WSJ article on plaid

[rayalexsmith]

Plaid is dead. Love live plaid. My story in today's WSJ about the abundance of plaid in menswear at the moment. Thanks for the forum members who let me interview them for this. You were great sports. Ray

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...KEYWORDS=plaid

 

[Gus]

I will always have a very special place in my heart for authentic madras plaid (with slubs and bleeding).

 

[medtech_expat]

Interesting article - thanks for sharing.

 

[Dewey]

Interesting article, thanks for posting and inviting comment here.

Isn't plaid ubiquitous over the history of American menswear? Was there ever a year when a man could not buy a plaid shirt and wear it and not be conspicuous? I think the answer is no, but I am not sure.

For that reason, something about the argument of the article is not working for me. It's like arguing that "Shirts are dead. Long live shirts." Once again, shirts are present on runways. "I think we'll do more shirts," says one clothing director. I guess I am saying that plaid as a category of menswear is not specific enough to be meaningful.

Plaid shirts and plaid sports coats have had independent life cycles since the 1970s at least. There was nothing Herb Tarlek about Seattle grunge, and likewise plaid Black Fleece suits don't really belong in the same paragraph as plaid Woolrich work shirts. The fact that both are plaid, just barely begins to describe them.

Still it is much easier to write snarky comments than to write articles for the WSJ, so props to you on this success.

 

[HHD]

I enjoyed that, thanks for posting. I'm seeing a lot more plaid in Paris since Uniqlo opened earlier this year, just before Christmas the entire ground floor was dominated by colourful plaid shirts.

Going upmarket, Margaret Howell has included a (usually relatively sober) plaid shirt in her mens collections for decades.

 

[GoldenTribe]

"Hickey Freeman plans to introduce suits with a glen plaid pattern over herringbone, which makes the normally subtle pattern stand out more, for fall 2011" This sounds really cool, anyone got photos of anything like it?

 

[Gus]

I feel like we are going through a late 70's plaid revival.

 

[Dewey]

Originally Posted by pocketsquareguy

I feel like we are going through a late 70's plaid revival.

I don't. You remember the 70s?

Black is still way too popular to have 2011 looking much like the late 70s.

With cotton & other natural fabrics becoming more expensive very quickly, we could be headed back to polyester days. Still I remember the 70s as far more garish, on average, than what we have today.