather than being individual bloggers. The female bloggers were American and Chinese, as well as British, and varied from solo writers to managers of transatlantic teams. All a little humbling: I do hope menswear catches up soon.

I learnt a little about why Bicester is so good for up-market menswear shopping. Although Ralph Lauren has many outlets around the country (and makes more money from them than its normal stores, according to one blogger), Bicester is the only RL outlet to get Purple Label. There was a beautiful double-breasted, shawl-collar tux from Purple Label, in the Custom Fit, which is a lot narrower and seems to fit me very well. Reduced from £2200 to £440.

But I resisted – I have one set of black tie already and little need for another, given that I wear it four times a year. Plus I swore to myself to only buy bespoke jackets from now on.

Loro Piana only has two outlets in the world, one in Bicester and one in Italy. So valued is the outlet here that celebrities have been known to land by helicopter in the nearby field and make a beeline straight for the store. And the staff manages a very detailed customer register that allows you to request updates when particular items come in, and even order in advance.

So how did I fare? Pretty well. An Alfred Dunhill doctor’s bag from the traditional English range (all 100% handmade, in London) a ‘Roadster’ cashmere sweater from Loro Piana and a ‘Horsey’ coat from the same store – the model made for the Italian horseriding team at the Barcelona Olympics and featuring LP’s famous Storm System.

One more trip before Christmas would be excessive, right?

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An Exercise In Wardrobe Building

I commissioned my third bespoke suit from Graham Browne today, and I had thought about the choice pretty constantly for three weeks. There was one particular bad night in Hong Kong, plagued by jet lag, where I turned over the options for jetted versus flapped pockets for seven solid hours. I like to hope it was the insomnia that made me obsessive.

Essentially, it was a question of wardrobe building. Which suit should I commission next, given my existing bespoke, from Hong Kong and London, and ready-to-wear suits.

The existing wardrobe of suits is:

Graham Browne (British bespoke):

Single-breasted (SB) navy chalk stripe

Double-breasted (DB) blue herringbone

Henry Herbert (British bespoke, coming):

Mid-grey SB plain worsted

Edward Tam (Hong Kong bespoke):

Pale grey SB with bold Prince-of-Wales check

Mid-grey DB flannel

Dark grey SB worsted, with faint purple check

Ready-to-wear:

Blue SB pinstripe

Mid-grey SB Prince-of-Wales

Grey/green SB plain worsted

(Plus a few others either too old or cheap to mention…)

So what to commission from Graham Browne next? I want to build up a relatively conservative, business wardrobe. So the next commission would likely be navy or grey. My previous two suits from Browne were both blue, so logically grey next? But then all three Hong Kong suits are shades of grey…

Plus both the British bespoke suits have been heavier wools (12-ounce worsted and 13-ounce flannel). I haven’t really got a normal, worsted bespoke suit yet – one that would stand out at a conference only for its cut.

I’d also absolutely love a Prince-of-Wales; but I have two already. It would be nice to have a navy suit where the jacket would work as a blazer; but that would probably mean a heavier cloth. A bespoke tweed jacket would be different and practical; but I should probably get a suit while I have the money (a jacket would be cheaper).

It was all rather introverted and narcissistic. And not helped by the various cloths on display, such as a lovely thick, grey herringbone that was just sitting there, left over.

In the end I went for an SB two-piece in mid-blue, one button and with a slight cutaway to the jacket front. The cloth is 9.5 ounce, with a very small herringbone. A basic business suit, really. My only concession to experiment is the trousers – high waisted, to be worn with braces. I’m excited about this, my first ‘braced’ suit. The trousers will be about one and a half inches higher than mine at the moment, which isn’t that much; but there will be a fish-tail back.

Oh, and I couldn’t decide between a peaked and notched lapel. So I went for a fish mouth instead – where the lapel is slightly pointed upwards, but not as much as a peak lapel, and not extended either. It creates a smaller, more pointed notch. And is a compromise between the two traditional options.

Expect pictures of this fishy suit being cut soon.

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A Pleasant Visit To Huntsman

There’s a festive reindeer in the window of Savile Row tailors Huntsman. There is some dispute among the staff as to whether it is, in fact, a reindeer, or a mere stag. But it is definitely dressed in a spotty red silk scarf. And its name is Brian.

Chatting to some of the cutters and tailors there last week, it was interesting to hear that the back part of the ground floor was only opened up four years ago. As this back section houses all the cutting, with five full-time cutters on board now, it seems natural to have it on view. A feeling of involvement with your clothes is a key benefit of bespoke, and without this open plan the connection would be lost.

It’s also a wonderfully bright room, the ceiling being almost entirely skylight. But that does make it noisy when it rains.

Talking of the cutters, it was noteworthy that one is now dedicated to women’s tailoring. Having a woman in this role makes a vast difference, as I have seen with my own eyes when men’s tailors take the measurements, and discuss style preferences, of women. No matter how discreet the tailors are, it is not easy for many a woman to discuss her shape. And even harder to communicate how she’d like something to be cut.

Far easier if the cutter is a woman trained in womenswear and coming fresh to Savile Row tailoring, rather than the other way around.

It was good to chat to some of the other staff as well, who demonstrate an impressive range in ages. The first-floor room is more youthful than any other I have visited in Savile Row, with three young tailors. Looks can be deceiving though – coatmaker David Hayes started as an apprentice at Huntsman 12 years ago and has now trained the other two. One of them showed off a gorgeous tweed shawl-collar jacket of his own design (after some jeering from his colleagues). Down in the basement, a rather older generation is led by finisher Sybil Dance, who has served Huntsman for 57 years. She claims to have started when she was two.

Sybil also loves the reindeer, but maintains it should be called Rudolph.

The pattern room is fascinating to browse – full of both client patterns and works in progress. I was struck by one coat in particular, a wool coat in a large herringbone pattern, alternating grey and bright blue. Lovely.

Being Huntsman, tweeds stand out as well. After a relatively muted range last year, this year’s offerings are far brighter and – in that way – more typical of Huntsman. The Bridgend and Ellen are deceptive, a conservative ground allowing pink, mauve, orange and turquoise to play in the checks. And the Finlaggen and Charlotte, with their stronger vertical lines, have been much photographed in recent magazine shoots. All are exclusive to Huntsman, the collection rounded off with the Bowmore.

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