Men’s Guide To Business-Casual – The Summer Edition
Paying Attention To The Details
Men’s SS13 Fashion Trend: Statement Tailoring
Men's Short Hairstyles
Men's Mid-length Hairstyles
Men's Long Hairstyles
Men's Curly Hairstyles
Men's Black & Afro Hairstyles
Celebrity Hairstyles
Introduction
Now for the fashion focused, stylistic guys like we, separation from the masses and the stereotypical “walking Topman” is a must.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Topman’s collection but it’s hard to express any form of individualism wearing the same clothing all of your friends do (along with most of the guys in town, oh and at work, oh and just about anywhere else you arrogate yourself to).
With anything in life you have a comfort zone. Whether it’s being settled in a 9-5 job instead of starting your own business or settling for a pair of straight jeans instead of plum coloured chinos. Everybody has a different level of comfort.
“Your comfort zone is like a muscle, stretch it often and watch it grow.” – What is meant by this statement is fear and nerves to try something different will always be a part of life, but once you challenge that fear once, twice, three times and so on the fear will soon be eliminated.
Think back to when you started learning to drive, or the first day at work. Now this is heavily related to your style. A lot of my friends are scared to break their comfort zone in fashion and tend to follow whatever the majority of people are wearing. With this lacklustre approach comes no individualism or expression of his or her personality. Don’t fear to be different, and the best way to implement this into your wardrobe and fashion style is by paying close attention to details of clothing.
Lookbook Inspiration
Now I’m not asking for you to read this and automatically become the eccentric Gaga – that’s something I’d defiantly endorse. All I’m suggesting is to break your fashion comfort zone and wear something you wouldn’t normally.
Detail on clothing is the main reason I buy something, it is what makes a piece stand out and makes me hand over the money. You can always tell when someone has made the effort to, well, make an effort. Community fashion forums such as lookbook.nu are a great place to build your confidence up into knocking out a killer look. Here are a few that dared not to be a sheep among the flock:
So here are the details I like to pay close attention to:
Fabrics & Cut
The selection of fabrics to choose from when buying could take me another full article to cover them all. Obviously the most popular choice of fabric is cotton, but the idea is to step away from this.
In the winter you’re often drawn towards fabric that generates warmth and a sense of comfort. My personal opinion would to opt for something like tweed, wool or even washed or laundered cotton.
As for cuts, go for extravagance. What I mean by this is something that is in opposites to your standard basic t-shirt, pair of jeans, or cardigan for example. Here are some of product picks playing close attention to fabric and cuts.
The Added Extras
I’m talking about buttons, zips, buckles and pockets. The consideration of these added extras is the definition of the finer details and something most people don’t really pay much attention too.
Think carefully, what makes a cardigan hit the right notes in the military trend? It’s the inspired buttons and understated epaulettes – without them; calling it a military cardigan is blasphemous to say the least!
Colours & Prints
Colours and prints are among the first visual detail your eye pays natural attention to. It’s what’s going to direct your attention to a piece of clothing and hold it until met with the finer details. So powerful, it is something you can use effectively to portray your personality, your mood and your motives.
With the autumn and winter season being heavily influenced by neutral palettes such as blacks, greys and beiges, try and be different and add a bright approach to your look. This effort can easily be achieved by the use of accessories or layering brighter colours with your neutral colours.
As for prints, again a whole new article would be needed to cover every print. But with animal print being popular for women this season, who knows if us gents will be brave enough to follow suit?
Also pay close attention to the trend patterns such as checked or striped clothing. Even though a lot of males are now wearing these patterns, you can still find unique examples to set yourself apart; whether it be a mix of checks (colours & sizes) or just destroyed/faded stripes. Here are some of my favourite product picks focusing on colour and print.
Life’s too short to blend in. Fashion is one of the most exciting ways to separate yourself and showcase your personality using clothing. Now you didn’t ask for a life lesson, but if you only asked for what you got, life would be a pretty dull affair; wouldn’t you say?
