One of our members sent the following picture of a single breasted peak lapel suit to me for comment. It contains a number of evident imbalances chief among them those of cut, style, cloth design and texture, and accessories mismatching.
An understanding of elegance’s contrary state is a useful and practical tool for those who wish to dress in good taste.
“Without Contraries is no progression. Attraction and Repulsion,
Reason and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence.”
(There is Blake again. What is he doing in an article on elegance?)
Cut and Style imbalance
As many of you who read the LL on a regular basis will know, I am not particularly keen on the SB peak lapel as a model. That preference has nothing to do with the following. The SB peak can be done with great aplomb and taste, and we shall see examples of same later on.
The subject at hand is of Italian manufacture from a very reputable house. The quality of the manufacture is undoubtedly well done. But what appears to be a spalla camicia is out of place in the context of a dressy SB peak lapel style. This imbalance is exacerbated by peak lapels that seem to be grafted onto the trunk of the coat, two immense bat wings glued onto the body. The inordinately straight and wide lapels are complicated further by being too high set and devoid of any roll.
Compare the exaggerated lapels above to those on our two veritable Italian dandies Il Avvocato Angelli and Antonio de Curtis, the most elegant Neapolitan of all time.
Toto, the first and original Tony Curtis, wears a large patterned glencheck suit. He was of minuscule stature, maybe even shorter than Windsor. For all of you who can not imagine wearing a pattern of this kind because of your compact physique, think twice! De Curtis pulls it off with ease.
Study the roll of the lapel, it grows, issues forth from the body of the suit like the branch of an olive tree, naturally, effortlessly. It has always been there or was it sewn? The shape and form of the lapel is contained and understated. The notch is placed perfectly on the chest, in the upper quadrant, but not too high. Even if we appreciate the high set notch on an SB, it has to be avoided or tempered in the peak lapel.
Fabric texture imbalance
Most of you will know how much I favor patterned suitings. The Cloth Club’s major occupation in recent years has been to resurrect these classic styles tossed into the waste bin by Fashion . Windowpanes and large glenchecks, in fact, all large patterns, have to be conceived with a balance of color and one of texture. Using again the example of the Best of Both tweed, the large crimson overcheck is balanced and rendered less visible with respect to the whole through the use of color and texture that surround it harmoniously.
The large windowpane cloth in this example is a clear cut worsted or a worsted flannel in gray with a sky blue window. Executed properly, it is a charming combination, but it cannot be done in a shallow clearcut cloth. The sky blue needs deep texture and color woven into the body background to remain in balance. A woolen flannel, a tweed or a worsted mixed with a tweed would have done the trick.
If you want to wear large and brightly colored patterns, and know that Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey is neither a SR house or a law firm, make sure the cloth is designed, conceived, woven and finished properly to render the pleasant special effects “seen but not seen.”
If you ever ask an elegant lady about her dress, she will undoubtedly remark that “its all in the accessories.” Men should learn to keep their use of accessories to a judicious minimum and insure that those worn are seen but unseen. This wisdom is amply illustrated by the profusion of colors and gadgets in the present example. The choice of belt and socks are inconsistent with the tenor and color of the suiting. Jewelry, even if it may seem like a lot of fun, is better off left off.
The present example is clearly targeted at being “fashionable” and destined for a RTW application. The pervasive imbalances described above have been inserted with premeditation to render a “ new”, dynamic and youthful fashion image. Luckily it serves by its errors in taste as a model of “seen, quite seen thank you very much” dressing.
