All this recent chambray talk has me thinking of other sartorial riddles wrapped in enigmas–namely, the ideal roll for a buttondown collar.

Yeah, I’ll admit it: I have no idea what people mean when they say “nice roll.” I know how I prefer my own collars, but I’ve observed near zero consistency whether a roll is admired or regretted. Moreover, this variability goes all the way to the tip-top of the buttondown universe: the legendary, extinct, unlined Brooks Brothers OCBD collar. People post black and white photos of vintage specimens all the time. Then, everyone young and old comments wistfully on the greatness of what’s been lost. Meanwhile, I nod and smile in agreement, trying to be respectful of religious beliefs.

But let’s get real. Each one of those Golden Age OCBD collars looks completely different from one another. Some show only a hint of roll up top, some roll over the top of the collar band before turning straight, and others are bell-shaped, rolling up top before inverting into another roll toward the points. There are rumpled-up versions, and baby smooth ones. Some are subtle, while others are bombastic.

At the end, I truly have no idea which is supposed to be the one. I just know they can’t possibly all qualify.

So, make yourself heard. Click through the different collars above and let me know which you consider the ideal. Please add your thoughts here (just click on “logged in”–I know, confusing), but make sure to vote over on StyleForum. The poll is open until midnight (GMT), April 17. That’s one week from today.

I know which I think is best, but I’m not saying a thing until the votes are all in!

In my last post, we discussed the revelation that Simonnot Godard sells at least two different sorts of chambray. For most of the people who randomly stumble on this blog, that is surely the least interesting news you could possibly hear. But, for the half-dozen or so of my regular readers, it is potentially earth-shattering.

Well, it turns out, that’s not the end of it. Rumors have been floating about the past couple of years that the “old” chambray (the rougher, denim-like, internet-famous stuff) is actually part polyester. Carl Goldberg, of CEGO shirtmakers in New York, was first to rouse suspicions over the matter. Sadly, he was quickly laughed out of the room. Everybody knows that Carl knows his stuff, but it just seemed like too much to swallow. Sure, there were reports of pilling after moderate wear and the shirting seemed to be mysteriously springy, but we all wrote-off any odd qualities as “character.” It must be the 18th century looms!

Then, I thought to ask the European distributor that sold me the “new” chambray about what was really going on. He let me in on two facts: (1) Simonnot Godard sells exactly two sorts of chambray today, and (2) the old version is, in fact, a cotton-poly blend (20% polyester, to be precise). He got the latter bit of information directly from an invoice.

Not suitably shocked yet? What if I lit stuff on fire? Carl deserves vindication and everybody knows the worst sort of treachery is French treachery. So, for the greater good, I got my hands on a sample of the “old” chambray.

It turns out that cotton and polyester behave very differently when burned. Pure cotton burns very much like paper. That’s to say, quickly. It also releases white or grey smoke and emits a pleasant, woody scent. The ash should be brittle and dusty. In contrast, polyester burns much slower and will appear to melt, shrinking away from the flame.

The video shows the results quite plainly. The new chambray lit up rapidly and was fully engulfed within moments. When pulled away from the flame, it continued to burn until fully blackened. In contrast, the old chambray burned at a far more gradual rate and stopped shortly after being removed from the candle. Moreover, and perhaps most telling, it left behind a small pool of gooey, bluish residue–as if some of the fibers in the blue yarns had melted.

I’ll leave it to the textile experts to deliver a final verdict, but combined with word from an official Simonnot Godard distributor, I’d say the safe bet is that the “old” chambray is not all it’s cracked up to be. While it’s likely they didn’t always make it with polyester, it’s quite disappointing that they do now, or ever would. At the end, I think it just shows how easily we can delude ourselves when we really want to believe in something.

By now, you may be skeptical of your own fancy French chambray. No worries. I’ve got matches to spare.

As some of you may know, I’m embarking on a project to replace my tattered shirt wardrobe. For my new solid blue shirts, I chose Simonnot Godard’s chambray–the stuff of internet legend. It’s remarkable how infamous this shirting has become over the years. In the beginning, barely anybody who clamored for it even knew what it was. Then, it turned out, a lot of the “chambray” they were buying was actually a species of slow-loomed voile. When genuine chambray from Simonnot Godard finally surfaced, internet gentlemen worldwide were aghast with disappointment that it beared a disconcerting resemblance to . . . chambray.

I for one like the nubby, slightly hairy stuff that is actually Simonnot Godard’s chambray. I first saw it on Mariano Rubinacci back in 2007. He’s been trying to sell me shirts made from it ever since. I finally caved, but went my own route and ordered twenty meters from an independent source. Happily, everything went smoothly and the shipment arrived from Europe this morning. I skipped home like a schoolgirl and cut open the package with my keys.

Fuck. They sent me the damned voile. Then, I looked closer. And that’s where things get interesting.

The shirting I received is chambray. It is plain-woven. Unlike a voile, the yarns are not tightly twisted, and it is completely opaque. Most crucially, the warp is blue and the weft is white. The blue voile I’ve seen from Simonnot Godard has a light blue warp and light blue weft. So, there is no question regarding this shirting’s taxonomy. Chambray it is–but not the chambray I was looking for.

