Last Days of Linen

…and Seersucker too while we’re at it.

I’m known and prone to bend break the rules and and amidst these remaining shards of  post-Labor Day heat, I’ll be extending my use of linen till probably Halloween. Your Seersucker (yes, I capitalize Seersucker. I’m from the South. South and Seersucker deserve to be capitalized and I don’t have to explain it. Shut up.) however, must now be gone. At least around these parts.

I have a buddy in South Carolina—we coulda been blood brothers…our proclivities-quirks and other idiodamnsyncrasies are almost identical…kinda like me and LFG’s Uncle Toad…butcept I still have abs and those guys don’t—who uses the “85 Degree Rule” and it makes sense for South Carolina. According to my Sandlapper cousin, it makes no difference what month it happens to be, if it’s 85 degrees, everything in the closet, including Seersucker remains fair game. I’ll go with that—but only in climes like the Carolinas or that tropical place where I lived for a couple of years—New Orleans. (The punctuation in this paragraph has the makings for a Goat Rodeo. Shut up.)

My cadet blue linen togs barely arrived in time for any 2013 use but they managed to eke their way to me a week ago. And I’m still all about frog mouth-top pockets and flat fronts on my casual trousers. I don’t wear navy blue trousers. They just don’t seem to go with any of my jackets and even if they did, the stark contrast is too much for me. So the cadet blues offered an alternative to a twelfth pair of tan linen trousers and enough contrast that I can pull these off with a navy blazer.

Figured I’d get ‘em in Seersucker while I was at it. And for winter 2013? Light gray flannel—top pockets—flat front—BUT with belt loops. I need a canvas from which my Orange Fuzzy Coffman’s Crocodile belt will preen. You laugh now. You’ll be jonesin’ later. Be quiet.

Two inch cuffs, too…and a dress extension front closure on flat fronts. These are enough of a folly, design-wise, to keep me interested and others curious. If only I could manage that in my romantic endeavors. Where’s that neighbor lady this morning. I've suddenly got a cravin’ flung on me.

My other quirky-fuzzy trouser experiment over these recent years was thanks to Bookster (R.I.P.) and my ideation of a flat-front, dress extension, split back—fishtail waistband tog—reminiscent of cavalry officer trews. Dark green corduroy above.

Got ‘em in grey flannel, Seafield tweed, and tan linen too.I wonder if Bookster will rise again. Anybody know?

Ok, I digress…back to linen and seersucker. Of all my potential follies in 2013, my M. Dumas—Vineyard Vines seersucker jeans…aren’t one of ‘em. Home run. Period. And for some crazy reason, I can make ‘em work. Shut up.

Light as a feather yet substantial enough to keep all the bits secure when going commando. Seersucker Commando. Now that’s something.

Since I’m down to writing two stories a month, let me really digress and offer an update on my move and LFG and everything else. I drug dragged  my feet for months on end regarding pulling the trigger on a place in Bethesda. I’ve got great excuses but they are excuses nonetheless. One of my business partners had a second heart surgery in January so we were all doing extra duty, my mother’s high drama health saga began in March and has kept me pretty much consumed during every bit of free time I’ve had to break away and go to South Carolina and assist. But I promised LFG that I’d be in Bethesda when the new school year started—and I barely made the deadline.

And when she and I found this quaint little cottage we both knew that this would be a great nest for me/us. As I explained to her; even though I’d only be five minutes away, I would still be spending more time in my Bethesda nest without her than not. Therefore it was crucial that the place felt right and good for me. I signed a two-year lease on this house and my hope is that I’ll be inclined to stay here till LFG graduates from high school.

It’s been humbling to learn how much sh_t one person can accumulate in ten years. My marriage ended a decade ago and I’ve happily added more books and toy soldiers and caricatures and clothes and other irreleventia to my holdings during this epoch. And I swear that I’ve given tons of stuff to Goodwill and have shed at least two hundred books.

