That Classic 'New England' Look...

[JBZ]

Originally Posted by vaclava krishna

Do you mean, tweed chowder?

No, no - he means "tweed chowdah"

 

[Larry Lean]

Originally Posted by JBZ

No, no - he means "tweed chowdah"


Shhhhhh - Ralph Lauren might hear you.
He could wring out season after season from a concept like that.

Bless him.

 

[Larry Lean]

Originally Posted by abc123

I have a few very well fitting, waist suppressed sacks. They actually are just as fitted as my darted ones. A lack of darts doesnt mean the thing has to fit like a garbage bag, and I think a clean front looks far more elegant than a darted one.

As mentioned, you just can't go wrong with a pair of khakis, a buttondown and a pair of loafers. When it comes to business wear, I prefer English styled shirts (and about 50% of suits/sportcoats), but I lean towards the IL style in most of my dress.

Of course, I have crab pants and lots of bowties

Is the problem with the old Ivy look in the U.S. that it's so taken for granted that it's discounted?
If you want to 'dress well' you look abroad for more 'complicated' tailoring?
By which I only mean the more 'waisted' look and all those pleats & darts which the classic American style does not feature on the whole (Although they DO have their place in the cannon of classic American menswear).

Just interested.

A sack suit can be fitted and have a very nice, smooth, clean silhouette as noted above.

... I like this post from another forum regarding 'Breakfast at Tiffany's':

"All you have to do is be someone who doesn't conform to "trad-disser" stereotypes. Said stereotypes at worst assume a pear-shaped fogey type in his late 60s, and at best an aging Ivy Leaguer like Plimpton or GHWB.

Peppard was (or at least appeared) reasonably tall, thin, and handsome. Also athletic. Active, fun. His life was just beginning, he was out doing things. And in their day, so were GHWB and Plimpton, James Stewart, etc. That's why young Stewart always looks like a little boy lost in a suit in a double-breasted number, but somewhat sophisticated in a sack.

Add in a few things that current J. Press trad doesn't have, the narrow lapels and ties, also which make a taller, skinnier person seem proportional with the sack...it undoes the image of sackliness and makes the undarted suit still look svelte.

I look at old pictures of my dad when he was 6'3 and 180, not 6'3 225, and I see why he looked great in that stuff too. I think I get compliments from girls about my clothes for the same reason... (6'0, 170-175).

It is the trad-disser stereotype, of the plump old flatulant fogey or the sagging eyelided, red nosed aging Dartmouth alum who was the quarterback way back in 1953, that gives that unflattering sense to trad. Because such a person, simply because of the era in which he lived, would be more likely to wear trad threads, the clothes become associated with his stereotype. The reality is, he'd look old, baggy-eyed, and not so great in anything. It might fit differently, but whatever he wore most would still be probably associated with him

Trad looks great on Peppard because he was young, good looking, and wore it. If more decent looking people wore trad threads, suddenly all this nonsense about its outdatedness and how it's an old-man, fading style would be out the window.

If Leo DeCaprio and Matt Damon started appearing in J. Press suits, taken in at the side seams, possibly with narrower lapels, there would be a run on 262 York Street.

It's just what FNB said in his article on Mr. Wilder: a look that was once associated with youthfulness is now associated with a perhaps undesirable maturity.

Just an opinion from a young guy who thinks he looks good in trad."

That was by Coolidge & I've quoted him behind his back because if I'd asked him first he'd have rightly told me where to go.
I'm happy for him to give me a good telling off for this.
He just says things so much better than I do, hence the quote.

I am genuinely really interested in why Englishmen wear classic English tailoring & Italian men wear classic Italian tailoring but only a minority of American men wear classic American tailoring.
And those who do when we get to hear from them on the MBs attribute some neo-conservative meaning to the cut of their jackets so often.

Why so often is home-grown no-go to the stylish American man?
Why is your wonderful & unique tailoring heritage left to be reduced to an odd dress-up costume for those who think more of social class & politics than the elegance of the way in which they present themselves to the world?

All opinions welcome.
No trolling here from me... Just asking questions that don't get answers elsewhere.

l.

 

[Larry Lean]

Oddly I posted this twice - Sorry.

Not like me to repeat myself...

 

[Larry Lean]

Little Christmas bump here just because I like the ideas in this thread and do genuinely believe that if any forum will tell me why most Americans don't wear American then it will be this one.

(Oh, OK you got me - I like the part where I cheek Alan C. too... I'm a bad person.)

A Happy Chrismas to you all!

LL

 

[jml90]

Originally Posted by Larry Lean

Shhhhhh - Ralph Lauren might hear you.
He could wring out season after season from a concept like that.

Bless him.
That largely depends on how well seasoned the chowdah is I would guess.