The rules and how to break them. No3

Do not wear white after Labor Day.

Rules are there for a reason, but there is nothing wrong with breaking them. These statements are not contradictory. Once you understand the rules, you can work out how to break them effectively.

Of all the rules, not wearing white after Labor Day in the US is the most disconnected from its intention. Doing so attracts the ire of many people who would otherwise have no opinions on correct dress or style. They certainly would not point out that notch lapels are anathema on a tuxedo.

For example, in an online discussion on this rule, one person comments: “White should never be worn between Labor Day and Easter. It is called good manners. Only the ignorant of decorum would say…oh, it doesn’t matter. It shows how much education and attention to propriety a person has. Only break the rule if you want people to think you do not know any better.”

Can you feel the vitriol spattering up onto you?

The reasoning behind the rule is simple. You wear white in the summer because the weather is brighter. It is usually sunnier, the sun is higher in the sky, so it is brighter. And light-coloured clothes suit brighter weather, just like black is the dominant colour of an evening event. Other light colours are equally summery – tan linen jackets, seersucker suits, co-respondent shoes – and suit brighter weather.

But that does not mean that it is never bright in winter. Indeed, the frosty and blue-skied days of December often seem the brightest, if only by contrast to the leaden days that surround them.

White is the lightest of colours and therefore only suited to the brightest of days. In order to avoid having to teach the plebeians about the harmony of colours and weather, a rule was invented – only wear white in the summer months, here defined as between Easter and Labor Day. Like all rules, this one loses in complexity what it gains in immediacy.

Once you know why that rule exists, it is easy to break it with impunity. Winter whites can look simply lovely, although they should really be creams and off-whites to be most practical and flattering.

The pictures illustrate this, with the wearing of cream cotton trousers (again, from The Sartorialist. He just takes the best pictures). Trousers are probably the easiest rule-breaker to go for, as they are after all not far off the ubiquitous American chino in colour. I’d go for shoes next, with jacket last.

It is no coincidence that this rule is dominant in the US, yet barely known in the UK. The weather in much of the US, particularly the east coast, is consistent enough to link sun with particular months, and so produce a sensible rule. In London, where you are just as likely to have grim rain in July and a week of sun in January, the rule seems absurd.

That is what the rule means, and understanding it allows you to break it intelligently. Wear white when it’s bright.

Paul Smith sale shop, take two

Ok, I’ve written about this before. But it deserves a second mention – largely because I bought my fifth pair of shoes in as many years there yesterday.

It is the Paul Smith sale shop. Located on Avery Row, just off a Bond Street tributary. Sells many items made by Mr Smith (suits, socks, shirts). But most impressively has a constant turnover of great shoes with 40% to 60% off.

You wouldn’t think that would happen with a sale shop. After all, its function is to take the dross that didn’t sell in the main store before the end of the season and recover as much profit as possible. When things don’t sell here, they have to be binned – so there is a steep incentive to try and recover your costs at least.

There isn’t always a great selection. Over the summer there was an alarming proliferation of leather sandals in the Paul Smith stripes. Which didn’t shift for months.

But pop in there when you are near Bond Street and I reckon every second or third visit will find you sorely tempted.

Last time I wrote about the store, I had just bought a pair of red “dip dye” suede brogues. They were lovely. All season I had watched that dip-dye range sit mockingly in Selfridge’s, daring me to spend over £250 on craftsmanship that doesn’t realistically match the great Northampton cordwainers they parade alongside.

Then, two months into the next season, a wave of the red suede numbers dropped into the sale store. It would seem red suede was the least popular of the permutations, yet they were my favourites.

But many of the shoes I have bought there have not been unusual. Chocolate wing-tips, for instance, and tan suede boots. The range of shoes and the sizes available is often impressive.

Particularly compared to a recent incarnation of the Paul Smith sale shop, which opened in the Royal Exchange in London. What was originally a straight Paul Smith store turned into a sale shop, but stocking an unusually limited range. All the shoes come in just one or two sizes, often seven for a man. (Which is usually a sign that the products are ex-display rather than ex-store, as display products are nearly always size seven – apparently it is the most aesthetically satisfying, for all you size sevens out there.)

