An article in Forbes suggests that the resurgence of Ivy style signals a cultural romanticization of the classic college experience. The article by Liz Doe Stone includes excerpts from her interview with Matthew Longcore.
According to the article:
Loafers and rugby shirts, cable-knit sweaters, and collegiate stripes are back. This fall, the resurgence of Ivy style has moved from trend to something closer to a cultural motif. J. Press, the 124-year-old brand founded at Yale, debuted a new womenswear collection during New York Fashion Week. Gant returned to Yale for a new multi-season “Homecoming” collaboration, drawing on its history with the Yale Co-op and shooting the campaign on campus. Tommy Hilfiger staged a collection called “Plaza Prep.” Tuckernuck shot its fall editorial at Vassar College. And a new generation is rediscovering Ralph Lauren’s rugby shirts, Polo caps, and other staples of classic American style.
Matthew Longcore, editor of Ivy Style, sees the campus itself as part of the appeal. Many students today, he says, yearn for what they describe as a “Hogwarts” experience: “an inspiring campus setting with grand libraries, ancient traditions, and social clubs that foster lasting friendships.”
The fantasy isn’t simply dressing the part. It’s having a place within the world the clothes suggest: a campus, a community, a set of traditions, and a group of people with whom you share them.
Longcore sees the revival partly as a response to an increasingly mediated world. “People spend a lot of time in front of screens, and have become disconnected from one another,” he told me. “The high-tech new world can be a lonely place.” With the future feeling uncertain, he argues, “there is a natural inclination to take comfort in the past.”
Read the full article here:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/lizdoestone/2026/09/29/ivy-style-is-back-so-is-the-fantasy-of-college-life/
Global fashion brands often use their “heritage” cynically for marketing purposes. For example, Gant is owned by the Swiss conglomerate Maus Freres and Its HQ is in Stockholm, thousands of miles from New Haven. The brand manufactures nearly everything in Asia or China. The new Yale collection is tiny so “homecoming” is nothing but PR hype for the gullible. It’s as Ivy as Abba!
Totally agree!
I think Mr. Longcore made a good point when he stated that “an inspiring campus setting with grand libraries, ancient traditions, and social clubs that foster lasting friendships.” is something we long for. My college experience was certainly like this, and I’m now currently in the Army which assumes a similar role. I wonder what my experience of life will be like when I don’t have an institution and the social web that comes with it to undergird my life.
Jay,
Church and family.
Check out Gottesdienst.org
There is a liturgical calendar there. (I try to wear neckties in appropriate liturgical colors, for fun and structure). Historical. Institutional. Traditional. Membership. The libraries generally aren’t “grand”, but the reading is as substantial as you want it to be. Log on there and ask anyone there for a local congregation.
Steer clear of COWO.
Hooah!
Bopper, LTC, US Army (Retired)
I appreciate the invitation, but I am currently a practicing Catholic. Christ is King! I hope everything is well for you sir, as a Specialist I salute you.
Well, you’re good to go, then. I might suggest (going through your chain of command, of course), to the Installation Chaplains office. He might have a copy of the Vulgate and a Castle’s Latin-English dictionary to lend. That’ll keep you busy for an hour/day. If he can’t give you one, there is Ebay. You’ve completed College? Look into OCS. Seek and you shall find!
Another topic: Does the PX still carry civilian khakis made in rip-stop cotton? Combined with oxblood penny-loafers, OCBD, repp ties in liturgical colors, and a navy blazer…STRAC!
Living, communicating, and educating in the digital universe can be alienating for many. We have been told that we humans are a social species. Have we arrived at the position of an independence through isolation? The elements Editor Longcore lists; I might also add the ivy-covered gables and towers add an element of enchantment and also include a sense of permanence, historical permanence that provide an anchor living in the swiftly changing digital universe.
Aside from the obligatory caveat about privilege and exclusivity – one must offer a pinch of incense to Caesar in order to be permitted to admire the temple afterward – the Forbes article says good things about what college (and clothing) can mean: belonging, tradition and community. “You don’t just wear the sweater. You imagine the life that goes with it” sounds like something Ralph Lauren would say.
Thank you, Matthew Longcore, for the recent flurry of Ivy Style posts and for keeping the forum active. As this article shows, all roads still lead, at least now and then, back to Ivy Style, inspiring campuses and the recognition that place, tradition, belonging and clothing still matter.
There might be a slightly broader thing going on. For those under 40, life might appear to be about chasing a future full of uncertainty and in the end landing at Longcore’s “lonely place.” In this cold world, the past simply does not matter any more and the disconnection makes them ask, “Who the hell am I and what the hell does it all mean?” That sounds pretty damn scary to me.
So maybe Ivy represents an escape from that dark destiny. It’s everything their future is not. These younger people might be saying “If I have to ride out this future at work, I need a safe harbor where I can find connection and nourishment.”
AI is artificial intelligence. Ivy is genuine
This was beautiful Admin. Thank you for your reflections.
This makes me look forward to going back to my old Liberal Arts stomping grounds at UT-Austin this fall when I return to visit family living nearby.
I look back on my old school days in the libraries studying and finding books on my own, and just loving the walk across campus. Met my wife there and she went to law school there. I know Austin has changed, and not much for the better, but some of the old campus bars are still there and I will be the old guy once again, but likely in fair isle and tweed. Thanks for a great read.
I arrived in ’77 and never left, so I’m an eyewitness to most of Austin’s many changes and its few surviving landmarks.
Near campus, the Hole In The Wall is still there, Abel Moses is now Cain & Abel’s, and Posse West and Uncle Nasty’s/Nasty’s are no more. You can still get the planet’s greasiest cheeseburger (it’s a good thing) and the coldest beer at Dirty’s.
East 6th — aka Dirty 6th — is still the party HQ for -21 students with fake Louisiana driver’s licenses and a thirst for shots (and drugs on the street). Adults are found in the numerous bars and high-end restaurants in the area west of Congress, east of Lamar, south of 11th, and north of the lake.
Other highlights and lowlights include:
* The frat boys now dress Preppy-adjacent and I have no idea where they drink now.
* There are several great live music venues south of the river, though you might trip over a Hermes bag getting to one.
* You can still dance country at the Broken Spoke.
* Believe it or not, East Austin is now Hipsterviille, with irony lurking at every corner.
* You start getting an “Anywhere America” suburban feel north of 183 or south of Ben White.
I suspect the “resurgence” is more preppy than Ivy. Updated Traditional, including spread collars and two button jackets with some padding, never disappeared. The golf bro/frat bro stuff has remained de rigueur at the stereotypically preppy colleges. Interestingly the schools where I’ve seen heyday, purist Ivy are the small, “liberal, brainy, quirky hipster” schools.
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Bit odd that the college experience is presented as some kind of lost kingdom. I attended a perfectly good but pretty standard public university in the Midwest (albeit in the 1980s) and the picturesque and social elements evoked by the article seemd evidently present. Is that no longer the case?