Your dream outfit

[Christiern]

I thought it might be interesting to see what my fellow posters either once wore or wanted to wear.

While rummaging in a closet this morning, in search of some Lonnie Johnson tapes, I came across a 1972 issue of Ebony magazine. Flipping through it was a nostalgia trip, but nothing I saw is a match for the following. In fact, Eleganza was the place to send your money if you wanted to wear the right (?)threads. In case it is too small to read, here is the enticing ad copy:

• Sensational new California inspiration, guaranteed to make people turn and stare at any man who wears it! The light weight coat, of 65% rayon, 27% acetate, 8% mohair, is FORTY-THREE inches long, sweeping from a 9" pointed collar to a broad two button double breasted front, down to a slim, tapered open bottom for a truly striking effect. Matching slacks have 2 1/2" Continental waistband; 21" flare bottoms; front western pockets; slash back pockets. A868 Burgundy with Gray trim. A869 Black with White trim. A870 Black with White trim. Coat sizes: S,M,L,XL. Slacks waist sizes: 28 to 36. $39.95 ppd., or $5 deposit on C.O.D., you pay postage. Satisfaction guaranteed. See our collection of dramatically styled apparel and imported footwear.
  

[Dan Gould]

There's a reason why the 60s-70s is universally recognized as the single ugliest clothing era in the history of mankind.

[catesta]

guaranteed to make people turn and stare at any man who wears it!

I don't doubt it.

[Big Al]

This doesn't have anything to do with that new poster over at AAJ, does it?

[Big Al]

Seriously, though, I wear my dream outfit on a daily basis: t-shirt, shorts, & flops*. And if I really wanna offend someone, I’ll wear black socks with those flops.

*”Flops” is a catch-all term I use for sandals of all type: Birks, flip-flops, etc.

[Christiern]

This doesn't have anything to do with that new poster over at AAJ, does it?

How perceptive of you, Al. Yes, I have to admit that he was an inspiration,

[catesta]

I’ll wear black socks with those flops.

Ouch!

B-)

[sheldonm]

I thought it might be interesting to see what my fellow posters either once wore or wanted to wear.

While rummaging in a closet this morning, in search of some Lonnie Johnson tapes, I came across a 1972 issue of Ebony magazine. Flipping through it was a nostalgia trip, but nothing I saw is a match for the following. In fact, Eleganza was the place to send your money if you wanted to wear the right (?)threads. In case it is too small to read, here is the enticing ad copy:

• Sensational new California inspiration, guaranteed to make people turn and stare at any man who wears it! The light weight coat, of 65% rayon, 27% acetate, 8% mohair, is FORTY-THREE inches long, sweeping from a 9" pointed collar to a broad two button double breasted front, down to a slim, tapered open bottom for a truly striking effect. Matching slacks have 2 1/2" Continental waistband; 21" flare bottoms; front western pockets; slash back pockets. A868 Burgundy with Gray trim. A869 Black with White trim. A870 Black with White trim. Coat sizes: S,M,L,XL. Slacks waist sizes: 28 to 36. $39.95 ppd., or $5 deposit on C.O.D., you pay postage. Satisfaction guaranteed. See our collection of dramatically styled apparel and imported footwear.
  

.....the price is right . I just saw Shaft on TV the other night, I think I saw someone wearing this thing!!!

[Guest Chaney]

This doesn't have anything to do with that new poster over at AAJ, does it?

How perceptive of you, Al. Yes, I have to admit that he was an inspiration,

Aw crap! Now I'll have to visit AAJ to figure out who you're talking about.

Slacks waist sizes: 28 to 36

Looks like tubbies need not apply.

[Noj]

How 'bout an all white suit with a matching hat? You'd think this dazzy cat was Cuban.

Andre 3000 bit his whole look from George Clinton, but even he didn't take it the extra step to the pink bikini briefs like Kool Keith...

[Big Al]

Actually, the above ad looks like a CTI ad for Freddie Hubbard's (at the time) latest LP!

[Spontooneous]

Y'know, when I was 12 years old, those Eleganza ads seemed soooo cool. Not that I bought the clothes, mind you.

[Guest Chaney]

August 17, 2004

Fedoras Fly and Trilbys, Too: Downtown Tips Its Hat to Harlem

By GINIA BELLAFANTE

When Rod Keenan arrived in Manhattan from Kansas more than a decade ago, transported by dreams of becoming a kind of contemporary Charles James, he took to the benighted habit of wearing a hat, a practice that yielded certain demographic discoveries. Generally speaking, his encounters with mockery took place in locations south of Morningside Park.

