I envy people who aren't interested in clothes. Just the sight of a chunky cream sweater or camp collar shirt is enough to send me into a daydreaming tailspin, where I waste hours of my day poring over online images and reading about the product's construction. Then I imagine the new and exciting life I would lead if I only had that outfit, temporarily forgetting that I'm actually sitting on my couch with my laptop, cat, and Pendleton blanket on my lap, having not moved for hours and with no intention of doing so. I recently found myself doing this, as many of the best online stores are having their end-of-season promotions, each product page ripe with the hope of possibility—the opportunity to dress up for a friendly lunch, a celebratory dinner, or a walk to the market to buy flowers for one's self. So here is a roundup of some of the sales I've been admiring online, peppered with ideas of when and where you can wear such items. 

SSENSE: UP TO 60% OFF; NO CODE

Maybe it's because I recently watched the Lemaire SS24 show, but I've been once again daydreaming about the artsy, cultivated life I assume I would live if I just owned a few more pieces from this French designer. Lemaire's clothes fit loose, giving you comfort and room to hide an aging dad bod, but they're rendered in fabrics and details that allow you to pretend you're a sophisticated Belgian artist excited about the coming relaunch of the beloved book-lit mag Bookforum. I really like the company's summer pants, which come with self-belts, twisted side seams, and topstitching in unusual places. They move and swish when you walk and lend an attractive silhouette to plain summer outfits. I've been wearing the company's taupe twisted pants with a cream-colored, silk camp collar shirt I bought from The Post Romantic last year, modeled after this Umit Benan design (the shirt isn't on Post Romantic's site, but is available if you just email them). 

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For the last few years, I've been doing these posts about things I'm excited to wear for the season. They're a way for me to talk about things I'm excited about without getting into the fraught concept of "wardrobe essentials" (which feels increasingly less relevant nowadays when people have such different needs and lifestyles). Still, readers have found these posts to be useful as seasonal style guides. Here's this year's "excited for spring" post with a bonus soundtrack at the end. You can check previous years' posts for 2018, 2019 (I also did one for summer), 2021, and 2022. 

CHAMBRAY AND SILKY SHIRTS

I've always been primarily an oxford cloth button-down guy. I admire the style's place in American clothing history, as well as its casual, rumpled nature and bookish appeal. However, in the last few years, I've also added two other shirt styles to my regular rotation: snap-button Western shirts, mostly those rendered in denim or needlecord, and silky shirts made from slippery materials such as rayon, Tencel, and actual silk. 

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In the mid-2000s, I used to take the bus to Kinokuniya, an Asian bookstore in San Francisco that sold Japanese magazines like Men's Precious, Men's Ex, and, of course, the famous Free & Easy. Non-English publications, then as now, covered classic menswear better than their English counterparts. While American magazines like GQ and Esquire featured articles on Thom Browne and Tom Ford, Japanese publications discussed the differences between English and Italian tailoring, Alden's many lasts, and specialty retailers like The Andover Shop. The issue, of course, was that the writing was in Japanese, making it unintelligible to anyone who did not know the language. Aside from English brand names, there were only a few amusing English phrases, such as RUGGED MAN and DAD STYLE (terms for workwear and trad, respectively). Despite my misgivings about spending $25 on a magazine I couldn't read, no one else did this kind of print coverage. The photos alone were an education.

Last summer, I was delighted to learn that Eisuke Yamashita, a former Men's Precious editor, now runs his own website, Mon Oncle (French for "my uncle"). His site features profiles on menswear legends such as Luciano Barbera, celebrities such as Juzo Itami, and artisans outside the menswear space, such as woodworker Takafumi Mochizuki. I was also pleased to see a multi-part series on Yukio Akamine, whom I regard as the most stylish man alive. Akamine has a long history in the Japanese menswear scene. He's introduced generations of Japanese men to classic style and consulted for brands such as United Arrows. Nowadays, he runs a made-to-measure tailoring company called Akamine Royal Line and appears on Japanese shows to discuss menswear.

