The fashion rules they are a-changin'

By Mike Pound
THE JOPLIN GLOBE (JOPLIN, Mo.)

April 25, 2008 12:38 pm

— The good news is that some of the rules regarding men’s fashion apparently are changing.
The bad news is that I don’t understand any of the rules or how they are changing.
It’s sort of a mixed blessing, I guess.
I discovered that the rules of men’s fashion are changing by reading a story in the New York Times (Motto: “Oh, come on. We’re not that liberal”) written by someone named David Colman. From what I gathered by reading the story, David knows a thing or two about men’s fashion. The reason I think that David knows a thing or two about men’s fashion is because I couldn’t understand most of what he wrote.
The main crux (it’s a word, I looked it up) of David’s story appeared to be that men are now allowed to wear clothes with different patterns. What he said to make me think that was the crux of the story was “ ... the old rules about pattern-on-pattern dressing have been tossed on the style scrap heap ...”
The problem, at least for me, is that I never bothered to learn the old rules about pattern-on-pattern dressing and, now that they have been tossed on the style scrap heap, I feel sort of sad. But to be honest, I feel even sorrier for the guys out there who did bother to learn the old rules about pattern-on-pattern dressing. Now they’ve got to learn new rules.
I don’t know who, or what, caused the old rules of pattern-on-pattern dressing to change, I just know that David says they did. According to a designer guy that David spoke with, “men are more brave with color and pattern now.”
The designer guy said that it’s difficult for men to be brave with color and pattern. He said men sometimes hesitated to be brave with color and pattern because they were afraid of making a mistake.
“That’s what’s difficult,” the designer guy said. “You have to be brave to think you can do it.”
Gee, I don’t know. I think you have to be brave to think you can rush into a burning building. I don’t think you have to be brave to wear stripes with plaids. Although, after reading David’s story, I’m still not sure if it’s OK to wear stripes with plaids. I’m guessing it’s probably not. I’m also guessing that at some time in my adult life I have worn stripes with plaid. And I don’t even play golf.
The problem I had with David’s story can be summed up in the following paragraph he wrote in which he described the six different patterns worn by a guy he was interviewing: “A brown-and-cream houndstooth suit from Paul Stuart, a Truzzi dress shirt in blue and white stripes of varying hues, a Paul Stuart salmon pink tie with a blue paisley pattern, a Charvet gold-and-cream pocket square, suspenders in a chinoiserie pattern of blue orange and yellow and color-block socks.”
See, I don’t know anyone who talks like that.
Most of the guys I know don’t use terms like “suspenders in a chinoiserie pattern.”
Me: Hey Earl? Them suspenders you’re wearing. Is that a chinoiserie pattern?
Earl: No. I think it’s gravy.
Me: Oh.
Most guys I know don’t spend a lot of time thinking about what they wear. Most guys I know don’t spend much time thinking about anything that isn’t on ESPN.
When I was single, I only had three fashion rules before I would wear an item of clothing.
No. 1: Was it mine?
No. 2: Was it clean?
No. 3: Was it at least a little bit clean?
If the answer to at least one of those questions was yes, then I would wear the item of clothing.
There was one thing in David’s story I did understand. Toward the end of his story, he said that it’s important to look like you don’t spend much time getting dressed.
“Even if it takes more time, it’s worth a little trial and error to look as if you got dressed in a hurry,” is what David said.
Now that makes sense.

Mike Pound writes for The Joplin (Mo.) Globe.

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