Which brings me to the reason my enthusiasm was ignited anew. I had been looking for some practical boots, particularly with the prospect of Christmas in the country and lots of long Dorset walks. Something rubber-soled, possibly calf-length, nice hard-working leather.

And I found them yesterday in the sale shop, in the shape of Paul Smith’s collaboration he did with Triumph motorcycles. They’re slightly different to the model shown, being lower and not having the checkerboad pattern on the inside. But boy were they great value.

Go now. And watch out for the brown snakeskin oxfords.

Sweater colours for autumn

Winter provides a new outlet for the man interested in expressing himself through colour in his clothes. A sweater underneath a jacket, particularly with a suit, provides a very different pop of colour in an outfit – larger yet also more restrained than a handkerchief or even a tie.

Like a coloured waistcoat, it functions best when peaking out around the jacket’s waist button, as shading and outline. Without the jacket it is a dominant colour rather than an accent. Yet it is also subtler and more practical than either of the silk accessories mentioned above, and benefits as such. It is harder to appear foppish or affected, smacking as it does of utilitarian warmth.

The sweater can be V-neck, cardigan, shawl collar or anything else – the only thing to bear in mind is that the neckline should roughly mirror that of the jacket it is worn with. A loosely buttoned cardigan will seem more natural with a one or two-buttoned suit. A round-neck sweater is always going to suit a high-fastening three-button suit.

So to the colours. I have three recommendations that particularly please. They are bottle green with navy, biscuit with brown and red with green (probably tweed).

A dark blue such as navy has essentially two options with its accent colours: very subtle or very brash. Red socks with a navy suit work somehow because they are over the top, equally yellow and other bright colours. But the most harmonious accent colours are dark, strong colours, principally green and purple (see picture from the Sartorialist).

So with a navy suit try a bottle-green cardigan, loosely framing the jacket’s lapel, enriching the blue itself in its richness and reflection of tone. Perhaps a blue/white striped shirt, and a dark tie if desired.

Second, bringing out the browns of a chocolate-coloured suit through a biscuit colour, or tan. The pleasure of a chocolate-coloured suit is that, despite its unusual colouring for business, it is so dark most people take it for grey. The addition of a sweater in either a pale biscuit colour (think Rich Tea) or tan (think highly-polished Oxfords) brings out that rich brown tone. Again, I’d go for a blue or blue-striped shirt (depending on the balance of pattern elsewhere in the outfit).

And finally, bounce up a green tweed with something bright – and nothing’s stronger than red. Strong colours work so well with tweed because it is so subtle on its own, quietly hiding flecks of autumnal colours in its thick weave. The country squire’s socks of bright red and bright yellow work well for this reason. As a sweater against the cold, perhaps over a pale yellow or cream shirt, it is no longer so affected as the socks, but charming and ever-so practical.

The final suit: so close

No matter how much time you spend thinking about the instructions to give to your tailor, there will always be something you forget.

I had been thinking about the Norfolk Blazer for months, considering peak lapels, two buttons and additional pockets before I decided on my final design. (See previous posting.) Those months were almost feverish at certain points, as I debated which elements in the jacket would give it exactly the right balance between formal and informal.

But I still forgot to specify the cut around the waist and the finish at the front.

The problem was that I used an image from a style forum to demonstrate to Edward Tam what I meant in terms of a belt that overlapped across the front and fastened with two buttons. While I pointed out that there were several things in the image that I wanted differently, I didn’t specify the two points above. I assumed that in these areas he would follow the designs of previous suit jackets and only make the additions I described.

So when I tried on the final Norfolk Blazer it was rather fuller than I expected around the waist. This was because the design in the picture had a less tapered waist, no doubt more practical to the Norfolk’s normal outdoor pursuits. The belt was the correct length, cinching in the waist to my preferred size.

And the jacket finished with square fronts at the bottom, as in the picture but unlike a suit jacket, which would always be curved. I hadn’t even noticed this about the picture, but now it was pointed out it seemed obvious. The angle here was even mirrored in the squared-off patch pockets.

So my first prototype is still in Hong Kong, having the waist taken in an inch and the jacket fronts rounded off. I’ll include a picture in the next post.

In the meantime, my lesson from this is to always use an item you have had made in the past as the base for any commission. I’ll have jacket number two, but in brown with peak lapels, for example. Or shirt number three in a pale-blue herringbone.

