Des Esseintes wrote:Gentlemen
two photographs not of the good Duke himself but his wardrobe were posted today on the, generally rather entertaining, weblog "The Trad":
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_wwgXxAjQedA/SvrPt3bJwSI/AAAAAAAACUk/V-LcCsgB89M/s1600-h/Duke%27s+Closet1.jpg
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_wwgXxAjQedA/SvrPtpTqq5I/AAAAAAAACUc/4zM7y_WTAVY/s1600-h/Duke%27s+Closet2.jpg
I am not completely convinced about everything I see in the second photograph, but the impressive number of rather extraordinary sartorial details on display serves to explain the reverence the sartorially interested continue to pay to this man - just to list a few immediately obvious ones:an arguably rather loud tartan jacket with cuffed sleeve and cloth-covered buttons - for evening wear, perhaps?
a corduroy jacket, again with cuffed sleeves
a pale tweed (?) blazer, or rather, a pale tweed jacket with brass, or gold, buttons
a light coloured corduroy jacket, again with brass, or gold, buttons
an Alpine-styled mottled grey loden jacket with a rather intricately ornamented green sleeve cuff
On the other hand, the photograph also hints at an aspect of the Duke's personality that, in lesser human beings, may well be considered attention-seeking to the extent of verging into tackiness - note the in your face placement of contrast colour shirt monograms. Clearly, the Duke would not really have needed to present his initial and, of course, the ducal coronet, to those he met with, or would he?
dE
The Duke's monogram or cypher is especially interesting as the Duchess used the same shape, turned on its side for a W with the coronet above it. Given the complete integration of their style, this is a neat device. I once saw an exhibition on tartan in Edinburgh that had some of his tartan suits on display and they were amazing--all the more so because of how small he was, and yet wore such large patterns so easily.
Sadly no recent updates of the blog.
