After chatting to Alex via PM I'm really fired up now about moving The Look on -
The Ivy League style has never been set in stone & it will move on with or with out the involvement of any internet MB people. Just you try and stop it.
'Trad' looks to stop the clock, if not to turn it backwards. 'Period dressing' really.
Japanese Ivy seems to stress an Americana 50's/'60's take on the style. London does this too to an extent.
The thing to do is to make this style (like any style) relevant to today.
Keeping that Ivy spirit somehow, but stopping it being stuck in a rut.

New to me last year was the Slack jacket (That Larry David look!) - An old style to many other people, but new to me.
I'm keen for more new elements in this old style to keep the continuum going.
All the innovations on the forums that I'm seeing relating to this style are to do with reviving consciously archaic details.
The emphasis that interests me more is taking this classic look and stressing its timeless components.
Remembering its heritage, but making it to do with today and not an evocation of your fondly remembered Grandfather.
Seems healthier somehow.

Any thoughts very welcome.

t.

Last edited by Terry Lean (2007-02-25 11:50:56)

LOL!

Who will I 'discover' next?

That hot young kid George Burns?

This outfit looks interesting IMO ( note the updated bit as for the jacket ) albeit still a bit on the safe side :

http://www.brooksbrothers.com/BB_OutfitProduct.process?IWAction=Load&Merchant_Id=1&Section_Id=424&CurSeq=0

and some of this gear too really :

http://www.oipolloi.com/brands/RalphLauren-40.html

As for a footwear example that might work :

http://www.brooksbrothers.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Merchant_Id=1&Section_Id=525&Product_Id=1051571&Parent_Id=522

Last edited by Alex Roest (2007-02-26 07:44:08)

I think Trad people have moved on. They select many of the same fabrics, thy, many of them have been bitten by the same idea of modernity. Modernity is not quite as bad for clothes as may have been thought and I am sure they are adopting them. I dont think they died, they walk amongst us wearing 150s suits and Kiton ties. I find it absurd that a mindset as powerful as the Eastern Seaboard upper/uppermiddle class just vanished because they no longer wear stove pipe pants and small lapels.

Personally, I find a lot of the principles still in evidence at Nino Corvato's shop. He continues the natural shouldered tradition and mates it with a little English seriousness and Italian artistic flair and precision. That's the sort of fusion I would imagine the Ivy league set would appreciate (If they still attended the Ivies, that is); the look was always a moving target.

It's a wonder that Mr. Corvato doesn't do a ready to wear line, or at least more patterns for them, or make a more permanent shop that will serve as his legacy and pass down his accumulated knowledge like a Huntsman or a Poole.

Do "ivy-leaguers" (meant literally, those who go to ivy league schools) dress "ivy" anymore?  it's doubtful, not that I know of many (any), but the typical am-jack casual style is probably the norm for anyone of college age. 

classic looks are timeless in that you can't really fault any of it for looking anything other than, perhaps, staid or boring.  I like my classics tweeked just enough so they don't appear stodgy...and there's a fine line between getting it right and becoming caricature.  God knows I've seen enough tweeking of classics into monstrous atrocities.  The most basic example is jeans...the classic Levis 501 cut isn't my favorite, but modern cuts have adjusted it enough so there's no glaring departure from the original 501 but enough so it fits differently (better)....another example that readily comes to mind is the newer Baracuta slim G9 harrington.  I've always thought the original G9 is a bit boxy with thick sleeves but the newer slimfit version fixed all those minute problems that I've heard folks being irked about.

I like classic beefroll penny loafers but some 'classic' models of it are just too dainty for my taste.  I like a bit heftier loafer with double soles and a higher toebox.  The Loake 'brighton' loafer is a good example of a tassle loafer that has some weight behind it and doesnt look so fairy.

Again that fine line exists between a classic style evolving with the times rather than evolving into a new beast altogether.  All this stuff is cyclical, so I suppose at some point even a tweeked classic will evolve into something closer to the original....but i like my tolerance of sartorial evolution to go from -1 to 0 to 1 back to 0 to -1 etc etc rather than starting at -10 and going up to 10 before going back