You always need a base item because there will be many items you will forget to specify otherwise. No matter how many lists you make.

The mistake I made was not giving Edward a base – so he used the picture instead. Still, no harm done, just a few frustrated days while the final Norfolk Blazer catches up with me.

Hong Kong: The fitting

One sure sign that a tailor knows what he is doing is how he reacts to innovation. Granted, many houses have their own particular style and justly stick to what they know. But for smaller tailors with less tradition in a speciality, it is always interesting to see they react to making something a little bit different.

Thankfully, Edward Tam reacted manfully to my Norfolk Blazer and double-breasted waistcoat requests. He was a little unsure on the belt, as he had never made one in wool before, and suggested that a single pleat in the middle of the jacket’s back might work better than two at the side.

But a few specifications on the former allayed his fears (a two-inch width, it turns out, was what I was thinking of) and I was happy to acquiesce to his suggestions on the former – in his experience a classic bi-swing back often remains stubbornly open a lot of the time, no doubt due to the fact that modern man is so often reaching for his computer’s keyboard.

My inspiration for the double-breasted waistcoat was taken from a recent Brioni model, and featured vertical points on both sides of the vest at their extreme corners, so that the line from the buttons went straight down to a point, before angling up again. As a result, the waistcoat has two points exposed when it is done up, with the rear flap of cloth peeking out below the front flap – much like the pointed finish that a single-breasted waistcoat has.

Double-breasted waistcoats nearly always have a clean, horizontal line to them at the front – something confirmed by Edward’s book of classic style illustrations. So he was a little unsure about this modern take, but again thought he could reproduce the look and had an intense conversation with his studio about it (in Cantonese, unfortunately).

This contrasts with Edward’s unswerving insistence that my waistcoat had to be made when I was in Hong Kong, so that it could have at least one fitting. I commented on this a few months ago and it supported something Flusser has written, about how hard it is to tailor a waistcoat, given that it needs to be snug to the body yet retain freedom of movement.

So Edward is not one to accede to a customer’s demands not matter what. He has his principles but he’s willing to give my bizarre creations a go.

The final fitting is this afternoon. I’m almost too excited to write proprely.

Inventing the Norfolk Blazer

One of the most enjoyable parts of having bespoke clothes made is coming up with your own creations. Designing unique jackets and suits not only guarantees that you will never meet yourself coming the other way; it also allows you to express yourself in every aspect of their construction.

For my latest commission from my Hong Kong tailor, Edward Tam, I have designed a casual blazer with a twist. A three-button jacket in navy cashmere, it will feature patch pockets, a bi-swing back and a removable belt that buttons across the waist. The belt will overlap, using two buttons to fasten, and hang on two loops exactly half way around the waist – that way it will be able to fold over and button across the back.

It will also be half-lined. Although an autumn/winter jacket in the weight of the wool, the lack of lining across the back will make it cooler and more comfortable in the office – hopefully allowing me to wear it at my desk all day while working at a computer. (The bi-swing back will also help in this manner, giving quite a new use to a feature that originally helped you train your gun on an airborne duck.)

It is essentially a merger of a traditional blazer and a Norfolk hunting jacket. It will have a deeper, more blazer-like neckline than the original Norfolk, but will still have three buttons and feature a hidden button under the lapel, which fits into the working buttonhole on the other side.

This way the jacket will be able to button all the way up against the cold, as the original Norfolks were designed to do.Without bellows on any of the pockets, it will lack much of the bulk of a Norfolk jacket, yet it will retain that casual feel through the belt and the fact that the pockets are patched rather than sewn inside.

My hope is that the resulting creation will be smart enough for me to wear to less-formal meetings (probably with the belt removed, an open-necked shirt and cotton trousers of some description) and yet casual enough for the weekend (with the belt, perhaps the collar turned up and a polo shirt).

My fitting for the jacket will be tomorrow afternoon and the final product should be ready at the end of the week. Expect further reports on the success (or failure) of this creative endeavour.

Review: Indochino suits

Given that fit is more important than anything in men’s style (at least according to me), an online service that can provide you with bespoke clothes – even made to measure – has to be a good idea.

