Sweet Enlow

Last night, I took my Brazilian to see Jude Law play Hamlet on Broadway.  It was an incredible show.  But, after the show, I began to think more and more about this article I had just hours before read in the latest GQ (where Jude Law was oddly enough featured) about the reversion of men’s fashion currently into turn-of-the-century type garb. 

I personally love this era.  Lots of thick garments, herringbone prints, and vests.  But some era’s should never be repeated… like the 70′s.

In any regard, I began to think about the cyclical nature of mens style and what it means.  I thought about the interesting aspects of different trends that come and go i.e. Skinny ties, Lacoste polos, Plaid etc…  But what I came to conclude is that, for 90% of men, a man should avoid the current trends extremes and always buy “timeless.”  The reason being is that most guys have no idea what they are doing when they are purchasing clothes. 

Being “timeless” in your wardrobe means taking an approach of simplicity and quality to your selection.  To give an example, take the Blazer.  A quality single-breasted Navy Blazer from the likes of Brooks Brothers or Ralph Lauren will forever be cool.  As long as it fits properly (spend some money on this… at least have it tailored) and has moderate lapels, a Navy Blazer can be the most versatile piece of clothing you own.  Casual or Dressy, it  goes with anything and can be worn anywhere… anytime.

A great blazer is but one of many examples one could list, but that is not the message of the post.  The point is, always approach your wardrobe with simplicity and quality in mind.  With that as your foundation, you can almost never go wrong.

Yes, this does rule out graphic tees

The aforementioned turn-of-the-century style is essentially very simple with the most extreme thing being likely the bow tie.  Dark Suits, dark ties, and white shirts were staples.  Jude Law’s next movie is Sherlock Holmes coming out on Xmas this year.  With Robert Downey as Holmes and Guy Ritchie the director, I am sure it will be great.  But, I can’t lie, I am interested to see what they are wearing

Looking dope - dark suit, dark trench, white shirt

My favorite subcategory in a person’s wardrobe has to be shoes.  For some reason, I find myself sometimes searching for shoes that I don’t even need.  It is a weird obsession I guess.  In addition, and I know this is odd, but I find myself highly interested in women’s shoes, particularly boots and pumps.  Weird I know, but if  a girl wears tight heels, it turns me on incredibly.

This post, however,  is dedicated to the men’s side of footwear, particularly boots.  I am specifying boots because I feel at least one pair of great boots should be a staple of every man’s closest.  I personally have five or six different pairs that I love and wear 90% of the time.  Breifly, here is  a description of the types of boots I think every man should have

Tall Boots

Most consider “Tall Boots” to be Cowboy Boots – understandable.  If you are into that kind of thing then so be it.  I always feel it is better to express your own personal style than someone elses.  Being raised in Oklahoma, the Cowboy Boot prevalence, as consistent as clockwork, comes to the forefront of most wardrobes circa the first year of college.  This is fine, except that since everyone does it, it loses some originality.  If you are looking for good cowboy boots, I recommend “Lucchese.”  They are but one of many a great product coming from the Lone Star state.  Cowboy boots are fine in my opinion, but I prefer Square Toe Boots, particularly by Frye Company.  Here is a picture of a particular pair

While I am not exactly a big proponent of these particular pair, I think they provide a good enough example for what I am speaking of i.e. sqaure toe, overall shape etc…  With these particular pair, however, I do not like the harness and I do not like the rubber bottom.  Considering that, ddly enough, I have a very similar pair with a wooden bottom and no harness.  A great place to look for Frye boots is eBay.  In addition to simply Frye Boots, eBay is also a great place to look for vintage boots overall.  Generally, I would most often expect vintage boots to be much cooler than new…most of the time that is.  One of the best examples of someone who has great vintage boots is Dave Matthews.  He always wears these old boots to perform in and he looks real good doing it.

Ankle Length

I personally wear 25-year-old (literally) vintage timberland boots 75% of the time.  Dark Brown and ultra vintage, they go with anything and everything and always look good.  Mine are so old I was forced to buy a new pair so I could eventually replace them.  Either way, ankle length boots provide utility and compatibility.  Again, I would suggest searching eBay for vintage ankle style boots.  Here is a picture of my 7-eye Timberland’s.  Imagine 25 years of constant wear, completely worn out soles, and beat up leather and you get the idea of my current pair

Chuka

Chuka’s are a description of the type of length (ankle height) and the composition of the shoe (the shoe is basically two pieces of whatever material it is composed of).  The greatest example of Chukas are the famous (or infamous if you are a right-winger) “Wallabee” chuka boot by the English company Clarks.  Worn by every professor during the Viet Nam era and still worn by pseudo intellectuals throughout, these really are great shoes and incredibly comfortable.  They are likely the best casual shoe I can possibly think of.  In addition to the Wallabee, Clarks has a large supply of “Desert Boots” sometimes called “British Officer Style Boots.”  These are very similar to Wallabees in their composition but look slightly more hipster.  I have a pair of both and I love them equally.

