CLOTHES MAKE THE MAN

CLOTHES-MAKE-THE-MAN.COM wants you !

OK so Clothes-make-the-man.com has been live now for two months and we want to know what you’re thinking about it. Good or bad, literally anything we want your opinions, what you’d like to see more of or even less of, what you’ve loved but also what you’ve loathed. The blog can only ever be as good as the people who read it and if we aren’t speaking to you we need to do something about it to improve the service we offer you.

So whether your in Bangkok or Birmingham, Mumbai or Melbourne we don’t mind we just want your feedback on the blog.

Now to make this offer more tempting, one of your opinions will be selected at random and a great secret gift will be sent to you, all I can promise is, it’ll definitely be worth while, I promise !

So please feel free to contact us either email us @ askant@ymail.com or leave a tweet @Clothesmakethem on twitter or simply leave a response at the end of this post. It’s that simple.

Thanks for joining us, so far

A.M.

Morning, Ola, Guten Morgen, Bonjour, Buongiorno, Godmorgen, Selamat pagi, Dea-maidin & Buenos Mias wherever you may be reading this. So without any further ado lets get down to business today and act as a fashion conscious Jimmy Saville (google him for our non-UK readings) and answer the problems of the great masses of style aware men out there. This week’s stumper came via our Facebook page, yes we have one, honest !

Well Dave, firstly better start speaking to mensa cos a Fashion genius is gonna totally answer your query sir ! OK then, lets break this question down.

1) You’re after a look to wear on informal occasions, down the pub to us mere mortals and you don’t, “want to buy jeans and converse All-stars again”. Well fair enough, the answer to this is simple, go for a chino, I refer you back to an AskAnt from 13th March when Blubes wanted to buy himself some strides but not JEANS, sorry are Jeans tres unpopulare ???? Anyway, as I advised him, ” There is literally a pair to suit any man of any colouring and body shape.” In reference to chinos and no matter who you are there are a fit and colour out there for you and your j-lo esque statistics Dave. As with jeans, chino come in pretty much the same fits, O leg, twisted, slim, skinny, baggy, carrot leg, boot cut (Sorry, never a boot cut never) and as Summer is all about colour literally every colour of the spectrum is covered. So as with anything, take a little time out and visit your fave retailers whether that’s in the comfort of your home via the use of the information super highway or your local high St or mall. I would advise, and hopefully save you some time, if there is a cut of jeans or a denim brand you favour, I’d let that be your first port of call. But no matter what you want to spend, chinos are a key staple of a man’s wardrobe at the moment and please don’t think that they are exclusively the attire of exchange students or hooray henrys, every one from Primark to Polo Ralph Lauren and Burberry to Burton are producing great examples of them.

A Rainbow of Ben Sherman Chinos

I'll take a pair in every colour - Dockers

2) Shoes, all important, don’t leave home without them, you don’t wanna invest in a classic pair of Converse and I’m reading in-between the lines, that you might already have a pair or two, am I right ? That’s cool, then what I’m thinking is a choice of two opinions;

a) Oxford or brogue type shoes –

In recent years we have seen a real return to the great British formal shoe as a fashion essential whether worn in a formal or informal manner. Brogues and Oxford style shoes can equally be paired with a pair of jeans as with a suit and can be used easily for work or play.

The Brilliant Grenson Brogues from Selfridges

The Great British Institution Loake shoes

b) Boots –

A return of boots in a hiking-esque kinda way was seen all over the catwalks of Milan, Paris, New York and London and it certainly didn’t take long for the high St to jump upon this trend and brilliantly aswell ! There aren’t many men who don’t suit a certain type of worker boots is some incarnation.

Either of these type of shoes work really well with chinos (and jeans) plus they are versatile enough to be worn with a suit and for you not to look as though your off to work in the offices of a lumber mill or a manor house.

The Wolverine Boots available from Urban Outfitters

3) The all important top half. We’ve sorted you out with the bottom 50% of you, now for the upper part of Dave. Right, brilliantly you laid out what you did and didn’t want from an outfit, thank you sir, this is really helpful as it gives me a guide to work from. Quite rightly a guy like yourself in his….. mid 30’s doesn’t want to look like Mutton dresses as Lamb or even Mutton dressed as a Hoxton graphic designer, (sorry hoxton graphic designers reading this blog, I love you really). I hear you ask, but only girls can do Mutton dressed as Lamb surely ? Elton John’s partner David Furnish, Peter Stringfellow, Shane Warne (of recent time), I rest my case your honour !

