Yule Be Cool: Chipp’s Naughty Santa Ties

You probably never thought of yourself as a holiday-tie kind of guy. But don one of these ties by Paul Winston/Chipp2 and watch your coworkers at the virtual office party snigger, “Nice Santa tie,” followed by, “Hey, waitaminute… “

From the witty clothier who gave the world Kama Sutra suit linings in conservative sack suits comes a troika of ties featuring Santas on whose laps you’d never entrust your children. Two of them feature the Chipp signature of a repeated sedate motif with one of the emblematic characters misbehaving. From left to right, the ties are known as “Moon Over the North Pole,” “Santa With a Heart On,” and “Fireman Santa,” in which ol’ Kris Kringle, after downing all those glasses of milk people left out for him, proceeds to douse the smoldering embers of a happy home’s hearth by relieving himself down the chimney. The ties are still available in this remarkable year of 2020, although they might be difficult for your friends and family to see over Zoom. But they’ll keep you in good spirits, and there’s nothing Santa can bring you better than that. 

13 Comments on "Yule Be Cool: Chipp’s Naughty Santa Ties"

  1. Jancis Robertson | December 6, 2010 at 2:23 pm |

    Well it’s truly remarkable. Tomorrow in London the finest new Ivy League clothing shop in an age is opening – I’m talking about the new John Simons shop – and here, on, ahem, ‘Ivy Style’ we get a piece on Santa Claus ties. Finger on the pulse? If this website was ever alive it sure is as dead as a Dodo now.

  2. Often there is a thin line between brilliant irony and the authentically awful, other times there is a gulf….

  3. Vulgar. Crass. Tasteless. Awful. Disgusting.

    I guess I don’t like the ties very much.

    I’m not dumping on you, CC–you didn’t make these ties; you’re just reporting on them. But I am sick and tired of this schoolboy sniggering, this finger-in-the-eye-while-playing-dress-up approach to clothes.

    Which is probably why I dislike patch and “fun” clothes: they follow the form while giving it the finger.

    Why can’t men just dress like men, like mature, sober adults? There’s a time and place for casual looks, for dressing for fun (and I realize that GTH is part of that–just not in my part of the world). This constant infantilization of menswear is one of many manifestations of the all-out assault on our culture that started with the Cultural Revolution of the 60s.

    In contrast, we have A Suitable Wardrobe. Will’s site is always classy, always mature (with perhaps the sole exception of this year’s Valentine’s Day post). It’s a welcome zephyr in our base world.

  4. EffortlesslyTrad (FT) | December 8, 2010 at 1:34 pm |

    Chacun à son goût, I suppose. I own one of these ties. I purchased it directly from Mr. Winston earlier this autumn when I was in New York. I dropped into his shop on a whim and he was there and full of stories. I would never have known about him if it weren’t for Christian’s blog.

    Needless to say, I don’t find the ties awful. Maybe infantile, but I don’t think anyone buys these ties thinking they are mature or sober. I purchased mine because it made me laugh and I think it would amuse those whom I admire.

  5. Mr. Winston on his ties “I maintain that the difference between sophisticated humor and bad taste depends on who is wearing the tie or giving it as a gift. A “funny” tie that the chairman of a Fortune 500 company gives to one of his board members would be “sophisticated humor” and the same tie on the counter at Bloomingdales, Saks, etc. would be in “bad taste”.

    Read more about their history here http://www.chipp2.com/blog/?tag=sophisticated-humor

  6. Henry,

    I guess you would not like the http://www.chippneckwear.com/pussy-on-the-mind-tie/ either.

    At this point, mature and sober might be overrated.

    Cheers, BC

  7. Old Bostonian | December 5, 2020 at 12:23 pm |

    Truly vulgar.

  8. Funny seeing the reactions to these ties – you’d think they had swears plastered all over them. I won’t be buying one of these, but they gave me a chuckle.

    To all those getting worked up over them: lighten up! It’s the holidays 🙂

  9. Ha! I have a fair number of Chipp ties, and these are some of my favorites. (The baseball tie is probably in first place.)

    Anyway, several years ago our CFO had a particularly annoying woman for her admin that was uniformly despised by everyone except our CFO. I wore the heart tie one December. She saw it, looked closely at it, and then, totally obliviously, said in a heavy Russian accent, “Santa has a heart on. Why does he have a heart on? He doesn’t usually have a heart on.”

    One of those moments that makes life worth living.

  10. Another Chipp tie story.

    Many years ago, when I was in college, I wore the “cat lovers'” tie (aka “POTM”) on a first date, thinking that I would be able to smile to myself over dinner, being the only one who got the joke.

    Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

    I knocked on the girl’s door. She opened it, checked out my tie, and within seconds was laughing out loud at it. And at me.

    Lesson learned: don’t underestimate women.

  11. Even one more Chipp tie story.

    A few years back I was heavily involved in lobbying Congress on behalf of my employer, a big US tech company.

    I routinely wore the BS tie to meet with Congressmen and their staff. And absolutely nobody noticed.

  12. whiskeydent | December 6, 2020 at 9:56 am |

    Iwarti
    BS jokes aren’t exactly new on the Hill.

  13. PocketSquare | January 27, 2021 at 2:23 pm |

    I think they are a bit of naughty fun. I would wear one to our holiday party in December, I think most adults would see it as nothing more than a little holiday wink. You don’t have to take my word for it, try it yourself next year and let me know.

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