Not everyone has a high-quality tailor around the corner, and so access to bespoke is limited. Perhaps more importantly, the lack of tailors at the lower end of the price scale has moved bespoke out of the range of most men.
Indochino aims to correct both of these problems, by providing bespoke tailoring at reasonable prices over the internet. The suits range from around $250 to $400, which is cheaper than you can get made to measure pretty much anywhere, and shipping is free. Suits are shipped within two weeks and can be altered for $25.

I was invited by Indochino to try out its service and agreed to give it a go. The first thing I noticed was that it offers three different ways to get your measurements. You can measure yourself with a tape measure, measure a suit that fits you well or take instructions to a tailor and ask him to measure you.

This is an improvement on the offerings of most online suit or shirt stores, many of which invite you just to measure yourself – I’ve tried that and it can be tricky. So I went for the second option, to see if this was a viable alternative that might work online. It certainly makes more sense, and seems to offer less room for error.

There are quite professional videos demonstrating how to take the measurements, and the number asked for is impressive. However, the instructions are not necessarily clear. You are asked to lay your jacket flat. But does that mean with the side seams at the edges? Or with the jacket buttoned? Or should their be no overlap of the front panels?

These little points make a big difference – buttoning the jacket reduces your waist measurement by at least an inch, and so it is unlikely to fit. After watching the video several times, and trying to make out how the tailor had his jacket laid, I decided the jacket was buttoned.

Which was the right decision, for when the jacket arrived the waist fit perfectly, as did the arms and the waist of the trousers.

Unfortunately, that was all. The jacket was too small across the chest and the shoulders, and the collar stood away from my neck by about an inch. The trousers were also too short, almost comically so, not even touching my shoes.

Now the length of trousers is easy to alter – I can do that myself. But as I have written in previous posts, the neck is the hardest thing to change and the shoulders the second hardest. It will be expensive to correct and take time.

I have to say I wasn’t that impressed with the quality of the material either, despite it being the most expensive in the range ($400). There were signs of quality elsewhere – the jacket was canvassed, not fused. And it came with a free tie, tie bar and cufflinks.

But I’m afraid it was a disappointment. A service that sells itself on a great fit needs to get that right and it was wrong in many ways. Perhaps I should have gone for the tailor-measured option, for this route obviously didn’t work for me.

The enigma of Flusser

Alan Flusser knows a lot about style. Anyone who has read his books knows that, and knows that he has a gift for communicating his knowledge (though I would say that he had a better editor on Dressing the Man, which has a lot less flowery prose than Style and the Man).

The enigma of Alan Flusser is that, although he knows a lot about men’s clothes, he doesn’t necessarily follow his own advice. In a recent comment on this site, one reader pointed me to a video interview with Alan on men.style.com, the GQ men’s style website. The video can be seen here.

In the interview he is wearing a charcoal-grey pinstriped suit, white shirt, black tie and a pink handkerchief. It’s a combination of strong tones that some might find hard to pull off – that black tie and white shirt could easily make you look like you are at a funeral, and a strong colour like pink can easily look cheap against black.But it seems to suit Alan well, and he has obviously decided (pace his tonal recommendations in Dressing the Man) that his is a high-contrast complexion, complemented by high-contrast clothes.

Half way through the video, though, the camera pans down to reveal Alan wearing a pair of pale, ripped, rather baggy jeans. It’s hard to think of a starker failure of marrying formal and casual – indeed, as in our previous discussion, in wearing jeans and a jacket – well.

The textures of material are at completely different extremes (worsted, denim) as are the colours (white and high-contrast, blue and subtle) and the patterns (pinstripe could not be more formal, ripped jeans hardly more casual). It is an archetypal Newsreader Look.

So I am afraid I have to disagree with the reader on this point – Alan here is doing the exact opposite of everything I have professed and argued. Try wearing that combination yourself and then wear it to work.But, and it is a big but (no sniggering in the cheap seats please), I have complete confidence in Alan Flusser. His books are too good, and have been too fundamental to my passion for clothes, for me to think that he does not know what he is doing. He knows the rules and he knows he is flaunting them.Alan also has a rather personal take on style generally, as can be seen in the other photos shown here. I can only presume that when you know all the history and traditions of men’s cloth-combination, you want to do something a little different.

You can only break the rules well when you know why they are there, after all.

