Vintage

I was sitting at my favorite coffee joint working away on the laptop. My buddy Mark Fisher, a well known photog who's shot everything from the Stones to the highest of high fashion, said "come on, let's get a shot". Wondering what on earth got into him, he led me across the street, stood over a bicycle and told me to get on. Thinking this is hokey, he starts shooting away.

Back inside 30 minutes later, he spins his laptop around and shows me an image. My jaw dropped. The vintage quality, the colors, the timelessness of the image was striking. The artistry of a true professional is amazing. He looked out that window and knew exactly what he wanted, the image in his mind was already there and made it come to life.

Mark said this would be great for the site. I was a bit reticent about putting it up- but everyone who's seen it seems to have enjoyed it... so here we are! A tribute to the great American photographer, Mark Fisher.

Sartorially, I'm accustomed to commenting on others but here are a few comments on what I happened to be wearing that day. I started with checking the weather to gauge what would be required to be comfortable and that dictated weights and textures. I started with the jacket and worked out from there. The jacket is a nice mid-weight wool, forest green and cream houndstooth, perfect for a mid-50's Autumn day. Next choice was a pair of caramel-brown, mid-weight trousers with wonderful texture. Next was to choose a nice button down shirt to pull both jacket and trousers together and went with a soft yellow solid. The vest at this point gets a bit tricky to pull it all together while not distracting. I went with another mid-weight, a subtly textured light brown vest with thin tan vertical pinstripes. The light-brown was darker than the trousers and complimented the colors in the jacket and shirt.

Brown shoes were a foregone conclusion, it was just a matter of which shade. I went with a cognac- I love the richness of the color and felt a darker brown would have been too harsh. With socks, Style 101 says match the socks to the trousers (not the shoes). Style 201 says you can bend this rule if you're careful and thoughtful about it. I wanted a color that would compliment, not distract- but ultimately allow the bottom of the outfit to pull the top together and ultimately draw the eyes upward towards the face. The color needed to be pleasing between the trousers and the shoes but pull out colors from the jacket, shirt and vest. A nice light tan with subtle brown patterns did the trick for the light cream in the houndstooth, the light brown (and matching tan pinstripes) in the vest and a general comparative lightness with the shirt.

Last choice was the pocket handkerchief. Silk is a nice subtle textural contrast to mid- and heavy-weighted and textured clothing. To mix additional patterns or not? I took the easy route and chose a very subtle-yellow tinted silk solid, much lighter than the shirt and soft enough to bring out the cream in the jacket without overwhelming it. White could have worked as well but a stark white could have been distracting and overwhelming. I thought a matching cream (to the houndstooth) or yellow (to the shirt) would have been too contrived (ironically, given the effort).

Mixing colors, patterns and textures takes some understanding of the basics and plenty of practice... of which I'm personally still doing and probably always will. The elegance of the timeless fashion icons prove the sartorial journey's worth the effort. So, there was a window into one of the New York Sartorialist's small pleasures of life, as insanely obsessive as it may be.