Short bit from a chamber of commerce site, or some such thing, for the city of La Jolla. Discusses a store that sold Ivy stuff, plus another useful date.

The Ascot Shop is another of these long-time residents, having first opened its doors in 1950. For three generations, it has been providing residents with quality clothing. The original owner, Jack Matzinger, moved to La Jolla from his job with a big department store in Chicago in attempt to lead a more simplified life. There was a lot of competition, but Matzinger had a unique niche— the classic Ivy League look— and his business succeeded.

Tony Ventresca wrote:

Short bit from a chamber of commerce site, or some such thing, for the city of La Jolla. Discusses a store that sold Ivy stuff, plus another useful date.

The Ascot Shop is another of these long-time residents, having first opened its doors in 1950. For three generations, it has been providing residents with quality clothing. The original owner, Jack Matzinger, moved to La Jolla from his job with a big department store in Chicago in attempt to lead a more simplified life. There was a lot of competition, but Matzinger had a unique niche— the classic Ivy League look— and his business succeeded.

I think they're still around -- an old Southwick customer I believe.

Sort of a sidebar post...
Three internet finds from Japan.
The first is a review of the Ivy Illustrated books (the ones with the "cartoons").
The second is a reply post made by a woman to someone's blog.
The third is from another blog (...it is self-explanatory, I think).


1. www.retrotogo.com:

Ivy Illustrated - the Ivy League look

Recently picked up on a spending spree on Amazon Japan were these superb Ivy Illustrated books. All the text is in Japanese, so much so that I don't even know the name of the author/illustrator - though the ageing gentleman does look very cool on the inside sleeve in Harrington, button-down shirt, and jeans.

Don't worry about the language, the books are all about the images. All hand-drawn, they cover every conceivable detail (as Japanese books tend to do), from outfits, accessories and luggage through to food, plants and even famous wearers of the Ivy League style - all using the same drawing style as the front cover.

Really nice things to own - they retail for around 1680 Yen each - that's around £7.30.


2. www.japantoday.com:

I've lived in both America and Japan, in Tokyo and New York, and I would say the spending habits of Tokyoites and New Yorkers are roughly the same. There just isn't as much huge press attention that gets seen and discussed by the entire world when flagship stores open in the U.S., for whom buying expensive brand names is old hat.

There is also the stereotype that Americans don't have good fashion sense or know how to shop, while Japanese do, which is completely false. I see just as many "kakko warui" Japanese walking around in Tokyo as I do Americans in New York. Japanese fashion itself has lost the luster it once had in the eighties. Most Japanese I know (including my family) buy European (e.g. this article) and American brands. American style and American clothes are huge among young Japanese in my generation, just as they were in my parent's generation (Sometimes I laugh when I see pictures of them in their "Ivy-League" look). Everytime we go to Japan, usually our "omiyage" are American clothes.

So, Arjun, please don't be so quick to dismiss American clothes as poor-quality and American shoppers such as doudesuka as impoverished bargain-hunters.


3. www.expatbirds.blogspot.com

So, a not-to-be-named young lady inquired whether there might not be any non-creepy guys in Asia. The reason for the question shall remain shrouded in mystery – surely not even our favorite church could be scarce enough in the "single young men" department to cause anyone to leave the country?! ...and Wade, why aren’t you doing your "connecting" job?!

The answer, is simple: Yes, Virginia, there are hot guys in Asia. The best spot for guy-watching I’ve encountered so far is the IFC (International Financial Center) tower in Hong Kong -- a wide selection of mid-twenties to mid-thirties single men of different ethnicities, each of them impeccably groomed, beautifully attired, internationally versed and top-of-their-class ambitious. As we used to say – the Ivy League look.

Good stuff as always, Sir.
I love the look most when it's not 'A Look'.

http://imdb.com/title/tt0105327/

The film in the link above was recommended through Modculture forums by a young Canadian lady who's an Ivy enthusiast. I watched it again during the weekend and I was wondering if anybody would be willing to share their thoughts on the clothes being worn..... TIA,

Alex

P.S. Been reading a lot and learning a thing or two in the process rather than posting on those topics concerning Ivy League. Fascinating stuff though......

Alex Roest wrote:

I watched it again during the weekend and I was wondering if anybody would be willing to share their thoughts on the clothes being worn.....

Not seen the film yet.
But I would like to.
From photos I have found on the internet, it appears to be a hard-core "prep school" look...
(...i.e. lots of blazers, chinos, and repp ties.)

