Psychic pleasure of clothing and dress

[alden]

In an ongoing thread regarding country clothing, Uppercase wrote this superb line:

Country cloth colors, variegation, texture and heft offer alot of pleasure and provide a lesson in the importance of cloth to the psychic pleasure of clothing and dressing.

The “psychic pleasure” of clothing and dress is an undercurrent that is rarely discussed or described. And yet, after reading these words, many of you will immediately connect to its meaning.

I have often heard new bespoke clients speak about the comfort of their clothes, the confidence it inspires and the source of attraction associated with the above, but what of the deeper, more instinctive feelings? Things that provide a sense of well being, things that just make you feel good.

As Uppercase has remarked, good cloth is a source of much “psychic” satisfaction, slipping on a warm overcoat going out into the coolness of the night, feeling the dryness of linen against the skin in a scalding summer’s day or the clinging warm softness of cashmere curled in a leather chair in front of a roaring fire.

And there are other pleasures to remark, the bone dryness of shoes that are worn once a month instead of every day; the smell of lavender talcum in socks in the morning; the splash of Trumper’s Limes after a hot shower.

What are your psychic sartorial pleasures?

Cheers

M Alden

[Costi]

The weight, the substantiality, the silky smoothness of the fiber and rough coarseness of the weave of a white, impeccably ironed, large-sized fine linen handkerchief with hand turned edges.
The "vacuum" sound of the air rushing out of a bespoke shoe as I put my foot in it.
The bracing, medicinal top notes of a good splash of SMN Potpourri cologne on a cloudy autumn morning, before putting on a crisp poplin shirt.
The familiar myrrh scent of burnt paper of Armenia invading an unfamiliar hotel room.
The feeling of a hefty winter overcoat that you need to “wear” rather than just throw on the shoulders and forget about it.
Reshaping the crown and brim of a crushable rain hat to bring it back to life before putting it on.
Taking off shoes, coat and tie and slipping into a pair of grecian slippers and a soft, velvet collared robe de chambre to enjoy a few pages from a good book and a cup of jasmine tea in the evening before supper.
The “snap” of a properly crafted non-fused shirt collar as your turn it down after putting on a tie.
The feeling of soft flannel on the thighs in a pair of unlined slacks.

[marcelo]

What are your psychic sartorial pleasures?

It is always the same smell at the tailor’s atelier – several rolls of clothes filling the space with a most distinctive fragrance. For me, the bespoke experience has an indissociable olfactory tone.

[Costi]

Agreed, Marcelo!
A member of noveporte.it cites Neapolitan writer Domenico Rea (1921-1994): "Un uomo, per sentirsi bene, deve respirare ogni mese almeno quattro o cinque ore di aria di sartoria".
(In order to feel good, a man must breathe the air of a tailoring shop for at least four or five hours every month)
I would say every week

Adding to the list the psychic pleasure of admiring, touching (,rolling and pinching ), draping and choosing cloth from bolts in a well-supplied store.

[marcelo]

Agreed, Marcelo!
A member of noveporte.it cites Neapolitan writer Domenico Rea (1921-1994): "Un uomo, per sentirsi bene, deve respirare ogni mese almeno quattro o cinque ore di aria di sartoria".
(In order to feel good, a man must breathe the air of a tailoring shop for at least four or five hours every month)
I would say every week

Adding to the list the psychic pleasure of admiring, touching (,rolling and pinching ), draping and choosing cloth from bolts in a well-supplied store.

Great quotation, Costi! That air has amazing restorative properties!

[JRLT]

For me it is tweed that brings the greatest psychic pleasure, so strong are the associations carried by that great fabric: country pursuits, quiet libraries, fine liquor and tobacco, low-ceilinged pubs.

Slipping into a tweed coat is to welcome and accept these associations and to accept myself as a product of the same heritage (viz the british Isles). And as I (rapidly!) approach the landmark age of 40 it is also a mark of accepting the aging process and of welcoming what is quieter and less fashionable, but tested and honoured by time.

I'd go as far as to argue that the wearing of tweed has nothing less than a calming and uplifting effect on the wearer, producing not just psychic pleasure but psychic well-being. Perhaps prescriptions of tweed suiting should be dispensed at the doctors' surgery to the stressed and depressed.

My other psychic pleasures are more mundane. In these the phsycical object acts as a trigger for nostalgia. For Proust of course, taste, triggered by the madelaine, was the sense that evoked such feelings. I have never found taste to be a nostalgia-evoking sense. For me it is a scent that produces reverie.

Working in New York in the early part of 2005 I wore Miller Harris's Citron scent on a daily basis (in retrospect a very unseasonal choice for such a harsh winter). Recently I unpacked a scarf I had overlooked to clean since that time and the embedded scent thrust me back into Manhattan's snow-bound streets more fully than any photo album from that time could have achieved.

Similarly the smell of dark tobacco that hits the nostrils on landing in Spain and which follows one, or which one follows, in every corner of that great country evokes for me past visits and past pleasures. Though sadly even Spain is going the way of the rest of Europe and that characteristic dark tobacco scent is slowly fading away.

And most prosaically, one of the first inklings I had of the finer things in life was a tv commercial (which now seems quite bizarre) run, when I was much younger, by the mass-market soap brand Imperial Leather. In this commercial a family of mum, dad and a couple of kids all sat in separate baths in some Alpine snowdrift passing their bar of Imperial Leather around by means of a miniature train that ran on tracks between each bath. Whenever I smell that soap it reminds me of this advert. Proof perhaps that advertising can work.

[Des Esseintes]

I have written recently in a different thread about the “psychic” qualities of clothes when they evoke fond memories of the past. Somewhat similarly, I gain immense pleasure from the re-appearance of those items in my wardrobe that are, inevitably, stowed away every year, waiting for their resurgence once the appropriate season has arrived again:

The tightness of a cummerbund around your waist, the armour-like feeling of a starched evening shirt, and the firm grip of a pair of patent leather pumps, as one prepares for the first black tie event of a new season.

The coarse tweed of a shooting suit, feeling raw against one’s legs, and the weightiness and warmth of the long woolen socks to go with it, on the cool, misty Autumn morning of the first shooting party for the year.

dE