The London Lounge

An interesting phenomenon I’ve noted at times on this and other for a dedicated to the lost art of sartorial elegance ((as well as in comments to similarly themed blogs) is the tendency to heavily criticise any evidence of exhibitionism.

- People wearing any remotely archaic garment (I’m not referring to Regency attire but, say, a bowler hat) are pilloried as being “in costume”.

- Anyone opining that there’s nothing wrong with wearing a DJ (black tie) outside of a currently proscribed occasion (say, a smart evening out, as opposed to a specifically black-tie event) is sternly reminded that in so doing they stand far outside modern norms and therefore will stand out excessively.

- Words like ‘fop’ (which for most of history had the same meaning as ‘dandy’) are thrown about with a tone of disapproval.

- Anyone whose attention to clothing goes beyond paying a small fortune for extremely well-cut but otherwise unremarkable clothes is chastised as not truly elegant.

To me this attitude smacks of self-dislike. Outside of a numerically tiny proportion of ‘men of leisure’, through much of history most chaps have not cared at all or much about their attire (beyond, before the rise of the cult of authenticity and individualism, the desire to conform to current rules). It is fair to say, I think, that anyone with the level of interest and knowledge displayed in fora such as this is clearly vainer than most at which point one must either try to abjure it or embrace it. I don’t see the advantage of fence-straddling here.

Any thoughts?

Luca wrote: Outside of a numerically tiny proportion of ‘men of leisure’, through much of history most chaps have not cared at all or much about their attire (beyond, before the rise of the cult of authenticity and individualism, the desire to conform to current rules).

This past weekend I was watching at the photographs from my father´s bachelor party (a rather large informal dinner at an athletic club in 1950) and, absolutely all the men looked fantastic. A galore of double breasted suits, pocket squares, cuff links, polished oxfords, pomaded hair, etc. These were no "men of leisure" and certainly they didn´t have the interest or knowledge of LL fellow members, but by merely caring to conform to (then) current rules, they achieved to be elegant and even stylish. Could you picture the same bachelor party today?

It doesn't bear thinking about... (the modern bachelor party, that is).

As you point out, those men dressed well simply by conforming, in the same way that you very rarely look at even a modest 1860s building and think,"gad that looks awful"; it's usually the other way around.

People of our generation who care about 'traditional' clothes at all are clearly a small minority and should embrace that 'specialness'

Another DJ stricture one sees in the forums is, "Part of the appeal of black tie for men is that it gives the women an evening to stand out." and that black tie has to be within a strict set of i-gent approved limits.