TV

There are some good guys there.
I only stick to the American MBs because my interests are US clothes & music.

Coolidge wrote:

Tony Ventresca wrote:

Peter Jennings, 1965.

http://img412.imageshack.us/img412/5919 … 196ax7.jpg

A picture truly is worth a thousand words....

Amen.
This is why it hurts to see some of the manifestations of neo-Trad.
It's not a hard look to get right, you just have to try to stop trying to make it into a 'show-off' look.
Less is more.

Peter Jennings in 1967 and the late 1960s.



...at his home in Quebec in 2002.

If the pear-shaped wore their sacks cut closer they would look better too. An unfitted bag flatters nobody.
Word for word I agree with you, Cooly.
This style has always been one of youth, energy and education. It's a college boy style in origin.
Trad on the MBs emphasises a different aspect maybe - the young grown old, perhaps - but an older man with a youthful attitude can look chipper in Ivy League clothing too I think. It's a very adaptable style.

Another old men's clothier that got started with the Ivy League look, this one is Milton's Clothing Cupboard. Below I have a few relevant quotes, but I recommend reading the full article here (read about the sales!).

For more than 60 years, Chapel Hill clothier Milton Julian has been serving fashion-conscious clients throughout the Triangle. A Chapel Hill icon." "The ultimate haberdasher." "A fashion pioneer." These are just a few of the accolades bestowed upon Milton Julian, president of Milton's Clothing Cupboard, a one-man upscale men's clothier. Eighty years old and still going strong, Julian is truly a living legend in the local fashion industry. His story is inspiring, his stamina unusual, and his success well-deserved.

...Julian up-and-left Maurice's store in 1947, and nine months later, in the fall of 1948, started his own shop: the now- legendary Milton's Clothing Cupboard. After scoping out possible locations for opening his new store, including Charleston, SC and Morganton, Va., he decided to stay in Chapel Hill. He set up shop at 163 E. Franklin Street in Chapel Hill, a location at which he remained for over 40 years. Julian's game plan was simple: offer innovative, Ivy League clothing along with superior customer service. He told one interviewer, "We pioneered the Ivy League and Brooks Brothers looks in the Southeast. Esquire and GQ thought we were in the vanguard of men's fashion." Julian got the word out about his new store by placing fliers on cars around campus, and posting them around town. He also enjoyed extensive word-of-mouth referrals.

...Julian's clientele was made up of students, alumni and faculty from UNC-Chapel Hill. "I started out with about 100 percent campus business," says Julian. "That evolved through the years to become about 10 percent campus, and 90 percent career business. The strongest segment of our business wound up being alumni, not students." For the next 40 years, Milton's Clothing Cupboard sold items essential for the Ivy League look: Gant shirts, Weejuns, Rivetz ties, Harris tweed sport coats, khaki Chino pants, snazzy worsted wool suits. As one reporter stated, Milton's clothes had "snob appeal."

This article is very informative, although it has the unlikely title of "The Muskrat Man". I do not want to fill up this thread with huge quantities of text, but I think this one is worth quoting fully.

“The Muskrat Man”
Patrick Cavanaugh, Williams ‘54

When I was young, I spent a lot of time perusing my father’s closet. As befitted an ex-Army officer, everything hung neatly in place. Rows of handmade worsted suits from Jacob Reeds lined up in ever-darkening colors. Countess Mara was the tie of choice, in generous widths of rich fabric and vivid colors. The mahogany dresser contained rows of shirts from Sulka, their perfection a testament to my mother’s skill with a hot iron. Neatly creased Borsolino hats rested in oval nests. On the floor were aligned the finest offerings from French Shriner & Urner, their shape maintained by wooden shoetrees.

Do not think my father was a dandy. His personal history was the stuff of Horatio Alger stories: child immigrant who delivered tubs of beer to the Irish railroad workers in New England, sometime Montana cowboy, World War I officer decorated with the Croix de Guerre, sales manager for a trucking company, successful small-town businessman. He was a three-goal polo player and an avid hunter and fisherman.

But the image I have is of him leaving the house for the Tuesday meeting of the Kiwanis Club, smelling of Old Spice and talc, wearing one of Jimmy the Tailor’s hand-cut suits and a complementary Burberry overcoat. He looked good. He looked like Somebody. And he must have felt as far from the drafty, rented stone cottage in Shanaho, Ireland, as he possibly could.