Wear a flat cap, but wear it right

Winston Chesterfield wrote a good column earlier this week on the love/hate relationship many have with the flat cap. I too am a fan of the flat cap, and it is usually my preferred hat. But I think two points are essential here: many men, including me, turn to it because there are few other sensible alternatives; and when wearing a flat cap, material is key.

My hair is thinning (some would put that in the past tense). On a cold day, I need a hat.

Plus, wearing a hat is a much more practical way of keeping off the rain than an umbrella. Take a look at any 1930s Hollywood film that features rain and you will find almost all men sheltering by turning up the collar of their coat. A waterproof coat with a high collar, combined with a hat, is very good at keeping out the rain. You don’t need to carry around a cumbersome brolly and your shoes are drier.

Modern man has an irrational aversion to getting anything wet, even if it is a coat designed for that purpose. Take a hat out next time it’s raining, rather than an umbrella.

So I need a hat, and hats are good. But what are my options? A Fedora, Trilby or other rimmed hat is terribly hard to pull off, particularly when you are on the young side of 40. I think it comes after cigars but before pocket watches in the order of accessories you can get away with as you get older. A beanie makes me look like a teenager. And a baseball cap makes me look like an American freshman.

(I think this lack of reasonable headgear is one reason for the huge turnover in umbrellas. People buy disposable umbrellas because they don’t really want one that is bulky to carry around, or they are afraid of losing. But they have no alternative against the rain because they feel silly in a hat. So we’re doomed to drown in crap brollies.)

A flat cap is the only realistic headgear for those between 21 and 40. It was this necessity that first persuaded me to buy one. But over time I have also learnt lessons about their suitability and propriety. Here, material is key.

A flat cap need not necessarily look like country headgear. It does if it is made of tweed or thick wool in hound’s tooth – even more so if it has large checks on it in bright patterns. As Winston rightly points out, Lock & Co does some marvellous caps, but they are deliberately items of countrywear: they are casual option for a man that already wears a Fedora or other rimmed hat for work. They are deliberately sporty to contrast with the formal brims of the working week.

We are not in that position, and do not need checks or tweed as a result. Instead, I recommend going for corduroy or felt. Both look smoother and smarter. Plus, ape the colours and (lack of) patterns seen on formal headwear: black, grey and occasionally brown.

If you wear a tweed flat cap with a suit you look like an Irish farmer on his way into town. If you wear a smart, black felt hat with a suit (and black shoes, obviously) it is merely your take on a staple formal headwear.

British style genius: The country look

The roots of British style in the functional garb of hunting and working in the country are obvious. But one easily forgets the broader and longer roots of these traditions.

So many pieces of modern British clothing originate in country wear. The centre vent and angled pockets of some suit jackets, for example, which consciously ape the hacking or riding jacket. There the central vent was required to allow your jacket to sit comfortably when you rode your horse, and the angled pockets made access easier when mounted, as your legs and lower jacket are naturally thrown forward.

Items like the trench coat, equally, which while not necessarily country garb come from the same tradition of practical British clothing. There the epaulets are required to keep your ammunition or gun sling on the shoulder. And the extra layer of material across the shoulder is intended to help cushion the recoil of a rifle.

With both these items, elements that were originally practical are now there just for style. But it is comforting to know somehow that they are not merely the whim of a designer, that they have tradition and history.

That comfort in practicality was most amply illustrated in a recent episode of the series British Style Genius, during discussion of the Barbour jacket. While well known in the UK, it apparently gained fame in the US after the release of the film The Queen, where Helen Mirren wore a version while in Scotland. Apparently the day after the premier a woman walked into the New York store and asked for “the coat the Queen wore”, and sales of that model doubled.

But the comfort in practicality was demonstrated by a rough treatment of a typical Barbour, driving over it in a car, dragging it round a field and even firing shot at it. Only then did the jacket seem worn in and characterful enough to appeal to the Barbour faithful.
The wide-spreading roots of the English country tradition were demonstrated by an exploration of how other brands, particularly Laura Ashley, have influenced British style. While you wouldn’t necessarily think of Ashley and hacking jackets or trench coats in the same stylebook, the floral prints that originally made her popular come from the same idea – a fondness for the country and all the familiarity and comfort English people associate with it.