Paul McGregor
Brighterman.com
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Lookbook.nu can provide ideas to all, but on the whole the people on their really don’t appear all that individual. Ultimately they all conform in one way or another to what I can only describe as the markedly fashion forward and slightly androgynous look. A sort of Williamsburg/Shoreditch lose uniform. Similar haircuts, glasses whether they need them or not, skinny jeans. Perhaps I’m taking it too literally and overlooking its real purpose in failing to consider aspects of outfits rather than taking things at face value in assessing looks on there as a whole, but I do think you can strive to ‘stand out’ too much, to the point that many who do end up looking very similar.
are lot of topmans stand out pieces are just silly. they aren’t cool and tend to make the people who wear them look like they are trying too hard. it doesn’t say much about individualism. some of the pieces recommended there if not most are a perfect example. why not recommend customising your own pieces, buy more expensive clothes that less people are likely to have or even look to shopping in more obscure places. ie. army surplus, charity shops etc.
plus in the pictures from lookbook, the guy on the bottom left doesn’t “dare not to be a sheep among the flock”, hes just a loser looking geeky guy wearing pretty standard clothes with a pair of specs and a bad hairstyle.
The guy in the bottom left of the Lookbook panel looks like Where’s Wally.
People may be gently pursuaded into buying something different to what they’d normally pick up, but theres a danger of scaring them off altogether if they think it involves looking like you’ve crashed into a props department covered in superglue.
Dave has it in one there; shopping in more obscure places, or choosing higher priced items that most people won’t want to spend on are good ways to get a more individual look. However, don’t just buy something based purely on it coming from an obscure shop, else you’ll end up throwing on any old items and look like you’re trying too hard.
I once had a leather-look jacket from Burton, and one day in my own town centre (which isn’t even that popular considering the likes of Reading is just down the road) I saw two other people wearing the same jacket, and that bothered me a lot for a little while. Now I have one from Zara, I haven’t seen anyone else anywhere wearing it (in fact, I haven’t seen that many people wearing coats / jackets from Zara at all), and Zara isn’t exactly that obscure or high priced.
Another thing to do is take note of what other people are wearing whilst you’re out and about. Sometimes you might find a lot of people who aren’t wearing a certain type of clothing, texture, or colour, and you can fill the gap buy finding something of that type if you think you can make it work.
One I have to disagree on is the red checked shirt at the bottom left. Over the last year or two those things were all over Topman, and I see them quite a lot. It looks like that particular style of checked shirt is starting to go out of fashion a bit, however, so perhaps you’ll find it more unique this year.
Totally agree with all of your comments. Charity Shops are a perfect way to find some amazing vintage, obsecure pieces you wont find in high street retailers along with your fathers/grandfathers wardrobe!
But the whole purpose of this article was about focus on detailing when buying, along with taking the FIRST step away from following others, almost a beginners guide.
what i tend to do to ‘stand out’ if you want to call it that is… wear 1 piece, preferably a jacket to make the rest of the items which you could class as standard items….a v neck tshirt, a button up shirt (buy a couple of decent ones) and then team it with a jacket like one i picked up from tiger of sweden and ive never seen anyone else wear it. i got a sweet military jacket from the far east which also stands out. its about getting that balance and having that 1 piece to make you look money. decent shoes too. you dont have to wear a ridiculous tshirt with a snood built in to look stand out as its what most fellas would do. avoid trends to an extent and go it your own. do what makes you feel comfortable and what you are confident with. holla.
1. i dont think men have to use feminine looking scarves or silly coloured trousers to stand out. dont be affraid to mix it a bit but watch you dont stand out for the wrong reason by overdoing it!
2. wearing designer fake specs. i think its totally naff and i do not feel comfortable nor confident to ever wear them, but girls love them on men! Yes, those geeky looking losers who look like no-one would sit next to them in school are bedding all the birds on a saturday night – perhaps 3 at a time! maybe the look makes them look clever with a large bank account? bill gates would still be popular with girls right?
3. dont be a topman clone – but then some topman clothes are listed in the same article??
4. You have to be very self confident to pull off pretty radical styles or it will just not work as you’ll look well out of your comfort zone…especially if you live in a standard middle england town.
Some interesting points here.
Would you consider a future article where 3 or 4 contributors go a little off piste and buy exclusively from charity and vintage shops to put together an outfit? I know this has been done before but might be interesting.to see your take on it.