 Boot “Dont’s”

• Stay away from the Hip-Hop Tims.  Everyone one knows these boots.  Unless your Jay-Z, just dont.
• Extremely pointy cowboy boots is no-go… purely my opinion however
• Don’t buy cheap boots.  Not only will they not hold up, they are noticeable in quality.

Recap

• At least one pair of great boots should be main staple of a man’s wardrobe… do not be afraid to spend a substantial amount.  You should be able to keep great boots for a couple of decades – as long as your not actually working on a ranch of something
• One of the 3 categories above listed are a safe bet to be looking appropriate
• eBay vintage boots searching almost always causes one to find something legit

http://www.clarks.com/

http://www.timberland.com/home/index.jsp

http://www.thefryecompany.com/

http://www.lucchese.com/

A few weeks back, I dedicated a post to the way women wear eyeliner.  I provided some pictures, but really none of those pictures compares to the following.  I remember seeing these ads a few years back and I remember literally commenting out loud to myself on how amazing these pictures are.

The model is Line Gost, a Swede, shot oddly enough by the singer Bryan Adams (think “summer of 69′”) for the clothing company Guess.  Guess models and advertisements have always been famous for being ultra-sexz (Wayne’s World’s schwing  is about Claudia Schiffer’s Guess ad).   I was in their store over labor day in Miami and it unfortunatrly had way to much of an affliction/graphic tee aura.  Thus, I will likely never go back.

They dressed Gost up commemorating Sophia Loren.  If you can, check out how sexy her eyes are (I realize the entirety of the picture is like this).

I wanted to provide some more examples of a woman looking awesome with heavy eye makeup.  But after posting this, I think the main reason is I am just obsessed with this particular set of ads. 

If you are interested, check out the site www.Topman.com. 

It is a British clothing site that reminds me a lot of American Apparel.  A lot of over the top funky stuff that I am not really a fan of, but they do have some great stuff and it is surprisingly cheap. 

In my endless hours of internet searching due to captivity, I randomly stumble upon these sites.  For all you wannabe hipsters, I really don’t know the company’s history or how old it is etc… so dont try and highbrow me acting like I am way behind the times. 

It (Topman) also had quite a few photo’s in last months GQ. 

In any regard, check it out and see for yourself.

Lately, I have been getting quite a bit of commentary about, as Ted Bentler oh-so eloquently puts it, my passion for fashion(whats up bro!).  Most of my male friends love to give me a hard time for this seemingly odd interest of mine and I gladly except the teasing.  If you can’t laugh at yourself then something is wrong right?  However, I wanted to take some time and defend my passion and provide some reasons why you too should take a serious interest in the way you present yourself.

Every day I go to the gym to workout I see essentially the same scene.  I see a weight room filled with guys attempting to better their physique – whether through body building, crossfit, or through some type of cardiovascular exercise.  This is a universal scene across the world for having a better physique promotes confidence and increases overall general health. 

Oddly enough, the people who give me the hardest time about taken a more than serious interest in fashion are almost always the guys who are the biggest meatheads in the gym.  They drive the biggest trucks, have the most ridiculous tattoos, or likely repp the most amount of weight on the bench press (you know, unless they were having a bad day…ugh).  The fact that this is a reoccurring theme then forces me to ask the question, “where is your/their disconnect?”  These types that act in this manner are doing it for the same reason that I enjoy fashion.  They want to look good, stand out, and have confidence – and we all do it to attempt to demonstrate a higher value than others.  So that being the case, what is causing these mongrols to spend hours in the gym to get bigger, then show up to the bar wearing a high school t-shirt and tennis shoes?

As pretentious as this sounds (and I HATE pretentiousness),I think it is a lack of maturity  To tease someone for taking an interest in any odd hobby is of course valid within the realm of man-culture, but to seriously feel like its ridiculous to take an interest in how you present yourself to society is beyond reasoning.  It reminds me of the common theme that seemingly recurs throughout all generations of alpha male culture where somehow it is dubbed as “uncool” or lame to act as if your interested in education/kowledge/learning.  Of course this ridicule always seems to occur when “Groupthink” is at its highest: parties, tailgates, dinners etc… (if you are  going to argue that speaking about intellectual topics at those events is inappropriate, to a certain extent I wholeheartedly agree – like the saying “dont discuss religion or politics”- but that revolves around having social tact more than anything else). 

Either way, for all you haters out there, I ask you a few questions:

“Do you not care about the way you look?”

“Do you not want to bring attention to yourself in a good way?”

“Do you not want to be original in your appearance? Do want to look like everyone else or do you want to standout?”

“Do you want to look as if you have a hold on your life, or do you want to look sloppy?”

