Presented here are some vintage illustrations — presumably from the Esquire archives — posted to Ivy Style’s Facebook group by image collector and comment-leaver “Carmelo.” Sportcoats with stripes — often running through a herringbone pattern — aren’t often seen today, but were popular during the Ivy heyday and, as these images show, back to the …
Previously I’ve written about the Boston Cracked Shoe look, a term applied to certain WASP patricians who would wear items that had far outlived their presentable lifespan. Members of the press discovered the concept during the presidential campaign of Adlai Stevenson when they observed Stevenson had holes in the soles of his shoes while working …
The San Francisco Chronicle recently chose a very intersting piece to run from its archives. The paper chose a 50-year-old piece brimming with anecdotes about the buttondown collar. It opens like this: The late Jack Kennedy looked up from his desk in the White House on a day in 1963. One of his aides had …
If you were a socialite who lived through the 20th century and married enough times — say, nine — eventually one of your spouses would have been in the right place at the right time and dressed fairly Ivy League. Actress and socialite Zsa Zsa Gabor died recently at the age of 99. Husband number …
Some are fond of asking whether Barbour jackets are Ivy or preppy. They are certainly not collegiate in the 1960s sense, although they would later be embraced by J. Press. They were not in “The Official Preppy Handbook.” The jacket that was sanctioned there was the LL Bean Field Coat. So what was the Barbour? …
A member of our Facebook group recently presented the opening page of the Owen Johnson’s 1911 novel “Stover At Yale,” a coming-of-age tale about a young freshman at New Haven. Dink Stover, freshman, chose his seat in the afternoon express that would soon be rushing him to New Haven and his first glimpse of Yale …
As a blizzard whips through our national’s capital today, one preppy policeman is taking duty into his own hands — and putting his feet inside classic LL Bean rubber boots. We’ve previously profiled the same Washington, DC police officer in a post entitled, “Fashion Police: Ivy Style Reader Is A Top Cop.” And today the …
You might remember reports over the past couple of holiday shopping seasons that LL Bean could barely meet demand for its famous rubber boots. Well the kids are still wearing them and the company is predicting sales of one million units by 2018, up from the current 600,000. Ten years ago it was a mere …
Since I like to doodle at the piano and believe this to be the most wonderful time of the year, I break out the Christmas sheet music the day after Thanksgiving so I can enjoy a whole month of playing yuletide hymns. Of course the retailers start earlier and earlier, but decorations and music are …
To make sure you’re in the proper Christmas spirit, here’s Chet Baker and the Lighthouse All Stars doing “Winter Wonderland” from 1953. Chet cut one Christmas album, “Silent Nights,” in 1986. He declined to include, however, the Christmas tune that would have best suited him: “All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth.” …
“My kinda clothes” is a charming little phrase coined by Charlie Davidson of The Andover Shop. Here at Ivy Style, it’s a regular series in which readers share their favorite clothing items. If you’d like to share yours, use the contact button above. * * * I picked up my style of dress largely without …
This morning I received a lovely note in my inbox, which read, in part, “You do fine work. I check in almost every day and peruse your archives a lot. I am touched by your frequent tributes to the Jewish storeowners who helped establish the Ivy look. Philosemitism is very rare these days; love your …
Our confrere Matthew Jacobsen of OldMagazineArticles.com recently supplied us with a vintage article from the pages of Gentry Magazine (see “The Gentrified Campus.”) Now he follows up with another one, this time from Gentry’s Autumn 1952 issue, that provides an eye-opening glimpse into how collegiate attire was presented to young men at the time. As …
In our last post about Washington & Lee University in 1969, many were surprised — including myself — by how many of the young men had fastened the top button on their three-button jackets. It certainly led to many speculations here and on our Facebook page. Was this a regional thing? Were the jackets made …
In our last post, we saw that Harvard in 1969 was already a sea of denim. But what did a small liberal arts school like Washington & Lee look like? It looked like this. Thanks to frequent comment-leaver “SE” for submitting these. — CC
A reader sent in the following passage on changes in dress at Harvard in the ’60s. It comes from the book “Coming Apart: A Memoir of the Harvard Wars of 1969,” by Roger Rosenblatt. Click here for a 1997 lecture on the topic by Mr. Rosenblatt. * * * It is odd to remember, but …
I chanced to meet famed attorney Eddie Hayes in a hotel suite. No, nothing like that. There was a visiting tailor I was there to interview — Stephen Hitchcock, as I recall — and the client before me getting fitted was none other than the notorious clotheshorse Mr. Hayes, who was the model for the …
Ancient madder ties, a fall/winter classic, are extra prevalent this year. Brooks Brothers has introduced them in its narrow width, and Ralph Lauren’s collections, especially Purple Label, are full of them. But what exactly is ancient madder? We asked menswear sage G. Bruce Boyer to give us the scoop. * * * Authentic ancient English …
Over the years, one of the recurring themes at Ivy Style has been the lost art of menswear illustration. From JC Leyendecker’s Harvard jocks of the teens and ’20s to Esquire and Apparel Arts in the ’30s, from Ivy ads in the ’50s and ’60s to contemporary Japanese illustration, we’ve presented it all and many …