So in my learned opinion to finish this look off with as much style as your bottom half I’d firstly go with either a sweatshirt or cardigan. The unpredictable nature of the British summer means you could equally be dressing for rain and wind as much as for barmy heat and sun, so layer up my friend. This is another chance to show off your style knowledge of menswear trends in selecting to wear some colour, without looking like a kids TV presenter. One thing I would say, to prevent smart Alec’s having a go down the pub and for your own self confidence is, if you go for a brighter colour in your chinos go for a darker colour in selecting your garments of choice for your torso. The cardigan has been back around for longer enough now that even the most style illiterate of men most be able to see the benefits of it. Additionally, the sweatshirt has made a Christ like comeback for this season and is appearing in more colours then Joseph had in his technicolored coat.

If it's good enough for Bond. I can't see many people laughing at his cardi, hey ?

Acne from my-wardrobe.com

Now yes, you could finish this piece of Michael-Angelo style outfit with any number of T-shirts whether a polo shirt, a striped nautical number or even a vintage rock piece, any of these would go perfectly with a cardigan or sweatshirt.Or go with a formal shirt, OK a formal shirt and a cardigan thats fine, but no what I’m suggesting is a formal shirt, maybe a chambray or a nice oxford button down with a …….SWEATSHIRT ! Yes I know, but please trust me on this one Dave it works and works exceptionally well, honest.

Now after that bombshell, it’s all in the styling and how confident you feel. If you’re feeling particularly confident fasten the top button up on your shirt, wear your chinos with turn ups, even wear your brogues with bright coloured socks or even NO SOCKS !!! Plus, there’s always the sweatshirt and formal shirt combo, but lets not push these things, little by little mate or some luddite will say something to you at the bar and it will either knock your style confidence back lightyears or his teeth back his throat and we don’t want either of those to happen.

all that is left for me to do is to tell you, the choice is yours ??? Let us know what your decision was and join us again soon for another style clinic.

A.M.

Following a Pan European study, Lynx or Axe depending on where your reading this wonderful blog, found that, an unsurprising 88 per cent of girls claiming that bad hair can be a major turn-off (que the sound of teenage lads stampeding off to their local chemist to buy this range). They believe that hard and crunchy hair look caused by traditional hair gels has been consigned to history and following on from this study the Lynx scientists in white coats, formulated and dreamt up this complete hair care range designed to fulfil male hair needs and the need of single guys to get a better half.

Developed with powerful, ingredients to fight dirty, greasy, flaky and over-gelled hair,(YUK) the new shampoo collection helps men get healthier looking hair.

All products in the range are designed to suit different hair needs and address every man’s hair concerns:

Anti Dandruff with active zinc to avoid those nasty white flakes
2 in 1 shampoo and conditioner to speed up your clean
Deep Clean to purify hair by removing grease, oil and product build up
Just Clean a shampoo for normal hair that makes it easier to style
Attract a shampoo with a more sophisticated long-lasting fragrance

Then to complete the hair transformation those clever geeks have come up with a range of styling products to achieve everything from a ‘spiked-up’ look, a clean cut look or the ‘just got out of bed’ messed-up look:

Spiked Up Look (Structuring cream)

Messed Up Look (Re-workable Paste)

Clean Cut Look (Defining Wax)

Attract extreme Hold Cream Gel

Extra Strong Hold Cream Gel

Strong Hold Cream Gel

The range is available from all good stockists and for more information on the Lynx Hair range visit www.facebook.com/lynxeffectuk or follow @LYNXEFFECTuk (#lynxhair)

Mr William Borrows Esq, BAHons, MA, TCP, ABC

Author, journalist, raconteur, man about town, Man City fan (don’t hold it against him), general big mouth, Professional Manc, Friend of Hunter S Thompson, the list could go on and on, Bill Borrows has written for The Guardian, Loaded, L’Uomo Vogue, Esquire, TalkSport Magazine once again the list could go on and on. And God Bless him amongst all of that he made time to answer a couple of questions for your truly at Clothes-make-the-man.com

1)What would be the one piece of clothing you would rescue from your home in the event of a fire ?

I don’t suppose I’ll be allowed to save my snakeskin Doc Martens as, technically speaking, they are not an item of clothing (although I was granted a free run of the store in Covent Garden and, faced with entire range, chose them anyway) so for sheer comfort, familiarity and the memories it brings it would have to be a plain v-neck long-sleeved white Banana Republic white top I bought in Aspen. Or a sky blue crew neck jumper I grabbed off a rack in Salzburg airport.

2) If you could have invented anything what would it be?