It turns out, Simmonnot Godard makes at least two kinds of chambray, in addition to the voile some have confusingly taken to calling “new chambray.” Or, they made one kind before, and now make a different sort. The rougher, denim-like chambray I was hoping for is (was?) woven on centuries-old half-width looms. This more refined chambray is woven with more modern, whole-width looms (probably the same as used for the voile). It has none of the “fuzz” I was envisioning, but that may change after a washing or two. The weave is much finer and the hand magnitudes smoother. There is none of the porousness I expected.

I haven’t decided whether I prefer this “new” chambray. I will say this: the coloring is really gorgeous and it has all the striations I could hope for. Take a look and see what you think.

As one progresses in his sartorial evolution, something changes. At first, it’s all for play. You want to try this and try that. Next thing you know, you have a closet full of novelty odd jackets, but no navy blazer. You wind up with a couple dozen of those wool ties in suiting and jacketing patterns that are all the rage, but no repp stripes. All your suits turn out to be made of neither-here-nor-there cloth with new pattern iterations that are either too big or too small, too loud or too subtle. And of course, the blue shirt gets sacrificed for more exotic fare (usually some garbage in purple or something in pink that’s supposed to signal you’re stylish).

Then, you settle down. You start thinking about what you need, not for the fashion season, but for the climatological one (you know, the actual season). You become purposeful, directed. You stop collecting clothes and start building a wardrobe. And it hits you. “Outfits” are silly and frivolous. They’re costumes for playing dress-up. Women wear outfits. Women dress-up. A man ought to simply dress. You’re supposed to go to your war chest in the morning and assemble the appropriate gear. It had all better work well together and be adaptable. Even if you don’t wear something everyday, it ought to look like something you could. Lime green gingham ain’t going to cut it. That’s where the blue shirt comes in. It can be dressed up or down; it’s good for everything short of black tie and absolutely everything down to jeans. Elegant yet workmanlike, it’s good for any season. Light blue complements all the other purposeful colors you’ll find yourself gravitating toward: greys, blues, browns, tans, dark greens, burnt reds, etc. They’re essentially the colors of a country landscape in autumn. One you’d go hunting in. You want clear blue skies when you hunt.*

The bottom line is that blue shirts are the ideal foundation for your other clothes. Thus, sticking to blue doesn’t close your options–it opens them. Michael Alden and Yukio Akamine demonstrate that here. They are wearing completely different sorts of clothes, suitable for different levels of formality, and geared toward different functional purposes, yet the blue shirt grounds them both.

It was recently pointed out to me that the English tradition diverges from the blue shirt staple. For proper city dress, one was supposed to wear very plain, dark, sober suits. Hence, the shirt was left with much of the burden to add color and pattern. Makes sense. But how many of us regularly dress in anything akin to what the English tradition calls for? The British empire is long gone. Today, at least in the U.S. and continental Europe, tweed in the city is perfectly acceptable. Hell, how many Barbour jackets does one see walking through New York City or Rome? So, the blue shirt rationale prevails. Blue traverses both city and country. In a day and age where the distinction between the two has all but disappeared, and we need a shirt that can go both ways, the blue shirt is truly king.

* Apparently, this is absolutely not true. Grey, cloudy skies are generally better.

When we look at clothes, we often forget that they are not merely material things. That is the grand folly of Pitti Uomo. It reduces clothing to the level of mere merchandise–stuff to be advertised, acquired, and accessorized. Culinarily, it’s the equivalent of a mall food court. You can eat whatever you like, but none of it will have any truth in it. Clothes are not merely things to be bought and consumed. They come from a place and tell a story. They are culture. They are language.

Ishizu didn’t merely co-opt from the Ivy lexicon in a piecemeal fashion. He immersed himself in the genre, studying with great scrutiny the cultural context in which the clothes were worn. To truly dress (and sell) Ivy, he understood it was necessary to grapple with the people wearing it. In 1965, he partnered with Japanese men’s fashion magazine Men’s Club to produce the now famous, cult-followed book Take Ivy, a photographic account of what students were actually wearing on Ivy League campuses during that period. It’s become an indispensable resource on this side of the Pacific for those looking to remember how true Ivy style was done. Without Ishizu, how much of that heritage would have been lost? He learned to elegantly speak a language that nearly everyone else forgot how to speak. Then he retaught it to us.

Today’s internationalized menswear market makes everything available to everybody. This is a fantastic convenience, but we should be a bit more circumspect about how we approach its offerings. That Ishizu could epitomize an entire style of dress completely foreign to him, should mean to us that clothes can have content much deeper than the fabric and thread of which they’re made. Failing to mine for that content is to fail the first test of style: authenticity. It’s akin to speaking words in a foreign language simply because they sound nice, without any inkling of what’s being said.

As Ishizu demonstrated, authenticity is not about demographics, but spirit and attitude. Yet, the fast pace of modern fashion makes it very hard to be authentic. New things arrive on the horizon too quickly for us to properly acquaint ourselves with whatever they replace. Consequently, we too often find ourselves wearing costumes, clothes not fully our own. For those who genuinely love style, this can be no excuse. Just as fashion is more available now than ever, so too is knowledge. Ishizu brought himself face-to-face with a style of dress an entire world away, and yet he did not have the internet at his disposal.