But this move has shed light on the fact that I’m a borderline hoarder. Tasty hoards but hoards none the damn less. And to exacerbate the issue I closed my office in Old Town and now all of the caricatures and other goodies that swathed those walls are here in Bethesda too. It’s all good but I’ve gotta have a purge of sorts rather soon.

So it is all good, right? You bet. Moving is one of the top stressors in life…right up there with divorce, marriage, loss of a loved one etc. But some stress can be good and I’d define this move as positive tension. I’m going to be very happy here and can even co-parent the pooch now. However.

The renovation of my Old Town digs is another story. I’m on the record admitting that I’m a terrible investor but my saving grace has been the rental properties that I’ve owned in Old Town. I moved back into one when I divorced and began to half-ass evolve it into my own little Anglophilic Redneck Ass Deliverance Meets Sir John Soan with a splash of Hollister Hovey while babysitting Honey Boo Boo  pad.

And unbeknownst to me, it was a hot mess when I began to create the punch list of stuff that needed to be done to revert it back to the updated neutrality that rental properties need to convey. To say that I bit off more than I could chew…to say that there have been moments when I was teetering on being in over my head is an understatement.

But when the quotes started to roll in I declared that I could save ten grand by handling everything myself. And I will ultimately save the ten grand but methinks I’ve at least vanquished two of my years. I’ve been working twelve-hour backbreaking days and until yesterday, I couldn’t see that I’d made any progress. 

Never say never…but I’m pretty sure the next time around I’ll at least hire someone to do a few of the more aggravating jobs.

Aggravating? Ten years’ worth of half-ass do it yourself endeavors creates a pile of onerous revisions and I wasn’t gonna let someone else discover my previous “hell, it looks good enough for me” shortcomings while I was standing there. 

Drywall that came off in chunks when I removed prefab wainscoting…chair rail moulding nails that hadn’t been properly countersunk with a nail punch and had three different coats of paint slopped on them…

Crown moulding that needed recaulking but only after the old, cheap silicone caulk had been stripped. Bathroom fixtures, carpet and appliances that were installed in 1989. Damn.

And dark colors? Barney Purple LFG bedroom with Day-Glo orange outlet covers and lime green doors? I’ve used ten gallons of primer on one door. Never. Again.

Here's the Barney Purple bedroom after a zillion hours of .....

I did remove and replace the door facing with LFG's measurements on it.

And the new appliances are installed in the kitchen but I still can't muster the juice to erase LFG's chalk scribbles just yet. And no, I won't have the drywall cut out and replaced. I just need to suck it up and...erase it.

Bold striped walls with black and white photos in the half-bath. Brilliant, right?

I'll have all of that particular brilliance vanquished this weekend.

Ok. I’m gonna close this drivel and roll the refuse carts to the street. I live in the suburbs now and that’s what we do. And since I'm still getting to know my neighbors and first impressions are so important, I'm gettin' dolled up in linen before I step out.

Onward. With Aleve and Icy Hot--I've got Paint Roller Elbow.

ADG II--Bethesda

Trad Randomanalia--Reader's Questions

I have a pile of questions from folks over at my tumblr and being the long winded guy that I am I've decided to gather up a bunch of 'em and posit some responses here...

aduckgetsdressed asked:

“When did you get your first toy soldier?”

Ducksterini...I was a kid of the 1960's and '70's and essentially ALL of the lead-hand painted makers had given up on their version of to soldier b 1966. The heady era of painted-lead soldiers was the mid 1800's till the late 1950's. After that, bags of literally a hundred plastic toy soldiers could be bought for the price of ten lead ones. And by the '60's there was concern about lead poisoning. I had tons of plastic ones growing up. But then about 30 years ago my uncle gave me 6 old lead ones and that whetted my interest in them. I collected maybe 30-40 more and then put that collecting effort aside as I bought more art and caricatures. After my divorce, I unpacked the old box of lead toy soldiers and the collecting bug came back with a vengeance.

preppybythegraceofgod asked:

“Ok, what's the secret to your successful greening? Also, you have anymore paisley shorts or pants like you sent my cohort in style, Carolinastyle. Thanks, cheers, F.T.H.”

