Well one thing is for sure: they are the best fitting for a young man - or a man with a small build unlike others that ive come across being uber baggy or too long here, but too tight here.
There is a kind of snobbery (maybe, i dont know) aboiut items like it because of the 'kidnapping of the style'
can you still get hold of Brutus shirts?

I've never been a massive fan of the Ben S but I do keep going back to a blue & white college stripe long sleeve which has the baggier fit. It's from the late 1980's I guess. Over the years I've owned quite a few - mainly in white funnily enough before my discovery of Brooks, Hathaway, Arrow and later more esoteric brands. The only true vintage version I've owned I ended up selling as the fit just wasn't right for me - though a very nice shirt in its own right. IMHO they now just seem to be one of those brands (like Fred Perry) that nowadays produce the occasional little gem of a near replica 60's garment along side the over marketed, over logoed sea of belts, ties, wrsitwatches, socks, shoes, etc. etc. that have no stylistic lineage to the original company and designs. They live on the frission of excitement that is collectively 'remembered' from their heyday. I read somehere once that in the late 1980's the head of the Gucci family dynasty was near suicidal when he realised just how bebased his family 'brand' had become with the ridiculous ammount of licencing of the logo to other companies producing hideous yet expensive nick-nacks that brought in revenue but had destroyed the fashion house's reputation. I believe that they sought to buy off the contracts of around 80% of the companies knocking out Gucci branded tat and turn the creatively ailing business around and return it to the status that they thought they deserved. Apologies -it's late night and not even I know where I'm heading with this analogy! Btw, Chetmiles is bang on - I am a big fan of the Arrnold Palmer/Robert Bruce line. Been quitely impressed too with recent half-sleeve Aertex shirts though they size labels need to be standardised for sure.

Staceyboy

Last time I saw Mr. P. Hewitt on the telly he talked a bout a "three finger" rule - If you couldn't fit three fingers under the collar of a BD then the shirt was no good.

- Anybody else ever heard of this 'rule'?

I've asked around and, although the 'rule' is probably a nice idea, nobody has ever heard of this as being any kind of  rule.

Any input?

Ta!

I just bought a two finger one so I have one finger left to show to whoever made up that rule.

most of the guys on modcult do the three finger thing.
i must confess, i do too..but i've got skinny fingers so sometimes they're smaller than most (i can fit three fingers in my RL button downs).

you can see Paolo actually demonstrating the 3 finger bit in British Style Genius episode he is featured (#3 or 4?)

He also mentions how the button down was invented to stop the collars flapping into polo players 'mouthsies'.

"You can fool some people some time
But you couldn't fool all the people all the time..."

How did Hewitt get so many people, like Uden and Marcantio, to open up to him?  Anyway, I've done my own hatchet job on the Gruesome Twosome...