So would YOU/do YOU wear "Trad"?

[Larry Lean]

And so my old question again -

Can this style be salvageable?

Can the broadness of the style ever recover from the 2004-2006 'Trad' take on it on the net?

I can't think of any other clothing style (English, Itallian, etc.) that has this unique image problem.
Really interesting stuff...
The world's biggest democracy, but it's home-grown tailoring style has all this class-conscious baggage added on to it.
Be for or against the class system (It doesn't matter much either way, it's still there!), you have to wonder why this has happened in the US - The country that fought to be free of all those old fuedal ideas.
Do you want an aristocracy because you've never had one, other than a class of the wealthy & 'well connected'?
The ideas being played with here are fascinating for a European outsider like me.

I understand what Trad is, but I'd love to know why Trad is.

All thoughts (Even my good friend Dopey's - No hard feelings.) are welcome.

Thanks -

David

 

[Get Smart]

salvageable in what sense? mainstream acceptance?

i don't think it really matters...the clothes are still available, so one is free to buy and wear an 'authentic' ivy style any day of the week. It doesnt bother me that certain looks got appropriated into something they never started off being. When i was younger I cared more about that stuff, but now I could give a **** all about it. There's definitely a distinct difference between "ivy style" and "Trad" but so be it. History has shown that styles evolve and new ones come from the foundations of older ones, so it's nothing new.

 

[dopey]

Originally Posted by Larry Lean

And so my old question again -

Can this style be salvageable?

Can the broadness of the style ever recover from the 2004-2006 'Trad' take on it on the net?

I can't think of any other clothing style (English, Itallian, etc.) that has this unique image problem.
Really interesting stuff...
The world's biggest democracy, but it's home-grown tailoring style has all this class-conscious baggage added on to it.
Be for or against the class system (It doesn't matter much either way, it's still there!), you have to wonder why this has happened in the US - The country that fought to be free of all those old fuedal ideas.
Do you want an aristocracy because you've never had one, other than a class of the wealthy & 'well connected'?
The ideas being played with here are fascinating for a European outsider like me.

I understand what Trad is, but I'd love to know why Trad is.

All thoughts (Even my good friend Dopey's - No hard feelings.) are welcome.

Thanks -

David
Cleaning up after zealots can be exhausting.

"The world's biggest democracy, but it's home-grown tailoring style has all this class-conscious baggage added on to it."

The style came with the baggage. At best, the baggage was ignored for a while. Perhaps you mean "added back on to it" or regrafted, but I don't think even you believe it was ever lost in transit.

Perhaps that analogy is apt. The baggage stayed in the US and when trad's popular adoption dissapated and the style returned home, the familiar luggage was waiting. But since trad made the trip overseas in a mass of humanity and without the baggage, your associations with trad are different.

That would explain why your vision is so static (even if it is open). It is fixated on American trad at the moment it crossed the border, not before or after. Just a theory of course.

 

[globetrotter]

Originally Posted by Larry Lean

I can't think of any other clothing style (English, Itallian, etc.) that has this unique image problem.

David



many countries in the world have a "uniform" worn by the people who run the country, or at least the old money of that country. Italy does, so does England, so does France, so does India, Israel, Jordan, etc.

since the US is the single super power right now, the uniform of the old money in the US takes on greater importance right now, and is more interesting to study.

not that many people want to, or believe that they are able to, change their dress and fit in with the Jordanian, or German, or Bulgarian elite. many people hope that by changing alittle of their dres, they can fit in with the american ruling class.

 

[Man In Space]

Originally Posted by Larry Lean

And so my old question again -

Can this style be salvageable?

Can the broadness of the style ever recover from the 2004-2006 'Trad' take on it on the net?

I can't think of any other clothing style (English, Itallian, etc.) that has this unique image problem.
Really interesting stuff...
The world's biggest democracy, but it's home-grown tailoring style has all this class-conscious baggage added on to it.
Be for or against the class system (It doesn't matter much either way, it's still there!), you have to wonder why this has happened in the US - The country that fought to be free of all those old fuedal ideas.
Do you want an aristocracy because you've never had one, other than a class of the wealthy & 'well connected'?
The ideas being played with here are fascinating for a European outsider like me.

I understand what Trad is, but I'd love to know why Trad is.

All thoughts (Even my good friend Dopey's - No hard feelings.) are welcome.

Thanks -

David

All right, we get it. You don't like the AAAC Trad Forum. You didn't fit in and thought that they were snobs. Boo-hoo.

Quit pretending that the topic is so interesting. It's not - you're just trying to find an outlet for your frustrations with another forum. Why not deal with it over there?

 

[borace]

Originally Posted by Man In Space

Quit pretending that the topic is so interesting. It's not

Over 2900 views and 100 repies say different.