Green shoe polish. And yes, I've probably got another pile of duds that you boys would like to have.

Anonymous asked:

“I have to laugh. So many blogs have popped up recently that are unquestionably in imitation of yours. In some cases its the tone, in other it's the writing or the photos or the themes. You probably won't admit it, but I can and I have no horse in this race. You should be flattered by the imitation. And by the way, you still surpass them all in terms of style, creativity, vision, artistry, pathos ... You are a character!”

That's very kind of you to say. I wish that I had more time to write stories these days but I just don't. 

cosmosdream asked:

“Hey ADG, I'm a young guy who enjoys following your blog, and now the Tumblr. You wear a lot of cotton suits. They look great. Do you recommend buying them fully canvassed? I ask because I hear that cotton suits don't last so long. Maybe that's wrong? Sorry if this is obvious canon. BTW, I buy my suits custom made in Hong Kong, so finding the cotton suit in question isn't an issue.”

My greatest indulgence was having the Flusser boys make me a seersucker suit. Common wisdom, which the record shows that I possess none of, would tell us not to spend the big bucks on fully canvassed bespoke goods that are so seasonable and so perishable. But if you are getting them in Hong Kong, you are probably getting them for palatable prices so why not swing for the fences?

Anonymous asked:

“Do you have a go-to company for your chinos?”

Not really. I buy 'em on the cheap from Polo and J. Crew mostly. But I'm thinking about giving Bill's a try again. 

traddom asked:

“OK ADG, what's more classical and versatile for spring/summer, blue seersucker or pincord suit and why? Gracias, dollahs in the mail. PAB”

I haven't thought about pincord in ages. I do have a pair of pincord trousers but I'd vote for seersucker. It's just a personal preference I suppose.

Anonymous asked:

“How about some commentary / posting on lapel width and proportion? I just got a good look at 007 in the famous glen plaid 3 piece suit from Goldfinger and was shocked at how skimpy his lapels are. These days, I figure the go/ no go limit is probably at 50% on the Lapel-O-Meter, but your pal Ralph will frequently shoot up to 75 or more. What say you?”

Lapel width is something I've not paid too much attention to when it comes to my clothes. Since most of them are MTM/bespoke, I leave it to the elves to decide what the proportions should be. I was aware of Flusser's modest update and tweak to their house model about five years ago and was pleased with the slightly streamlined result. I do recall having a Polo DB suit about twenty years ago with lapels so wide that Mark "Puerto" Rykken referred to them as "dorsal fins."

"Was there ever a time when you first went from Off The Rack to something more and suddenly you had One Really Cool Garment and a whole lot of also-rans? Did you cull quickly and mercilessly or did you just work towards spreading the luxe around, like dressing on a salad? Or have you never had to suffer with the ordinary?"

First, I've never really deemed my closet as containing any "also rans." The off the rack stuff that I've held on to or bout at Bobby from Boston or whatever...has always been a complementary part of my sartorial lineup or it ends up out the door... eBay or to a couple of devotees who read my blog and wear the same size clothes that I do. Regarding culling quickly and mercilessly...It took me years to learn this skill. I used to hang on to stuff that I hadn't worn in years just because "this is Purple Label, I can't get rid of it..." I've now learned to let stuff go a bit more readily. And finally, my negative net worth tells me that not only should I have suffered the ordinary longer than I ever did, I should be doing more of it currently.

A question on Western--Top Pockets...

Eaztu (unregistered) wrote:

"What's your opinion of trousers with pockets cut like the one above? I've always preferred pockets cut vertically that are a continuation of the side seam. Even the slightest diagonal seems to emphasize one's width - probably not something you need to thing about."

Well first, yes, I'm blessed with having a build that I reckon is a bit more complementary to wearing these things. On the other hand, they still manifest the same puckering whateverishness on me and everyone else who wears them. Even Columnist and sartorial know it all, my favorite wordsmith...George Frazier.