In his Mon Oncle interviews, Akamine shares some charming observations and advice. He encourages people to wear jackets that are full enough to allow for comfortable layering ("It doesn't make sense if you can't wear a sweater underneath your jacket") and recommends using fountain pens on a regular basis ("Write letters and take notes. Dozens of years later, they will be a memory for the next generation."). Akamine also emphasizes the importance of good manners ("Don't arrive at someone's home empty-handed. Purchase something that you enjoyed eating. Take it out of the bag, hold it with both hands and say, 'Please enjoy this.' Or wrap it in a furoshiki."). Regarding style, he says, "You don't have to read fashion magazines. Open the window and look outside when you wake up in the morning. A man who can cook rice is a hundred times cooler."

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I was having dinner with Nicholas Templeman a few years ago at Besharam, a small Indian restaurant located on the outskirts of San Francisco. Over spicy vegetarian curries and delicate semolina puffs, we discussed how the British shoemaking trade has changed over the years. I told him I'd recently spoken with Daniel Wegan and Emiko Matsuda, two bespoke shoemakers who, like him, left prestigious West End firms to launch their own shoemaking businesses. Wegan and Matsuda's operations are modest, with no advertising budgets, celebrity endorsements, or visible shopfronts. When I asked how customers typically find them, they said, "Instagram." "That was a big part of why I left John Lobb when I did," Templeman told me. "At the time, some independent makers in Japan made good use of social media, but not many people in the UK. Even the big shops were barely visible online. With the rise of social media sites like Instagram, I felt this was a good time to become independent."

In the last twenty years, the British bespoke trade has changed dramatically along two fronts: skyrocketing rents and the loss of skilled labor have made it more difficult for larger firms to earn profits and maintain quality. Simultaneously, the internet has created a more informed consumer. These customers, who can be described as "shoe mad" enthusiasts, scour blogs and forums for niche details about shoemaking that few people know or care about. Like Athenian philosophers or Tibetan monks, they use the dialectical process to arrive at truths about handwelting and Goodyear welting, Celastic and leather stiffeners, and the specialized construction techniques that go into the uppers and soles of shoes, such as split-and-lift sewing and fiddleback finishings. For men who have succumbed to the allure of craft, celebrity endorsements and shallow, romantic accounts of the bespoke process are not enough. They want to know the intricate, technical details of shoemaking.

These changes have impacted the British bespoke trade in some crucial ways. In the mid-19th century, Punch co-founder Henry Mayhew published a seminal study on London's laboring classes. He estimated the city had 28,574 shoemakers (or "bootmakers" if you prefer the Queen's English) in the 1840s, making it the third most popular occupation. By the end of the century, improvements in ready-made footwear dramatically shrank this number to around 3,000, consolidating many workers into a handful of large firms. Among these businesses were gilded names such as John Lobb, Peal & Company, and Henry Maxwell, who built reputations by making shoes for presidents and pioneers, authors and actors, titans of industry, and other members of the ruling class. They also reaped the benefits of a fawning press. After reading enough breathless prose, wealthy men convinced themselves that spending thousands on shoes "would itself be an act of poetry," as my friend Réginald-Jérôme de Mans put it. 

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I rounded up every Black Friday sale for Put This On and will update the list through Cyber Monday. But as I do every year, I'm also highlighting some special sales from that list here. Perhaps most notable is the blowout over at LuxeSwap. I didn't include it in this list below because it's not technically a sale. But friend and menswear writer extraordinaire Bruce Boyer is clearing out some things from his wardrobe, and these items are up for auction on eBay. This is not only an opportunity to own something from one of the great menswear writers of our time, but also a chance to own some incredible menswear that may not be available elsewhere. Bruce uses world-class bespoke tailors such as Liverano & Liverano, Cifonelli, and A. Caraceni (the third of which also made for Gianni Agnelli). I handled some of the tailoring, and the workmanship is the best I've seen anywhere. The suits and sport coats fit between a size 38S and 40S, depending on the house style (I found the Liverano to fit slimmer than the A. Caraceni, the second of which has that Golden Age drape). There are also some handsome shoes from labels such as GJ Cleverley, Edward Green, and Stefano Bemer, sweaters from O'Connell's, and accessories from Drake's. You can find the entire collection by searching for the "Bruce Boyer Collection." Now to the other Black Friday deals:

Canoe Club: 30% Off; Code BF22

Canoe Club represents a new approach to casualwear, where stores aren't just carrying things with a singular point of view, but reflect the eclectic taste of their customers. Twenty or thirty years ago, most casualwear stores specialized in a "look"—the minimalism of Helmut Lang, the ruggedness of Levis, or the smart-casual looks of Loro Piana. But as more men have become comfortable dabbling in different aesthetics, and building wardrobes where rare Nikes sit comfortably alongside shell cordovan Aldens, stores such as Canoe Club have gained a lot of ground. 