Indeed, this is the enduring impression of Queen Elizabeth that was left by the programme. Growing up in a family of country-philes, and without a father from the age of 25, she always felt most at home outside, with a silk scarf around her head and a big jacket wrapped around her. Green wellies, not Kurt Geiger heels.

The pleasures of traditional dress

Oman has not been anything more than a small fishing and trading hub for long. Although historically a powerful port – crucial for the route between Europe and India – it only began to grow significantly this century with the discovery of oil and gas in commercial volumes in 1967.

Which is why the dress remains so refreshingly consistent; there hasn’t been the same exposure to frivolous or fleeting western tastes.

The men wear a white, ankle-length robe referred to as the dishdasha, which buttons at the neck, and a round, patterned cap on the head. They take great pride in both items. For white cloth in a dusty country, the dishdasha is remarkably clean and pressed. And the caps stick to a small range of geometric Islamic patterns that offer enough variation to encourage interest without being showy.

I was on holiday in Oman last week and was impressed with both this pride and consistency. Unlike Oman’s neighbours in the United Arab Emirates, there is a self-respect that comes with this costume that elicits an attachment to clothes largely absent in cosmopolitan Dubai or stringent Saudi Arabia. Men actively admire each other’s choices in material or pattern, without seeing the traditional dress as in any way constrictive.

Jump back a few decades, and this attitude is not that different from the passionate yet restrained attitude many British men had to their clothes – in the days when Victoria station was crammed every morning with dark suits, briefcases and bowler hats. It was the British love of a simple yet elegant style that created a love of good tailoring – fit was all important, cloth second and pattern a fair way back.

It is easy to assume that traditional dress, especially in a relatively conservative country like Oman, is an imposition, a stricture that is part of life’s implicitly religious framework. And indeed there are some aspects of dress that are forced on people: government employees have to wear a turban instead of a cap, and airport officials equally are controlled in what they can wear.

But there is a genuine attachment to this form of dress here – one that can be seen in the markets as men pick through potential materials for a new dishdasha, or select a new embroidered cap.

It is the kind of pride that is missing in much of British dressing today. If only there was the same recognition of the values of tradition, an interest in examining their heritage and a concentration on substance over form.

Two very different jackets and jeans

When a jacket-and-jeans combination works well, it is one of the most stylish outfits a man can wear, successfully bridging the casual and the formal, and merging the best elements of both.

It is, however, hard to get right. As mentioned in a previous post on The Newsreader Look, if the jacket and other elements in the top of the outfit are too formal, you can split yourself in half – giving the impression that you only paid attention to your upper torso, because you are going to sit behind a desk on TV.

The key to getting that combination right is making sure the fabrics of the more formal elements – jacket, tie, shirt, possibly handkerchief – are as casual as they can be. So no suit jackets (worsted wool cannot look anything but smart), no silk ties, probably no linen handkerchief and realistically no white shirt.

Two recent photos from the Sartorialist illustrate this very well. The younger gentleman has chosen casual fabrics for everything in his top half: rough woollen jacket; silk, stuffed handkerchief; a wool or cotton-mix tie; and a blue, oxford-weave, button-down shirt. By getting the fabrics right, he has managed to wear both a tie and handkerchief with faded jeans and plimsolls; the ultra-formal with the ultra-casual.

This is one extreme end of the spectrum: every fabric here is the casual choice. He could have opted for one or two more formal fabrics (white shirt, cashmere blazer) and it would still have worked, held in place by the casual material of the shirt and tie. He didn’t have to play it that safe.

The second, slightly older gentleman is at the other end of the spectrum. The shirt is white, of a smooth cotton with a spread collar. It is accompanied by a white, linen handkerchief. The material of the tie is hard to discern, but it is certainly more formal than that of the previous example. The only saving grace is the herringbone jacket.

Now, the jeans are admittedly darker and smarter. So the top half has less work to do in meeting the bottom half half-way, as it were. But the top half is still too pristine. The way the handkerchief is folded so precisely. The flash of a tie clip. It all smacks of dress attire and isn’t suited to jeans.

He wouldn’t have to change much to get my (entirely subjective and arbitrary) approval. Just wear a blue shirt. Or stuff the handkerchief in. Even unbuttoning the shirt collar would save the day.

Jeans and a jacket can easily go wrong. But bear the materials in mind and you’re half way there.