I'd waive anyone off from making buying western/top pockets if you are uber retentitive about lines and symmetry and such. Because regardless of one's build, they are gonna be problematic. 

As one who's always in search of things a bit askew, they suit me.

"Hello, Can you tell me the origin of "GTH" and patchwork. I have heard a few versions and would like to know the real story. Joe"

I'm not sure. But the general conscenus I hear from those in the know, generally attribute much of the Trady-Ivy jauntiness to Chipp, the venerable Gotham store that I undortunately, never set foot in. But the story goes that Sid Winston and his boys were always contriving jaunty assembleages of madras and patchwork stuff and colorful, woldly patterned linings and risque and humorous neckwear.

And I suppose the best evidence of Chipp's  propensity for whimsical, GTH items was their infamous jockstrap.

And of course, my Rinpoche, Mr. Flusser, courtesy of John Tinseth from The Trad and Rose Callahan  posits on GTH trousers here. And I quote the quote.."The stylish button-downers would engage in a form of sartorial one-upmanship that brought wild dollops of golf course color or tartan-inspired outrageousness into classic ensembles that made insiders smile while others winced." --Alan Flusser from Style and the Man

Ok. That's enough for now. Gotta go loofah my stretch marks. 

80G2

Trad Ivy Tuesday: Cabot Lodge, Jr. and Cotton Poplinosity

I’ve already written rather extensively on the role of seersucker in my sartorial life and I gave Haspel their due in one of my New Orleans reports. But one of my lengthier posts on poplin was lost when my blog crashed and I accidentally deleted forever the first one hundred-plus stories that I’d ever written. The good news is that a loyal reader was able to send most of my stories back to me for re-posting. My poplin post wasn’t one that could be resurrected. Probably a good thing though. It was a gut wrencher of a story—NOT the poplin part—the parts about my two years in New Orleans and the circumstances regarding my departure. So it’s poplin proper time y’all.

Poplin…probably the only fabric in a Trad wardrobe where a hint of synthetic fiber in concert with cotton is acceptable. Why? Because one hundred percent cotton poplin shatters with wrinkles like spun sugar Hollywood prop glass. You look at it on a hanger from a hundred yards away and an instantaneous spider web of wrinkles cascades before your eyes. Don’t believe me? Go to J. Press and purchase the all-cotton poplin suit offered above. It will look like crumpled legal pad paper before you get out of the store with it. And it’s not the “guaranteed to wrinkle”… the desired and expected creased subsets of fabric topography shifts that are de rigueur with seersucker and linen. Wrinkled poplin is uglier and less desirable. Phyllis Diller for some reason comes to mind.

I love linen and my summer sportcoat line-up includes four of them. But linen is that anti-poplin and seersucker is poplin's cousin who attended slightly better schools. Linen is more elegant and less provincial than poplin and if you want the skinny on linen from someone who loves it more than me, go over and visit my best buddy Toad. He’s always tinkerin’ with flax but in the shot above, he's sporting poplin from Cable Car Clothiers. Oh, and my “poplin is provincial” bias pretty much gets debunked towards the end of this story.

 So the standard poplin suits of my earliest Trad years had just enough synthetic fiber content to play the wrinkle blunting Sargeant-at-Arms to the Grand Master Cotton. Brooks the Brethren of course, was the go-to source for the poplin suit color trifecta…tan, olive and navy blue. Brooks wasn’t in every shopping mall when I got my first poplin suits so mine came courtesy of the little Trad shop that I grew up in. And they were private label house brands made by a little factory in Georgia. That same factory by the way made for years, the Nantucket Brick Reds that the Murray family sold/sells in their Toggery shop. It always kinda cracked me up that this New England Yankee iconic trouser was made in Crackerland. And leave it to LFG's pal Alan Flusser to offer a snazzy alternative to the formulaic poplin with a button down collar edict. Here above is Flusser's rounded collar interpretation in tandem with the standard.