So, whether wearing a Neapolitan shirt, an English suit, or an American buttondown collar, we should try to understand where they come from. If we can, we should travel there and get to know the people. If that is not possible, we should spend less time flipping through blogs looking for outfits that please our whimsy, and do some good reading. These things have stories in them. They are possessed of emotion and attitude. They can be alive if we let them. I’ve heard many men dismiss the importance of understanding clothes in this way because they are driven by so-called self-expression. Yet, if one is truly interested in expressing himself, why would he choose to stifle such evocative tools?

Ishizu spent a lifetime getting to know Ivy style. We should follow his lead. Rather than picking up pretty sounding words, we ought to be learning language.

In continuation from yesterday’s discussion, here are two more examples of the “Italian uniform” done really right. You can always count on Beppe Modenese to bring the elegance. In both cases, he uses yellow and gold accents to break up potential monotony and flatness without overwhelming the context. While there’s no doubt we’re looking at specimens of the classic grey-blue outfit, our eyes are rewarded with far better than merely grey and blue.

Another thing to notice is how refreshingly un-Pitti Uomo Beppe is in these photos. Every year, Pitti comes around and bloggers descend on Florescence with their cameras. Don’t get me wrong–there is certainly some stylish dressing on the scene. But it is far from the rule. Most of what occurs and gets photographed is blatant peacocking, full of gimmick, lacking in nuance, and entirely without elegance. It’s worth remembering that everyone is there to either buy, sell, or be photographed. Dazzling with merchandise is not the path to genuine style.

We should all learn from men like Beppe instead. The essence of style is how you dress, not what you wear.

And so it is with the uniform of Italian businessmen–the well-known staple combination of grey or blue suit, light blue shirt, and dark blue tie. It’s an excellent foundational approach. However, many men inspired by it unwittingly convert themselves into caricatures. While your mind may see just grey and blue, the truth is that the uniform relies on texture, tone, and pattern to really shine. If you observe some sterling examples, you’ll see there’s much more at work than might first appear.

Vittorio Feltri here is exceptionally styled. Note the patterns in his shirt and tie, and the way he’s used white as an accent color rather than a mere background. Ferrari’s Montezemolo often employs a similar strategy, demonstrating a consistent mastery of patterns and textures. In fact, you might notice his ties are often a bit lighter than the navy blue that your memory recalls.

No less than Gianni Agnelli knew to use the uniform as a platform for nuance, rather than rely on its basic elements to do all the work. It was never about the grey and blue, but what you can do with them.

Things just aren’t that simple.

Having tea at the Dorchester in London back in September of last year. Makes me fondly remember how much I love fresco and then look forward to spring. The tonal striations in this slate blue example give it a denim-like appearance. Blue is never just blue, but that’s especially true with frescos. This one’s striated effect may not be absolutely appropriate for the boardroom, but in the summer, when you need fresco most, everyone is a bit more casual with their suiting and it would be just fine. In a dressy hotel or restaurant setting, it will certainly pass muster.

That said, there are pitfalls. They say fresco is a great travel cloth, as the open weave keeps it from wrinkling. That has not been my experience. My sleeves are accordions by the end of the day and I need to frequently re-iron the trouser creases. In my case, I’m pretty sure it’s the cloth weight to blame. Nine ounces sounded great for the heat summer, but more substantial versions may perform better for you overall.

In this photo, the only thing I love more than my fresco is my Leica.

Someone get to O’Connell’s and buy this. It’s even on sale.

If I’d known it existed, I may never have ordered a bespoke greatcoat. It’s a real one-of-a-kind monster. Twenty-four ounce whipcord, entirely alpaca-lined. The guys at O’Connell’s must be real coat fetishists. You’d have to be to dream up something like this–and then have the conviction to stock them in your store, for two-thousand bucks a pop. Jeezus. They’ve probably been sitting around in Buffalo for years.

I’m normally not a fan of overcoats in beige or olive, as I’d prefer something darker and bolder. But the brown alpaca is a wonderful complement and more than compensates in the boldness department. Also, I’m going on a limb here, but I think you’ll be warm enough.

Wear it over jeans. Wear it over a suit. Don’t worry about the guys at the office. Nobody is going to say anything when it looks like you killed a woolly mammoth and turned it into an overcoat. So, even if you don’t buy it, you should make sure the coat you wind up with has at least an ounce of its character. Any overcoat worth a salt should make you feel a little like Patton.

Folks, this is treasure. Forget Pitti and Florence. Evidently, the real action is in Buffalo.

Midnight blue mohair dinner suit. Matching grosgrain facings and cummerbund. Cream silk square. Red garnet studs. Apparently, you can dress perfectly black tie without anything black but the tie. It was the first outing for my bespoke studs from M.P. Levine (no doubt made by one of the big Birmingham jewelers). Too pimptastic?

Damn it. The shoes are black. There goes my attempt at being pithy.