Yes Brooks made the best shirts (at least for ivy tastes) for many decades, with only the most minor of changes throughout that period. Troy Shirtmakers' Guild may well have been equal in terms of quality, but they sold on a much, much smaller scale. Gant? I've never been tempted, plus as I recall their old shirts generally go for big money. Sero? Maybe equal to Brooks, more likely a close second.

As I recall it was at some point in the early 1990s that Brooks killed the goose that laid the golden eggs i.e. they changed their shirt design to respond to contemporary tastes. Fortunately Ebay came along a few years later and, due to the vast quantity of Brooks shirts sold prior to the early 1990s, getting decent vintage and NOS was not hard for many years.

I believe Brooks always kept the price relatively low on their shirts, which is one of the reasons why they sold so many of them.

As any schoolboy knows, it's the word Makers that signals the classic look. Although I don't know if that was the situation in the 1950s and earlier.

Last edited by Yuca (2021-09-29 09:19:11)

Whilst you were on . . . ahem 'sabbatical', I recall Bop posted a shot of himself in a white Troy SG ocbd. The collar looked perfect. I've only ever owned one myself - very similar to a Makers. Probably made in the same place in fact.

Last edited by Yuca (2021-09-29 09:35:06)

I've dabbled with other brands but over the long term Brooks  OCBD is a reliable standard.
JFM was promoting a shirt years ago (can't remember the brand) and I suggested that the box pleat was oversized. He said that I didn't know what I was talking about and he was so aggressive that I suspected that he secretly thought the same.

I've not seen them in the flesh but a recent new company in London specialises in ocbds, and they look pretty good. Jake's is the brand in question. I heard that the owner (who's called Jake) was banned from the IS FB page by the new guy. Draw your own conclusions.

Once we are able to post photos on this forum, Jake's will undoubtedly merit their own thread. I vaguely recall that Woof is a satisfied customer. The owner will certainly be welcome to post any info and shots; on this forum, real ivy clothing is the norm rather than a threat.

Last edited by Yuca (2021-09-29 11:58:07)

Exactly. With the emphasis on bona fide ivy.

Good to see you back.

Paid in clothing - a tempting concept.

Last edited by Yuca (2021-09-30 12:21:27)

So: a knock on the door at eight in the morning.  An evidently stressed delivery driver hands me a package.  The wrong package.  How close some female unknown to me got to unwrapping this crisply ironed, perfect blue Brooks shirt we'll never know.  Driver scratches his worried head and hands me the right package.  Addressed to my daughter, who no longer lives at home.  No obvious sign it's come from outside the UK so the package sits for twelve hours until she gives permission to open it.  What is it?  A blue shirt.  Right.  But I wish I'd taken a lesson from Andy Warhol and ordered a large number when mildly flush. 
I still cannot think of anything finer.  Can you?

Indeed. I first managed to get there in '95. It was over. I was so disappointed even if I kind of expected it. I'd been shopping at J.Simons, a weeny little shop in Covent Garden and it was utterly brilliant, packed with the very best of everything Ivy/Americana. Brooks was cavernous and full of boring clothes, boringly displayed, and you were chased everywhere by desperate sales people after their 10%. America of the imagination is a long way from the realities of the country. But much of life is lived and enlivened by the imagination. Pity the man attached to 'reality'.

Can no-one provide an answer to what seems like a straightforward question?

I was looking through my wardrobe to check out what Gant shirts and BB shirts I now have and I came across a Boston Brothers shirt. I think it was given to me but does anyone know about the brand? I thought it must be a 'snide' label and I don't know where it was manufactured but it's not a bad shirt. Great collar roll 4 fingers. Yellow with a blue overcheck. A brief internet search suggests they were made in Italy and sold in Australia amongst other places.

I've been buying quite a lot of Brooks Made In The USA on Ebay recently (not Ebay Com., the UK site) for as little as £6 including postage.  Didn't someone on 'Talk Ivy' recently mention USA-made Brooks shirts turning up in TKMaxx?  Anyway, these are secondhand, quite clearly: some Makers, others M&M.  The collars can perhaps be a little disappointing but will doubtless soften with washing.  Brooks shirts I bought twelve or more years ago that were 'pre-loved' (horrible phrase, much like 'mid-century') are still going strong.  Others - RL, Gant, Sero, Lion Of Troy, even Troy Guild - have bitten the dust.

The guy in the BB shop told me they had an Italian contact who had agreed to buy any stock Brooks wanted to offload, and they'd agreed to be the only UK distributers. Apparantly there was warehouses full of it. Don't know how true that was, but it was definitely within weeks of a load turning up at TKMaxx