Apparel Arts / Esky Series Looking back your feedback Needed

[oldog/oldtrix]

Dear Etutee,

If I were to put all those printed pages together, I had a very nice book .

I have done exactly that, and the resullting looseleaf volumes provide endless entertainment. I have a couple of random issues of Esquire from the 1930s and the illustrations reproduced from your posts using modern computer equipment are significantly more vibrant than the Fellows illustrations in the originals.

I recall, from my youth in the 1950s, a shelf in the office above the men's store owned by my grandfather and father holding what was probably close to a complete collection of Apparel Arts. Unfortunately, that shelf and its contents, and the office, and the store were long gone before I realized what had been lost. Your posts have enabled me to reclaim a significant measure of that loss.

I am particularly interested in knowing how you came to have the resources on which your posts are based.

[David V]

Let me add my voice to the chorus of thank you's for this effort you have made.
To your question as to how these articles have help me, well I can't pinpoint one thing. It has been more a case of absorbing everthing I could and some how letting it come out in my everyday selection of items.
I too would like to see an article about hats

[luk-cha]

Etutee

i have found the threads very interesting and helpful in make my choices of both formal and causal wear.

i'd like to see more specific posts dealing with a the more general topic of city dressing, country dressing, formal and casual seasonal dressing, more like the the vol 3 with lots of pictures along with the said paragraph plus your own commentary too

i'd like also to have as reference topic that just focus on shoes, trousers & shorts, sport coats and other details that were available

as a finishing point keep up the great work and many thanks

cheers

L-C

[Cufflink79]

Dear Etutee:

Your AA/Esky posts can be summed up into one word, "Inspirational"!

I sincerely appreciate all of your hard work that you've put into these wonderful pieces of haberdashery literature.

It would be interesting to see a post on cuff links, and other accessories with photos from the AA/Esky era as well.

Thanks again for all your hard work and time that you've put into the great posts.

Best Regards,

Cufflink79

[Pangur]

Dear Etutee

many thanks also from this humble reader. The word "inspirational" really fits perfectly.
You helped me to understand (well, when I say understand..) a long lost art and not to listen to the fashion-prone comments about this-and-that I do. I now choose my clothes with much more care and understanding, even if I cannot go bespoke yet. I use them often for reference when I#m unshure ore undecided (I made a "book" out of the series,too.)
The only problem is, whenever I talk about clothes (much too often, I fear) I now know the English terms only, which leads to me sounding quite arrogant, at least in the ear of some of my audience, I think.

So, take your time, a new article will be much appreciated, whenever it comes.

Best Regards
Pangur

[Etutee]

It would be interesting to see a post on cuff links, and other accessories with photos from the AA/Esky era as well.

well not much about cufflinks out there. Few scattered pages every other year or so and certainly not descriptive enough to make a decent article out of it. Part of the reason is that my own knowledge of cufflinks is very limited so If I knew better I may have been able to write based on what I saw but since that is not there I don't want to write an article by second guessing what, where & why?

You may want to persuade Tom 'cuffthis' about such an article. I think he owns a decent collection of these books and his knowledge in cufflinks is certainly much greater than mine.

After all, you still must cover shoes and hats!

I cant do shoes article on my own with pictures because my issue has badly damaged pictures (real life black & white). I can certainly do it without the pics but it would not be nearly as great as with pics. For that I will need somebody who has that issue to do the picture scanning portion. IF that can be done I will take care of all the rest!

The hat article I can do... although when is the question but nevertheless I do have more than enough material to make perhaps the most (or one of the most) detailed single article about mens head wear anywhere online.

But all that aside, Be honest! How many people out there wear hats on daily basis and really need to know about finer aspects of mens head gear or the good old art of hat blocking? Very very few. Which is why I always ended up postponing it.

thank you all, again, for the kind words.

regards
etutee

[RWS]

I can go years without wearing a hat, Etutee, but an article on the subject would interest me.

[countdemoney]

...
I would would also second the hat article. I don't wear one, partly because I don't know how.

[Costi]

I would would also second the hat article. I don't wear one, partly because I don't know how.

Good point. The same may apply to many other items, from evening dress to sports jackets. This is why your articles are useful on any subject, etutee. You know better what pictures and text you have. Even the tails article was an excellent read to understand a side of elegance that is very rarely seen today: even if the reader is not going to comission a tailcoat, he will know a good one worn well from rented garbage when he sees it.
As for hats, I was talking to an Italian gentleman last week over lunch in Bucharest and he admired my florentine straw hat remarking that ever more often he sees hats being worn in northern Italy (Torino, Milano). Perhaps a hat article would not be anachronistic at all.

[Etutee]

ok... I will do a hat post. However, I cannot be sure when exactly but If I did another one it will be all on hats! In fact I will try to find some info on straws as well, which usually are ignored pretty easily.

Although I doubt you guys will ever be able to convince me of its usefulness.

[storeynicholas]

Why does it have to be useful? Maybe I can't convince you to do it at all let alone in short order - but here is a couple who might - George and Ira Gershwin:

The way you wear your hat
The way you sip your tea
The memory of all that
No, they can't take that away from me.

- with the Chairman of the Board singing, naturally....
NJS

[Costi]

Etutee, you'll see a a lot of hats off when the article is finished

You already have NJS's fresh section on top hats - he proved very literate on the subject and a master at wrapping valuable information in fine prose. He was answering a question - you see, the demand for information is already there.

[Midnight Blue]

I agree that your posts are invaluable but they are also largely inaccessible and that's where my suggestion lies.

Discussion boards such as these are wonderful places for temporary discussions that are intended to fade into oblivion relatively quickly. However, the information you have spent so much time researching and writing deserves to be permanently preserved in a manner that can be accessed by as many as possible as easily as possible.

If you are interested I would be willing to assemble your various posts into a dedicated web site that could look something like this sample layout. The site name, topic titles, etc are all only suggestions at this point - my goal is only to illustrate how the posts could be grouped together by self-contained topic, how all the pictures could be easily accessible rather than having some embedded and some linked to other host servers, how much easier it is for readers to search for specific keywords and how much easier it is to read, etc.

Please send me a PM if you're interested.

Regards,

Peter

[Doug]

AA contained some presentations based on photos rather than drawings, and I found these very valuable references because they were based on real people and not idealized figures.

[Tone Loki]

Etutee-

The reason I stumbled across The London Lounge in the first place was a google search for articles on Apparel Arts, so in my mind, your posts are invaluable and indispensable...

I echo the sentiment on a Hat feature - and maybe an in depth look at the colour& pattern mixing/matching for accessories that AA published over the years...

Thanks a lot, TS