Solipsistic Yearning; Prep and Ivy

[Aristide]

A long and interesting read:

http://asuitablewardrobe.blogspot.ca/

[Luca]

Thanks for the post, Aristide.

I think the observation about the stylistic and semiotic nuances of the late-70s to mid-80s "preppy" fad are broadly correct, if not greatly original. That moment was a revival not unlike the recent/current retro/formal/hipster one, albeit the preppy one was more internally consistent. It was a revival of a well-documented tendency for conservative menswear brands to sell the class glamour of the Ivy League that had disappeared in the 1970s.

OK.

But the tone of the article comes across, at least to me, as excessively elegiac and more than a little sour.

The "Preppy Handbook" phase was inherently snobbish and silly but compared to the avalanche of criminal-, derelict- and yob-inspired fashions that followed it in the 90s and 00s it was positively halcyon.

I think without that 1980s Reagan-and-Thatcher-era retrospective inversion, today conventional black tie, cufflinks, possibly all ties and certainly traditional shoes (just to name a few items) would be in the same category as frock coats, spats and walking canes.

For my generation (born in the mid-60s), that fad was a turning point; the beginning of a journey.