 

[Larry Lean]

This has been discussed nowhere else.
Try it on AAAC & it's Flaming or Trolling & they'll ban ya.

I value all the views here.

I'm relaxed about using various techniques & taking various positions to find out what's what.
Often you can find out just a little bit more by being just a little bit of a pain **********...

... Or arse if you live in England!

The discussion interests me. And that's what we're having here.
There's no recruitment drive going on here for the Ivy point of view. I'm merely interested in opinions & feelings on this subject.

And Dopey's are some of the most fascinating.
How many other 'True-Trads' come out of hiding to argue their case?

 

[Larry Lean]

Purely a PS to the above -
Get Smart's input has been of great value too.

It's not all about 'Goodies' Vs 'Baddies' like in Cowboy films, Man in Space. The point is to explore ideas. Draw people out if you have to, but see what's said.

I've kept on saying that I'm endlessly interested in all of this and I am. All aspects interest me. Blokes in bow-ties in Boston and kids from Stockwell in button-downs on a Saturday night. They're all the same to me.

All a part of the big picture.

 

[Larry Lean]

Just adding to the big picture of which I am so fond -

This is the latest find by the FNB poster known as 'Horace'. I'm posting it here not to make any point at all but because I think it adds to the debate/discussion.

" Sartorial Note. Commweal magazine (9 Aug 1957)

The phenomenon has been there to be seen for quite some time, no doubt, but it was just the other day that were fell to musing on the triumph of the Ivy League style in fashions for men. Natural shoulders and narrow lapels, somber colors and dignified cut are the now ubiquitous hallmarks of the Ivy mode, and what used to be the special garb of a special breed of northeastern American is now accepted dress of John Doe all over the nation.

What is curious about this fact is that the Ivy look is traditionally the mark of the Harvard type, the intellectual, the sophisticated Easterner. And, as we are assured continuously by writers who claim access to the general will, this type is either an object of fun or a sinister figure in the popular imagination. He is an egg head, probably a "pinko," more than likely a "bleeding heart" internationalist. He is clearly not a one hundred per cent American.

But if the Ivy League egg head is a figure of mixed suspicion and derision, how is that his working clothes have become prestige symbols for the nation at large? Why, if he holds the type in such contempt, does the average citizen now wear his emblematic short haircut and gray flannel suit?

We read too many papers to deny the existence today of anti-intellectualism or the prevalence of the anti-Harvard animus, yet merely to say paradox is to explain nothing. All we can offer is the observation that in cultural values, as in everything else, things are seldom as simple as they seem. Opposing attitudes can and do exist simultaneously in the minds of men, and we think this is the case here. The Ivy Leaguers's place in American life is not to be seen in black or white; it is as darkly gray as his famous flannel suit. "

Interesting! (As I'm fond of saying)

 

[dopey]

Nice article (it is "Commonweal" by the way, you have a typo).

You won't get a response from me on your new thread as, with a few exceptions, I don't have any particular affinity for trad clothes. Those that do are alive and well and can speak for themselves.

 

[Jovan]

Originally Posted by Get Smart

one thing that seems to be forgotten is that the ivy style was a YOUTH oriented style (since it's based on collegiate looks), hence there is some vibrancy to it, as it always occurs when young'ins take an established grown up look (which nearly all youth styles originate from) and make it their own. that's a big difference between "trad" and "ivy"....trad seems to wallow in oldman stodginess, where "ivy" is more youthful in its presentation. perhaps trad is what becomes of former ivies after they've had a few kids, taken on a mortgage, and otherwise lost their zest for life(!!)
Exactly what I pointed out in that AAAC thread. It's not really trad... pretty much every photo he shows is Ivy League-ish.

 

[Larry Lean]

Originally Posted by dopey

Nice article (it is "Commonweal" by the way, you have a typo).

You won't get a response from me on your new thread as, with a few exceptions, I don't have any particular affinity for trad clothes. Those that do are alive and well and can speak for themselves.

I never would have thought that. You have the Trad POV down very well for one with only a casual interest.
I think the new 'Class & Clothes' thread needn't be for Trads only but for anyone who's got any thoughts on why Trad might be doing so well on its forum at the moment.
Doubtless you & I will bump into each other in cyberspace again one day. You're an interesting guy. Thanks for all your input here.

... Sadly typos are my constant companion...

 

[Larry Lean]

More for the mix -

An update from the 'J.Simons' Ivy League style shop in London. The only Ivy League style shop in Europe.


http://j.simons.mysite.wanadoo-membe...uk/index.jhtml


Interesting!

 

[Get Smart]

I finally got to see the actual J Simons speak on a UK tv special called Sounds of Underground London (S.O.U.L.) during the "60s mod" chapter. Always nice to place a face/voice to the famous name.

 

[Larry Lean]

Nice bloke.
Down to earth and still an enthusiast after all these years.
Anyone can walk into his shop & talk to him.