These mostly cotton utilitarian poplin things I reckon, came to light amidst the same utilitarian desperation that spawned seersucker and pincord suits. The pre-air conditioned South was beyond oppressive from late June till Labor Day and men had to find options for business attire that wouldn’t have them fainting from heat stroke. Folks, I grew up in the air conditioned version of that world and I can attest that the heat at its most humid peak, is nauseating. Nowadays of course, men just wear wife beater t-shirts and butt-crack winking shorts and rubber flip flops to work. I mean it’s all about comfort, right?

And poplin suits at least to me, seemed more utilitarian and less stylish than seersucker. In an “it’s ok neighbor, we are all just trying to trudge through the dog-days intact” kinda way. Seersucker, even before you segregate it into style centric categories of single or double breasted options, has more syncopated swagger just lounging there as a bolt of cloth. The alternating colors and the warp-weft deliberate looseness that creates its seersuckling piccolo washboard of texture is gonna dictate more élan than poplin from the get-damn-go. Seersucker begs seven additional minutes of thought about whether to wear white bucks, spectators or some other shoe. Poplin says “either put your damn Weejuns or your Alden Tassels on and let’s get this over with.” Seersucker says “top me off with a Panama”. Poplin says “you might wanna grab an extra cotton hanky…not for show…but for brow wiping.” Shut up.

So the poplin suit ain’t steerage but it knows better than to show up on the upper decks, even as an employee. TinTang over at the Trad mentioned showing up for work one hot London summer day at Lloyds in some heat forgiving cotton suit and was at once interrogated about whether he was going on Safari that day. I can’t remember but they might have sent him home to change. Bottom line is that a poplin suit has its place and its limits. Fancy styling options? Not so much. Bespoke? Why in the world would you do that unless you had more money than sense?

 So what about styling? The construct and options for poplin is about as basic as the fabric itself. Three button sack—hook center vent—flat front trousers…hemmed with no break. A slight puddle of extra linen cloth on trousers a bit too long might be forgiven till you can get back to the tailor for a tune up. Poplin trousers with a break…poplin gathered in non-puddling, poly-cotton accordion-osity can’t be allowed out of the house. And…No ticket pocket no open breast pocket no double breasted nonsense. Get it? The Brooks interpretation did have patch and flap lower pockets but that's about it-styling nuance-wise. Remember the objective here. We are trying to avoid heat stroke, not win a preening contest. I’m all about having at least a white cotton handkerchief in my breast pocket. But a poplin suit seems to be an exception to even this basic sartorial rule. Poplin…the anti-fuzzy. And thanks to my buddy over at Heavy Tweed Jacket for the image above  that I stole from his site without permission.

 I wore the hell out of my tan and olive poplin suits when I was a sales rep in the Carolinas during my mid-twenties. I’m not sure what happened to them but by the time I moved north and worked indoors all day, they were absent my closet. I had plenty of lightweight tropical wools and as always, one seersucker suit, but no poplin. And it seems that my olive poplin suit was always rigged with an Argyle and Sutherland rep tie and a blue button down. I rarely wear button down shirts with suits but anything but the OCBD classic with poplin seems wrong.

And then I moved to New Orleans. Oy. I grew up in the South but had never set foot there. I agreed to a two-year assignment that would have me visiting state agencies and legislatures and legislators and advocacy groups and spending more time in and out of places than sitting in just one. All of that previous shit is code for being a lobbyist and shill for big pharma. Kinda of a Daumier version of Robert Macaire or a "reverse Ratapoil." I was fairly streetwise before rolling into New Orleans but nothing…and I mean nothing…prepares one for doing THAT kind of work in THAT kind of city and state and in THAT kind of heat. I think I’ve mentioned before that it was time to leave my thirteen year career after this assignment. I couldn’t shower long enough or often enough to rinse off the smarm.

But until the smarm calculi became unbearable I shilled. In poplin. It was May and things were already uncomfortably warm and sticky humid. I commented to an office worker who had been there all her life that even in our plush, hyper air-conditioned office, everything seemed “wet.” I’d pick up a memo or a report and it seemed limp like overcooked pasta. She just laughed.