“Do not want to look crisp?”

I think that if one asked any of these questions to the haters, they would all answer with a resounding no (unless they were in a group that is). 

When I post about certain aspects of style, I am not asking anyone to take a serious interest in fashion, only think about heeding the advice.  It’s similar to if some hipster walked into a gym to improve his  health and had no idea what he was doing, yet refused to ask a trainer any advice b/c the trainer wasnt ironic enough in his approach to current workout apparel.  I am certainly not Ralph Lauren, but leading for a lifestyle that is almost entirely opposite to the fashion world, I am pretty knowledgeable.

Do I devote likely to much time to fashion? Probably.  But that still doesnt mean it’s not important.

If you want to be the best at whatever you do, you cant look like shit doing it.

One my best friend's view of me - accurate I would say

The blog has been a little weak over the last week, but I have been swamped with mid-terms and my parents visiting this weekend.  I am sure you were all dying for an updated posts so for that I apologize.

Considering I live in upstate New York and have for the last 3 and 1/2 years, I consider myself savvy at handling extreme winters.  Also, I like when it gets cold because it allows me to accessorize.  In lieu of this accessorizing, I wanted to comment and suggest for this winter fingerless gloves.  I just purchased a pair last week and wore them this weekend receiving a fair amount of compliments. 

There are two types you can purchase.  There are the fingerless gloves that look like you cut the fingers yourself (shown below).  These are the type I prefer and of which I bought.  It gives me I think a nice eclectic flair to my usually fairly preppy attire.

The other kind is the fingerless glove that has the piece that folds back and forth basically looking like an oven mitt.  These are fine for girls, but for guys I think they are kind of effeminate.  Here is a pair

my apologies on the scarf

Gloves are a great present in my opinion.  They are fairly cheap and will be used alot.  I personally got mine from Ralph Lauren’s Rugby.

Here is the link to and a picture of the Rugby pair…http://rugby.com/shop/item.aspx?productId=3757367&categoryId=3138720&cp=3138868

Very quickly

I just wanted to point out a typo I had in my earlier “Fashion Respekk” post.  I mentioned in the parentheses that if someone chooses to wear nice dress shoes that they hopefully make them square toe black shoes.  I did this by forgetting to add a negation in the sentence.

Nothing is worse… let me repeat… nothing is worse than square toe black dress shoes.  Cheap, terrible structure, and almost always terrible quality, these shoes are an abomination.  When this New York hipster friend-of-mine  I know called me out on it, I immediately had to laugh at myself because had I actually meant that statement, no one should ever read my blog again…period.  I will post more soon on shoes in the future, but for now I just wanted to save my dignity. 

Shout out to my hipster for the service…

I spent this last weekend with two of my closest friends, Baby and Bru, in NYC.  It was an incredible weekend filled with just about everything that is awesome about New York: Beautiful women, great food, hipsters.  However, this post is not going to detail the weekend, but rather talk about a few noticeable fashion faux pas that I saw during my weekend. 

1.  The cargo short

I am at a loss for explanation on this topic.  I know that for some unforeseen reason these ridiculous things became popular in the late 90’s.  However, their time has passed.  Unfortunately, their appearance is like a ghost haunting the streets of every city in the US.  My own father wears these sometimes and I just have to shake my head.  This “trend” may be to blame on stores like Hollister, Abercrombie, and Aeropostale, but ultimately it falls on the consumer.  Either way, my biggest issue with the Cargo Short is that the solution is sooooo simple – one could simply buy normal (by normal I mean one without the sweet side pockets) khaki short of any color for basically the same price.  This is predominantly why I blame this epidemic on the aforementioned stores because they consistently stock their supply with cargos.  Unfortunately, a large majority of men shop at these hellholes, thus taking the logical route that cargoes must be acceptable… they are not.  Just go to the GAP or J.Crew and buy normal shorts (have them stop above the knee please).  You look exponentially better.  I personally prefer to buy 5” Khaki shorts from J.Crew – they are extremely short, but look very good with muscular legs.  Also, I think it looks pretty good if you take some old khaki’s, cut them to about a 7” inseam, and then wash them.  A nice homemade frayed pair of khaki shorts.

Nobody has gotten a hand job in cargo shorts since ‘nam!

