Jimmy in a Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

by

Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

Jimmy in a Gieves and Hawkes dinner jacket.

I’m not a big fan of vintage clothing myself. The costume effect that a lot of vintage clothing has scares me.

I have to admit, though, that some men are very good at vintage clothing, for instance Jimmy.

Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

The three-piece tuxedo he wears is from Gieves & Hawkes. Jimmy found it on eBay, and then he took it to a local tailor for a few alterations.

Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

Jimmy demonstrates that style and being well-dressed are something beyond build. He is a short guy with a bit of extra weight, yet he looks very sharp in that Gieves and Hawkes dinner jacket.

Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

I also like the tight-fitting cut. It undermines the rule that stout men should opt for drapey clothes.

Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

Bowler and balmacaan to protect the dinner jacket. For colder weather you swap the rain mac for a black or dark charcoal chesterfield.

Jimmy pairs his Gieves and Hawkes dinner jacket with a bowler hat. Perhaps that move is a bit much. However, looking at it purely stylistically Jimmy’s bowler hat and dinner jacket harmonize well.

Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

The label states the the tuxedo is from 1988.

Gieves and Hawkes Dinner Jacket

Vintage Austin Reed bowler hat from the 1940s.

Photography: Sartorial Notes

The Decadent Dinner Jacket Tradition

by

Decadent Dinner Jacket

King of Bling. Michael at The Royal Theater in a glamourous Turnbull & Asser dinner jacket.

Dinner jacket and simplicity

Some men will say that the art of the dinner jacket and the tuxedo is simplicity. Don’t outshine the woman on your side. Tone down every effect.

Decadent Dinner Jacket

The decadent dinner jacket tradition

That’s just a position, though. History has provided us with a glamourous, decadent dinner jacket as well. It’s an art of its own.

Decadent Dinner Jacket

Artsy silk cloth

Michael is showning us how to approach the bold clothing item. The single-breasted shawl collar jacket is well-fitting ready-to-wear from Turnbull & Asser. They have made it of jacquard silk cloth inspired by the work of Gustav Klimt.

Decadent Dinner Jacket

The other remedies are classic tuxedo items such as a white marcella shirt, black shoes and black trousers. However, they are not by the book, completely. The trousers don’t carry a braided silk band, and the shoes are neither black patent leather shoes nor plain oxford shoes.

It doesn’t matter though. Michael is beyond attention to those rigid rules. He follows the artsy decadent dinner jacket tradition, where you to certain extent make the rules yourself.

Decadent Dinner Jacket

Dad’s gold cuff links from the wedding with mom in 1965.

Photography: Sartorial Notes

Adventurous Semi-Formal Evening Wear

by

Adventurous-Semi-Formal-Summer-Evening-Wear-The-Journal-of-Style-1

When it was common for men to wear a dinner jacket there was room for variation in semi-formal evening wear. You could include a midnight blue tuxedo, and a ecru dinner jacket or cotton madras dinner jacket for summer in your wardrobe.

Adventurous-Semi-Formal-Summer-Evening-Wear-The-Journal-of-Style-2

Footwear could vary too. Men were allowed to swap black patent leather shoes with white loafers in those warm and light summer nights. The short spencer jacket was a solution as well, at least in sartorial magazines. Smoking jackets were seen in winter.

Smoking-jacket-1950s-The-Journal-of-Style

The only things you couldn’t change were the dark bow tie, the white shirt, and, save the Duke of Windsor and a Scotsman in trews, the dark trousers.

Photo: The Journal of Style

The Tuxedo – A New Volkmar Arnulf Project

by

Arnulf-bespoke-sleeves-The-Journal-of-Style

Eventually, I’ve reached the tuxedo (dinner jacket) order. The embarrassing fact is I don’t live a life, which makes a tuxedo a top priority. It shall not stop me though. I pretend ordering a dinner jacket will create a need for the garment.

Arnulf-bespoke-tuxedo-The-Journal-of-Style-1

I decided to place the order with Volkmar Arnulf. He is a great tailor evidently, yet it is also important that there is something old worldly about his style and approach, for instance his strong shoulder, which relates well to a tuxedo in my view.  A rippled soft spalla a camicia on a tuxedo cannot be a happy marriage.

Arnulf-bespoke-tuxedo-The-Journal-of-Style-2

I chose a fairly light fabric for the project, a black barathea mohair (from Dugdale). I cannot imagine a much better fabric for a classic tuxedo. The barathea weave is traditionally the default weave for a dinner jacket, presumably because the tiny zigzag design creates a pleasing shine in artificial lighting, and the mohair makes the fabric very crease-resistant, which supports a semi-formal dinner jacket in general and Arnulf’s clean cut in particular. And, a lightweight fabric is a convinient solution in the heat of the night.

Another classic and less shiny fabric option would have been a black herringbone or better, a featherbone worsted. I was afraid that fabric would be too warm, though, so I skipped it.

As you can see from the pictures I opt for a double breasted cut with shawl collar.

Photos: The Journal of Style

Bespoke Tailor Possanner in Vienna

by

Possaner-1[Cotton drill suit jacket and sports jacket]

Next month I will be going to Potsdam again for a fitting at Volkmar Arnulf‘s. In this connection I spoke with Bernhard Roetzel, who lives in Berlin and has a tailor in Potsdam. He drew my attention to an Austrian tailor, whom I had never heard about before: Bespoke tailor Possanner. Roetzel is planning to place an order with him in Spring.

Possanner-2[SB linen suit jacket and sports jacket in a particular Austrian “Hunters’ Linen”, “a blend of olive and brown native linen,” Michael Possanner says.]

Possanner-3[SB three button suit jacket in “Scottish 3-ply, two-colored brown-green fresco.”]

Possanner-4[Cream SB dinner jacket]

I was, of course, curious, and I went to Possanner’s website.  One should be careful with judging craftsmen on their online presence, yet hidden in press articles in German at the website I found some interesting and promising information about the owner, “Schneidermester” Michael Possanner.

Possanner-5[Four button DB blazer  with horizontally pointing peak lapels]

Before starting out in the trade Mr Possanner was a journalist. At 30 he decided to change path fulfilling a dream of his, and he applied for an apprenticeship at Knize, the famous tailor in Vienna. He got it, and for the next 10 years  he stayed there learning the craft.

“I always wanted to be a tailor, and I knew there was only one place to learn this craft. At Knize’s,” he told a paper recently.

Then around two years ago he left Knize to establish his own shop in Vienna. When leaving Knize he was a certified master tailor and “cutter, fitter and head of the prime-customer services,” Mr Possanner tells me.

Possanner-6[An unusual bottle green dinner jacket. Michael Possanner tells me:  “A traditional Austrian Hunting-Tuxedo, worn during receptions after a hunt/chasse or at our famous annual “Jägerball” in the Imperial Palace in Vienna.”]

Besides Mr Possanner’s solid curriculum, the pictures at the website hint an advanced classic taste. The shop is charming, and there is a fine selection of garments, exemplary paired with different shirts, ties and handkerchiefs.  There is no show off, just this tasteful demonstration of style.

Possanner-7[DB dinner jacket]

Fine bespoke tailoring is a little more than Neaples and London.

Michael Possanner speaks English fluently.

Photos: Possanner

Get new posts by email