"I'd be walking around downtown, and people would give me a weird look or say `What is up with that hat?' " Mr. Keenan explained last week at his West 122nd Street town house. "But in Harlem, where there is a long tradition of formal dress, I'd always get a `Hey, man, nice hat.' "

Fortunately for Mr. Keenan, who is one of the city's few custom men's hat makers, such geographic divisions no longer hold. At a time when formality is hardly the order of the day and presidential candidates campaign for office as if the whole of their wardrobes derived from the Gap gestalt, traditional men's hats including Panamas, fedoras and newsboy caps, among other iterations, are experiencing an unforeseen resurgence.

The current issue of Cargo, the new fashion magazine for young men, features a model in a plaid suit and a two-toned golf cap on one page, and another scouring a library shelf in a tweed trilby from Lands' End on the next. Mr. Keenan has watched with some fascination as his traditional hats have turned up in eccentrically minded style publications like Flaunt, as well as in Maxim and Stuff, men's magazines that pay little attention to the foppish.

At the same time, the Stetson company has chosen this moment to revamp its image. Early next year, the 140-year-old milliner, known as much for its organization-man hats as for its Western styles, will open its first-ever store on Bleecker Street, amidst the frenzy of the Marc Jacobs and Ralph Lauren boutiques. Eighteen months ago, the company put a new creative team in place to produce a line of expensive men's hats, some with intricate weaves and hand painting, that would sell at stores like Bergdorf Goodman to the urbane sorts who drive Vespas and speak more than one Romance language. It would be called "the modern collection."

During the venture's first season, Henry Hershkowitz, the company's new creative director, said, only 12 fedoras from the new line were sold to stores. For the coming winter season, the company sold hundreds. And for spring 2005, Mr. Hershkowitz, once a lawyer and an owner of the Screening Room in TriBeCa, reported that the modern collection will offer three varieties of the fedora, so great is the demand for the hat.

"It's very interesting to look at the demographics of all this," said Aida O'Toole, the owner of J. J. Hats on Fifth Avenue, the 93-year-old purveyor of old-guard Stetsons, boaters and Borsalinos. "We're getting 16-year-olds coming in here now asking for fedoras." Three or four years ago, Ms. O'Toole began noticing younger browsers in her shop. "We saw a big hat craze around the time of `Urban Cowboy,' " she said, "but after that it was quiet for a very long time."

When considering the cultural forces behind the renewed affection for such head gear, the impact of celebrity endorsement cannot be ignored. "I hate to say it, but if I had to cite a reason for all this, I'd have to say `Queer Eye,' " Mr. Keenan acknowledged. But hip-hop artists like Wyclef Jean frequently turn up in formal hats, and so do movie stars like Brad Pitt. Not long after a contestant on "Celebrity Poker Showdown" on Bravo played his hands wearing a particular trilby, Mr. Keenan was deluged with requests for the hat.

One afternoon last week, the actor Nicolas Cage paid a visit to the Midtown studio of Orlando, the one-named custom milliner who also produces hats for Worth & Worth and looks as though he should be a competitive tango dancer. In his work space, surrounded by wood hat blocks, steaming devices and framed advertisements that might have appeared in Fortune circa 1952, are Irish walking hats and the straw sorts that seem to be begging for the companionship only seersucker blazers could provide.

"Fifteen years ago, you'd see the mature man coming here — you know, 50 and up," Orlando noted. "Now I'm seeing the $150,000-a-year-plus, 32-year-old professional." Orlando's felt hats cost about $125; his cashmere ones, $350. Each year, though, he turns out two or three finely woven Montecristi straw hats that each take a year and 10 pairs of hands to weave. Mr. Cage bought one for $3,000.

However influential celebrity hat-wearing may be, most in the millinery trade acknowledge a gloomier imperative. "The whole hip-hop generation has done a lot for the hat business," Ms. O'Toole said. "But the real reason behind it all? Skin cancer."

[patricia]

Pile all the baseball caps, except those worn by men who actually play baseball, in a giant mound and have a ceremonial blaze.................marshmallows provided, free of charge. Why do men insist on wearing a little boy's cap???

Do NOT bring back the over-sized, feather-festooned fedoras favoured by business managers of ladies of the night.

BRING BACK COOL HATS, SUCH AS THE FEDORA AND THE PORK-PIE AND THE BLOCKED DRIVER'S CAP [the one worn by men in Ferraris and M.G.s. and Hef in his prime.]

The late sixties and all of the seventies was the WORST fashion period for men's fashion. Striped polyester bellbottoms anyone??

Edited August 18, 2004 by patricia

[Dan Gould]

Pile all the baseball caps, except those worn by men who actually play baseball, in a giant mound and have a ceremonial blaze.................marshmallows provided, free of charge. Why do men insist on wearing a little boy's cap???

Forget that. There's no harm in expressing support for your favored team.