By this time my Flusser bespoke habit was well in place but I couldn’t wear even my lightest weight tropical wool suitings. There was a Joseph A. Banks on St. Charles Avenue and over there I went. This was by the way, before Banks lost their way…before they became the Men’s Wearhouse…back when a reasonable but declining argument could be made that they were the “poor man’s Brethren.” I hadn’t yet discovered Perlis and I was in one of those “any port in a storm” predicaments so Banks set me up with one tan and one olive poplin suit. These two options that became my uniforms for that summer and the next one. Trad icons, yes. Fuzzy style preening platforms? Nope. Not poplin. Plus, the last guy who preened excessively in the Baton Rouge Capitol building got shot.

So what motivated a poplin post? Unequivocally I can say that the young man above, one Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. was the catalyst. Obviously not the exact photo above but I’ll start with it because it speaks volumes of an era and a man who like all of his ilk…cared about what they wore and how they looked. But not too much. Point collar. Pinned thru and anchoring a woven, grenadine maybe? …tie. Strong. Lodge passes typical WASP Ascendancy muster including a St. Albans and Harvard legacy, World War II distinction as well as a long history of public service. The only tweak I'd have made to this WASP's ensemble would be to tuck that white breast pocket linen in just a bit more.

I’m not interested enough to learn too much more about Lodge Jr.’s one-year stint as JFK’s Ambassador to South Vietnam but I can speculate that it might not have been his easiest year. I will at some point, enjoy listening to Lodge Jr.'s firsthand account of  his South Vietnam tenure over here at the WGBH Media Archives.

What I will say is this. The man sported one hell of a poplin suit while glad-handing those who might overthrow the corrupt puppet leader and while reconnoitering the local terrain. I suspect that Lodge Jr. probably felt that there were days during this year-long assignment when he couldn’t rinse away the taint of South Vietnam instability and corruption. Puppet leaders and protracted instability post Lodge Jr.’s one year visit didn’t seal South Vietnam’s fate but it didn’t help it. But I digress to more world changing topics. Let's get back to the superficial. If duende could ever manifest in poplin, this would be exhibit one at the Duende Poplin Possibilities Trial. Open patch pockets all the way round. 

Sleeve linen showing just so. Trousers hemmed short but not Thom Browne child molester short. High middle button stance vectors the three-two roll. Trousers appropriately covering a middle age paunch but in no way tries to hide it. Those may not be Belgian shoes but damn they look close. The swagger here says "South Vietnam is headed down the shitter and I've got a paunch. Wanna make something of it?" This is poplinessence all to be damned.

So do you think he had this one made in Hong Kong or back home by some east coast purveryor? Three-two roll. Open patch pockets. It’s way too Yankee for me to assume that anyone on Savile Row would acquiesce to such requests. And it defies the formulaic edicts of Brooks, Chipp and J. Press poplin. It says "Where I'm headed is hot in more ways than one." It says that "Even though these straw man scenarios and puppet leader whatevers are gonna test me, I'm at least gonna have trace elements of style amidst the drudgery."  Style he had. And I like it.

Finally, this is off the poplin topic grid but Happy Birthday two days ago to George Frazier. Happy Birthday to the man who won the Bowdoin Prize courtesy of an all-nighter at the typewriter. Happy Birthday to the man who wrote scorching, edgy stuff for Downbeat Magazine when he was in his mid-twenties. Stuff that smacks of what Rolling Stone editors would have lapped up like catnip if they’d existed in the 1930’s. Happy Birthday to the man who wrote Esquire’s epic treatise… The Art of Wearing Clothes…a treatise on men, some of  whom most probably wore poplin when appropriate and who cared about how they looked. But not too much.

Onward. Sans poplin and will probably remain so. Because I don’t wear suits very often and you never wear poplin as a sport coat. And five gets ten that Frazier never wore poplin of any ilk. Maybe shorts on Nantucket. Maybe.

ADG II

 And speaking of puppets.