Invent or discover? If it’s the latter then either electricity or tortoises. If it’s the former then I’ll go with the Kinder Egg – genius. Wrap a cheap difficult-to-assemble toy in shit-tasting sickly chocolate, put it in a yellow canister and bingo! The world is your bi-valve mollusc.

3) If you had one day to live what would be your biggest regret ?

She knows.

4) Who is your style icon ? Why ?

Big question. I’m going for a top three.

iii) James Garner in the Great Escape. Whether in denims (at the end of the film) or uniform with a chunky white polo-neck he rocks Steve McQueen off the screen

ii) Chet Baker. Lived fast, looked good the whole time. Even at the end when it all caught up with him.

i) Johnny Cash outside Fulsome Prison. Black three piece suit, no tie, leather trench coat. Just off to work love.

(See images below)

5) Tell us something no one else knows ?

I’m thinking about buying a shed

6) What piece of clothing best describes you ?

A battered old Thin Lizzy tour t-shirt

7) Have you ever bought a piece of clothing and regretted it ? If so what & why ?

Anything other than something black, blue or white – nothing else ‘goes with’ me. I’ve tried. So, to that end, it would be a bespoke green tweed three piece suit I bought in several moments of madness. I could have said no at the fitting

8) Who would do you ideal diner guest and why ?

Alive or dead? Alive? It would be Jessica Alba for reasons that need not detain us here. Dead? It would be Lyndon Baines Johnson so we can sort out who killed JFK once and for all. Alive and then dead? It would be George Osbourne so I could poison the shiny-faced little twat’s mulligatawny and watch him plead for the antidote as I crush the phial beneath my foot

9) What track would always get you on the dance floor ?

For Those About To Rock – AC/DC

10) What do you have to do after this conversation ?

Finish editing a book

11) What would you like to be doing after this conversation ?

Finish editing a book. And then get on a plane to Greece and sit by a pool for three weeks before having a mad one in Chicago with Jessica Alba for a few days

The Great James Garner in the Great Escape

Musican Chet Baker

The unmistakable Mr Johnny Cash

This week’s AskAnt, covers a problem which will affect us all at some point in our life, that being what to wear for work ? But more importantly in this situation, what to wear to work for making that all important right impression. Just in case you were wondering, this isn’t a scenario I’ve just dreamed up, this week’s subject, has asked us to keep his identity anonymous, which of course is fine with us, discretion is my middle name, well it’s actually Thomas, but for the sake of today it’s discretion. So without further ado, lets get stuck in;

OK then, immediately sir your question reminds me of a wonderful piece that appeared in the Sunday Times Style at the end of January, entitled, “How to get a head in advertising”,written by the ever so talented and even more witty Richard Gray. He surmised that they guys who work in modern day Advertising and I would extend this to the general creative industries, tend to be sporting what could be classed as a uniform. A uniform ? Pray tell, do tell more, essentially and this is a real generalisation but, these guys have taken to;

1) growing beards

2) wearing plaid (Checked) or Chambray (Denim) shirts

3) wearing Chinos

4) wearing brogues, oxford or a similar style hiking-esque boots in shades of brown

5) Certain brands are held in great esteem – Albam, Grenson, Acne, APC, Margaret Howell, Oliver Spencer to name a few

So as always we strive to search the entire market to answer your clothing conundrum. Now the first great thing about this look is, it’s somewhat of a hardy perennial in menswear trends and has evolved over the last couple of seasons. I agree and appreciate you don’t want to appear to look as through you are a try hard. So immediately I would suggest, working in any new pieces you invest in with your existing work wardrobe. So maybe follow these simple steps to assimulating your new look into your office environment;

1) stop wearing a tie everyday with your suit

2) then start to wear your suit jacket with a pair of chinos

3) replace your plain simple work shirt with aforementioned all important check or chambray shirt

4) then start to wear it with a knitted tie

5) Start to wear a pocket square, not everyday, easy does it and as you grow in confidence let the pocket square flourish with you

6) Slowly, grow some stubble, but remember a beard doesn’t suit everyone, not everyone can bust a beard like Tom Ford, you, meaning me can end up looking little like Topol in Fiddler on the Roof (google it) or Zach Galifianakis from the Hangover. So if you don’t feel comfortable with it, don’t grow the fro.

7) A pair of brogues look equally as good with a pair of jeans as a suit

8) Fasten up your top button when your not wearing a tie, it’s OK it won’t make you David Beckham in the trendiness stakes but it does show you know your P’s & Q’s when it comes to the look.

Examples of how to do it