Lookbook is honestly not that unique. You seriously don’t need to show off your threads to others unless you’re just an insecure, teenage hipster. What is so unique about people on lookbook when they just wear skinny jeans and seasonal trends. Snoods, military boots, ray bans… just a huge bandwagon on that site. Remember, the most well-dressed individuals don’t need to show off to assure themselves of their uniqueness.
Details are certainly great for certain pieces, but not all. You wouldn’t want too much design on a coat that you will want to wear over and over in the winter since it would be too memorable.
The more detail one’s piece of clothing is, the less versatile it is and people are just going to remember it straight off the bat once you wear it again.
P.S. to Fashionbeans editors: Can you please use pictorial examples from The Sartorialist instead? People from his site are the most beautiful and suave and also don’t have a lookbook!
@ Thom and Olly: Love both your ideas and will definitely look at expanding our lookbook images in the future to other great street style sites. Also with the launch of the new site we will be trying out many more ideas in terms of content and angles for articles.
I agree with everything said about Lookbook. It’s just a medium for teenage kids to post pictures of themselves in clear lens glasses and skinny jeans hoping they get “hyped” so they feel accepted. I have never once looked through lookbook and thought “That guy knows how to dress” because everyone on there looks like they’re trying too hard.
@Thom: Spot on with the Sartorialist, there are plenty of well dressed men there…..but you cant get better than Street Style in my opinion…what people are wearing, thats practical and fashionable.
The first few comments about lookbook.nu hit the nail on the head for me. On the other hand it’s not impossible to derive some ideas or inspiration from the site. Also Topman sadly seems to have become the uniform in Britain these days… I think it’s important to look beyond this admittedly convenient and cheap store when discovering our own styles and definitely when it comes to stepping out of our comfort zones.
I’m a big fan of men’s lifestyle and fashion aficionado. If you go to ‘stylefeed’ on the mywardrobe website and scroll down, you can find ‘websites we like’ which may be of interest to people.
“separation from the masses and the stereotypical “walking Topman” is a must”.
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are you not sponsored by topman?
@MR S – Yes we work closely with Topman and they do provide sponsorship for the site. That does not mean we endorse dressing like the models they set-up in store or even just kitting yourself out in just their clothing. They make exceptional clothing for the price, and are always ahead of the rest of the high street when it comes to bringing a new trend to market – we are just saying to try and mix up pieces from a variety of places and develop your own UNIQUE style. Just because everyone else has purchased the same quilted jacket, drop crotch cuffed jeans and boots from Topman doesn’t mean you have to follow suit, you can grab yourself a more unique shearling bomber from there or place emphasis on purchasing the basic timeless items first.
When we say “walking Topman”, we are aiming those comments at those that will literally just buy what everyone else is because they think they should, and dress like the models/look books/other guys who shop in there. Take some Topman and mix it with other high street like Zara/H&M/All Saints, mix it with some premium designer pieces, some high fashion, or pick up some vintage from a charity store. The idea is to craft yourself a unique personal style, which is different from the masses.
A Walking Topman is a fair description of the generic “fashion follower”; the disciple of the cult image. Topman have promoted their products in such a way that one will feel instantly, buying from their store, that they are now in fashion. but surely there is a difference between the ‘street trend fashion’ and ‘real fashion’. Just because you are wearing boat shoes, slouched Chinos and a low cut top, doesn’t mean you are now at the peak of the style pyramid. furthermore, wouldn’t one say that fashion is as much the material detail of the item as well as the look. For example, a V-neck jumper from River Island may look just as ‘stylish’ as a John Smedley from a far, yet as one would see clearly from either wearing, feeling or even admiring, John Smedley is far more respectable and presentable in the fashion world. Yes, you could argue that not everyone can afford the John Smedley’s and McQ’s of this world, but wouldn’t it be better to have a handful of expensive garments that one knows will last a long time, instead of promoting a quick and cheap way of getting in on the latest look. After all detail is in retail. Quintessential brands such as Hackett London, Eden Park or Barbour to name a few seem to rarely fade in and out of fashion, (Some could exclude the latter, that has influence the quilted jacket within the high street stores) and have kept a high level of style, detail and moreover respect. I suppose what i am questioning Ben is that wouldn’t you rather push people in the opposite direction to the high street stores, so they can experience the higher scope of fashion?