Title Magazine: saying goodbye to vintage clothes
This may disappoint some readers but I don’t often, if ever, wear vintage clothes any more.
The world of classic menswear is inexorably intertwined with that of vintage simply because it’s been decades since most men wore jackets and ties, hats and overcoats. So we are forced to look to the past to see examples of what we consider well dressed and that affects how we want to dress today. And so, like many others, when I started changing my wardrobe to classic, I was drawn to “pre-loved.” But recently, I began to give it up. That decision is the focus of my latest article for Title Magazine “Why I Stopped Wearing Dead Men’s Clothes. Mostly.”
In it, I explain why I made this decision, one of the reasons being typecasting by friends and readers:
People assumed that I only listened to ’40s swing music and watched Downton Abbey. (The latter may be true.) That I was a regular at the annual Tweed Run (which I’ve never attended) and spent my evenings cleaning and sorting my spats (which I don’t own).
To be fair, I also point out the benefits of vintage when building a wardrobe, the one used suit that remains in my closet (pictured above), and the greatest lesson the clothes taught me along the way.
You can read the full article here.
Issues of Title Magazine come bundled with Fashion Magazine, available on most major news stands.
2 Comments
Bradley
March 14, 2018 at 11:52 am
Pedro Mendes
March 15, 2018 at 2:18 pm
Hi Pedro. I was also into vintage at the same time as you. I still buy “pre-owned” clothes on Ebay, but they are mostly current styles, with the occasional older piece from Pendleton, for which I have a fondness. I’ve never understood the attitude of people who think wearing someone else’s clothing is creepy. Have these people never slept in a hotel bed?
Thanks for your note, Bradley. Perhaps the creepiness is due to a couple of factors. First, clothing is very intimate and becomes a part of you. Second, people are not used to wearing hand-me-downs any more because most clothing is so cheap and poorly made, it simply doesn’t last. Which is a shame on many levels.