- Seth Superbad

2.  Lugz

Where I am from, (the extremely fashion forward scene of Oklahoma) this unfortunate sight does not exist… thank god.  However, this epidemic resounds throughout every corner of New York (and most of the Northeast I presume, except I think they prefer Tims).  The epidemic I am speaking of is the Lugz boot showing.  Someone needs to let New Yorkers know that a matching Yankee hat and hoodie equipped with oversized jeans is already bad enough.  The bright yellow Lugz (which I tend to find is highly repped by the overweight late 20’s white guy) showing just compounds the “terribleness”

3.  White Socks

The importance of white socks in sartorial terms is entirely underrated.  The time to wear white socks is, well, never.  Simply put, unless one is heading to the gym (even though I don’t even wear white socks there), white socks should never be worn.  Often time’s I have seen attempts by young gentleman to attempt to excel in their approach to dressing themselves, yet fail miserably with the white socks saga.  Here is a great example I have seen multiple times.  A young fellow decides he wants to visit a club and decides that a black shirt over dark jeans is appropriate.  He closes the outfit with his choice of shoes (hopefully it’s not some black sqauretoe’s).  He looks adequately crisp.  Quickly, he reaches down to adjust his pants and all of the sudden his ankle reveals white ankle length socks.  His attempt to look fresh is done…over. 

The rules of socks are ambiguous, but here are a few quick fail-safe suggestions; opt to not wear socks a majority of the time, especially in the summer.  If you are someone who could care less about socks, (insert any number of my close friends here) buy some cheap colored socks at the GAP or wherever and use them appropriately.  I honestly feel that a failed attempt to match socks with the rest of the attire looks substantially better than white socks.  As one’s cash flow increases, one should choose to stock their closet with a substantial supply of high-end socks.  I once read that Thom Brown wears the same thing (grey suit) just about every day, yet is an advocate of eclectic sock choices.   He is a great example of a man who alters his style only slightly (socks and ties) and yet maintains a great look. 

 Ya, Jake and Elwood Blues were proponents of White Socks

Just think about it

I mentioned in my “about” section that I love style/fashion – whatever you choose to call it.  I have good taste, as do my parents, and I love to comment on any current trends as well as what I think is tight.  Thus, keep an eye out for future posts concerning these topics.

In addition, I, for some reason, like girl’s style as much as guys.  A girl having good taste and dressing well is extremely important to me (obviously more of a luxury than a necessity).  “ClassicSexy” with a bit of eclectic flair I guess is how I would describe my desire for my woman’s taste – similar to Sarah Jessica Parker’s except substantially less extreme.  Lots of high heels, dresses, etc… not really a big fan of women wearing UGGS (how did these even become popular?), hoodies, Chuck Taylors, or “scrunchies” to name a few.  Do some creative thinking and you get my point I think…

As I mentioned, I like girls to look sexy.  Thus, I want to comment on my particular preference for eyeliner on a woman (ya, this blog is about everything).  Simply put, I like a lot.  When I tell girls my personal preference I usually almost always receive an immediate response sounding something like “O that’s trashy,” or some other reference to the fact that they think they are somehow better than girls who wear eyeliner “in that way” (we all know what I am talking about here).  Well, I hate to break it to you, but if anyone is calling you any kind of derogatory name, it’s not because of your eyeliner.  It is, and I know this is a shock, probably caused by your actions and/or your character…

I am going to give a couple examples of what I like in eyeliner preferences and see what you think…

With blondes, I like when girls use black to contrast their hair (and a lot of times their lighter colored eyes).  That being said, take a look at Marissa Miller here.

Ya… clearly… she’s beautiful… no question.  In my opinion, probably the second best looking out there behind my girl Heidi (but she trounces Gisele).  Anyways, just spotlight her eyes in this particular picture.  Now, look at her in this one

Clearly, this may be a sexier picture for obvious reasons.  But after the initial response, I immediately noticed her eyes.  Good Lord.  She looks exponentially sexier with the heavy black on.

With Brunettes, I continue to like the contrasting look.  Don’t get me wrong, I still like the heavy black, but sometimes when Brunettes accent the black with a pastel eye shadow its looks sooooooooooo dope (see Rihanna).  Even though I don’t think Megan Fox is as incredible as everyone else, she undoubtedly has the concept of “sex appeal” down.  She doesn’t really need to do much with black hair and blue eyes, but here is a good shot of her “cat eye” style.  Just another way to apply it

Lastly, here is a good one of Rihanna using something besides black

I know this is all preference, but considering my audience is a lot of guys, maybe this will help provide a better understanding of what I am talking about. 

Lastly, I will close commenting on two things.  The first is that, especially to girls, I know the concept of wearing eyeliner to increase sex appeal is not in any way a novel concept.  The Ancient Egyptians, both women and men, were using Kohl powder (same thing) thousands of years ago.  However, I think it’s important to clarify (at least from my perspective) that it does not equate to a negative.  With me, it’s a positive… so start lathering it on.  Secondly, I realize that some guys either never notice it or simply don’t like this type of dress/style.  I have had to hear my dad talk for years about how he likes what he calls “the Montana look” – basically, no makeup, hair in a braided pony tail, and wranglers.  I couldn’t disagree more (unless it’s appropriate for something of course …. Like if I somehow decide to take my girl on a ruck march… you know me), but… 

To each his (or her) own I guess