What I say is: confiscate any baseball cap being worn backward. Then have your bonfire.

[7/4]

Why do men insist on wearing a little boy's cap???

Many do it because they're hiding a bald spot.

I only ware one when I walk in the park to keep the sun out of my eyes. As soon as I'm back in the car I take it off.

[Dan Gould]

Ballcaps have other valuable practical uses, like hiding unwashed hair when you just need to run out and get the Sunday paper or run to the ATM machine.

And don't deny you guys haven't done that yourselves!

[Noj]

I've got a ball cap on right now...

[patricia]

I've got a ball cap on right now...

Love ya anyway, Noj, but even you have to admit that a ballcap is not the most alluring hat that a grown man can choose.

As for the "unwashed hair camoflage" defence, well, that's just gross. Now, whenever I see a man in a baseball cap, I'll think that he has dirty, greasy hair. But, if you insist on wearing a ballcap, at least wear the beak to the front. That plastic thing on the forehead is a HUGE turnoff!!!

BTW, a bald spot, unless it is accompanied by a "comb-over" is not the worst thing that can happen to a man. I would rather see a man just go with his diminishing hair than spread twenty-seven remaining hairs over the spot. Stuff happens with guy's hair and women are really turned off by comb-overs, at least all the women I know. Just let your head be itself. Trust me.

Also, track pants should be burned in an adjacent bonfire, unless you are actually engaged in an athletic activitiy, especially if you are also sporting a "fanny pack".

I wonder whether men dressed in a baggy sweatshirt, track pants, baseball cap, "favourite" sneakers and a fanny pack know how really unattractive they look. What's wrong with jeans and a sweatshirt, worn with reasonably clean sneakers as casual, comfortable attire??

Edited August 18, 2004 by patricia

[Noj]

Did I mention I'm VERY single? Maybe it's the ball cap that turns all the ladies off.

My hair is clean under my cap. I don't want my hats to smell!

[patricia]

Did I mention I'm VERY single? Maybe it's the ball cap that turns all the ladies off.

My hair is clean under my cap. I don't want my hats to smell!

No, you did not mention that you are "very single", but any intrigued ladies, I'm sure, will have made a mental note. Clean hair is essential, always.

Baseball caps are not inherently evil. I just don't like them, even though both my daughters, from time to time, wear them and they look quite fetching on them.

I remain firm in my opposition to track pants though and the fanny-pack is the single, IMO, WORST thing that any man can have on their body, unless they are riding a bicycle and it is on their butt, simply as a convenience. Worn to the front it looks, as my youngest daughter would say, "like some sort of colostomy bag". So, remember that, next time you consider using one. Her words, not mine. The alternative is a shoulder bag or the inside pockets of your jacket. I speak only from an aesthetic standpoint, so you decide.

[Dr. Rat]

When I was younger and about 40 pounds lighter I went to see the Skatalites, and one of the gentlemen on stage was wearing a nice pair of shoes, nicely tailored tweed pants, a three-butoon, single-breasted thin-lapelled jacket, long skinny tie, white linen shirt and a porkpie hat.

That for me became the height of fashion.

It doesn't look good on stocky people, though.

--eric

[patricia]

When I was younger and about 40 pounds lighter I went to see the Skatalites, and one of the gentlemen on stage was wearing a nice pair of shoes, nicely tailored tweed pants, a three-butoon, single-breasted thin-lapelled jacket, long skinny tie, white linen shirt and a porkpie hat.

That for me became the height of fashion.

It doesn't look good on stocky people, though.

--eric

EVERYBODY can look good, if they just look in the mirror, briefly, before they sally forth.

I sometimes wonder if some people ever look at themselves in a full-length mirror, before they leave the house. I know that most of the time we are not going out to wow the world with our sartorial style, but when I see what some people wear, right in front of an unsuspecting populance, I just cringe. It takes the same amount of time to look like an attractive, regular person as it does to look like a person who just doesn't give a hoot.

Be kind to those who have to look at you, however briefly. How hard is that to do??

[jazzbo]

If I hadn't gotten married I might still be dressing in the manner I loved: Levi-Strauss suits so to speak, that is denim jackets and jeans that matched in color (had all the colors: blues, grey, black, green, brown, white!) and fifties shirts from thrift stores (I loved shirts from the fifties of many types---such high quality and such great classy designs). Then in the winter, because I would still be riding my BMW R90 or R65, my L. L. Bean WWII replica leather flight jacket, and jeans or flannel lined chinos. . . .

But I got married, my wife hated that look, gave me an ultimatum: her or the motorcycle, and my life is different now. Better? Probably, yes.

[Christiern]

Hate to admit it, but this is how I looked when disco reigned and I thumped the light fantastic at Studio 54, Xenon, Electric Circus, etc.