Anyhow, that is where I learned to love clothes. My preference was more Bill Blass than Adolph Monjeu, and I quickly shed any lingering influences of the latter after my freshman year at Williams, where, during rushing week, a jaded senior eyed my neat linen double-breasted suit and observed, “That’s a nice suit. Did you buy it in Panama?” I hastily repaired to the House of Walsh and embraced the Ivy League look with a fervor that still burns, the only evolutionary change being the acceptance of the two-button jacket, courtesy of John Kennedy.

My generation of businessmen dressed up. Coat and tie every day, pants creased, shoes shined, no worn heels. Everyone wanted to look like Gregory Peck in The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit. Then came retirement, and the uniform code changed dramatically: Goodbye Brooks Brothers, hello, L.L. Bean. My chapeau of choice became a baseball cap with a Ford logo, worn with the brim to the front like God intended. Cargo pants and flannel shirt. Rubber-soled mocs. The tweed sport coats and twill trousers languished in the closet with the Robert Talbott ties.

But one incident made me think I had shed my old skin too quickly. I was making a run to the recycling center in my pickup and had stopped at my insurance agent’s. An elderly man sitting in a parked vehicle nearby rolled down his window and yelled, “Hey! Over here!” Clearly he was ad-dressing me. “You got any muskrat?”

“Pardon me?”

“Is it muskrat season yet?”

I had to confess, I did not know. He peered at me intently, taking in the cap, the cargo pants, the olive jacket. “Ain’t you the Muskrat Man?”

Sorry, I said, not me. Having no further use for me, he abruptly rolled up his window.

For those of you who do not know about muskrat, it flourishes on the tidal marshes of the Eastern Shore of Maryland, living in mounds it builds of reeds and mud. It is hunted for its pelt and meat, which some claim is a delicacy and others disdain as grossly inedible. Trappers haul their catches to roadside markets, where they are skinned and hung on a line, accompanied by crudely lettered signs proclaiming, “Muskrats for Sale. ”Aficionados haul away their prizes to long-suffering wives who grind the meat, bones and all, into a sort of unrestrained sausage, heavily flavored with mysterious herbs. Muskrat is served at all political meetings on the shore, and woe is to the poor aspiring politician who cannot cheerfully eat at least three plates of ’rat, grinning vacuously at the ladies of the Auxiliary.

And so it was that my friend in the parking lot mistook me for one of these intrepid hunters, hoping that one of the boxes in the back of my truck held his culinary prize. I was not the Muskrat Man, but maybe, God forbid, I looked like one! My mind flashed back to class elections, 1954, when, to my dismay, I placed first in two categories: 1) Best Dressed and 2) Biggest Grind. Beau Brummell had become the Muskrat Man!

I told my wife and family the story, looking for sympathy, and got only gales of laughter. I was reminded of my newfound habit of rising early and dressing in the clothes closest to hand—usually the ones I had on the night before—and the fact that I showered and shaved less frequently. There was mention of my belief that you don’t need to comb your hair if you’re going to cover it with a cap. The phrase “pretty is as pretty does” was thrown around.

After some thought, I made a decision. Henceforth, I would wear my Muskrat Man outfit to destinations like the County Dump, Southern States and chicken sexing exhibitions. When I ventured forth to see anyone with a diploma on the wall or to borrow money or to go to a really nice party, I would revert to the Slightly Threadbare English Gentry look. When in doubt I would wear a blue blazer over faded jeans, black penny loafers with no socks, and would be mistaken for a recent transplant from Cape Cod.

Horace wrote:

[ I was never a fan of the black penny loafer with jeans and coat, but in the last few years, I think the look isn't bad.  The black penny loafer crowd was always an "arty" or "theatre" minority within the prep-contingent, as I saw it.  Not as much to do with Cape Cod, I think.

Also I could do one better than being on the receiving end of the Panama quotation, but a certain regard for the barest traces of political correctness prevents it.

Back when, the non-college-bound would wear black pants with black pointed loafers. The college-bound favored khaki pants and brown and/or oxblood penny loafers. Black shoes were more "formal" (e.g. black tassel loafers with gray flannels or black captoe shoes with dark suits). You could deny the formality of the suit (and conventional restrictions) by wearing tan captoes with the navy suit (the Italians have picked up on this). An antecedent to the fora "black suit threads".

Regards,

Steven