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For the past few years, I've been doing these posts every season where I talk about what I'm excited to wear for spring/summer and fall/winter. I usually do these at the beginning of the season. This one comes a little late, but on the upside, I get to talk about some new things I've purchased and have been wearing. There are also more links to in-season options. 

Flamborough Marine Guernsey

Daniel Day-Lewis once said he hates to be "dressed." By which he means, "dressed by others." He rejects the conventional photoshoot routine as an artifice—photographers and stylists carefully dress their subjects in clothes borrowed from fashion labels, often those advertising on the pages next to the celebrity being featured. So when DDL was photographed for the cover of W Magazine a few years ago, he brought with him a small duffle full of his own clothes. His wardrobe that day included a thoughtful mix of styles: a bespoke three-piece Harris tweed suit made by a tailor in New York City, a blue plaid shirt, a white tee, some rugged jewelry, a pair of slim-straight selvedge jeans, a striped Breton pullover, and some rugged work boots he designed himself. "I want to wear soft, comforting, plain things," he told the interviewer. When the article was published, a small line was printed below each photograph, taking the place where brand names would usually appear. Each line read: "All clothing his own."  

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Every year, I round up menswear-related Black Friday sales at Put This On and then highlight some of my favorites here. Black Friday always comes a little earlier than most expect—an example of how retailers push back their sale season to capture consumer dollars earlier. And so, today, many stores have already kicked off their promotions. I'll list a few today and then publish the rest later this week.

Mr. Porter: Up to 30% Off; No Code Needed

The most notable, of course, is Mr. Porter. I like their selection of Blackhorse Lane jeans (the original Drake's jean was based on the NW1), Inis Meain knitwear, Castañer espadrilles, Derek Rose dressing gowns (imagine sauntering into your kitchen in the morning while wearing this), Valstar outerwear, and fragrances from brands such as DS & Durga and Timothy Han. Their in-house Mr. P line offers a lot of value. The designs are stylish, "basic but not too basic," and work well for a smart-casual look. As usual, the best way to tackle Mr. Porter's massive selection is to filter for brands and sizes so that you can narrow in on what interests you. I tried to create a link to brands I think are interesting, but at the time of this post's publishing, the click-through is a bit wonky (it may work later).

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Over the summer, I emailed Fred Nieddu, the skilled cutter behind the independent bespoke tailoring house taillour, to see if he would be willing to extend his US trunk show schedule to include California. After a bit of emailing back and forth, I'm delighted to report that he agreed. Next month, he and his business partner will be visiting San Francisco and New York City to meet with clients and take orders (subsequent trips will happen once every three or four months, as usual for traveling tailors). 

I became interested in Fred's work at the end of 2020, when I wrote a piece for the Vulture about how the Netflix series The Crown used Barbour jackets to represent each character's relationship with power. Although the article was about waxed cotton field coats, it was the tailoring in the show that truly captivated me. Josh O'Connor's Prince Charles wears the three-button, narrow-lapel suits that the real-life Prince favored as a youth before switching to drapey double-breasted numbers later in life. I remember thinking that the silhouettes were more faithful to the Golden Age of tailoring than the bespoke sport coat I commissioned from Anderson & Sheppard in 2016. 

I later learned that Fred made all of the menswear in the series. He's also made bespoke clothes for Ralph Fiennes in Bond and all of the lead actors in Murder on the Orient Express (along with countless other films and TV shows). This, combined with the fact that he teaches pattern drafting to third-year tailoring students at the London College of Fashion, makes him a rather unique tailor. Most tailors are known for a specific house style they've perfected over time, such as Anderson & Sheppard's soft drape cut, Huntsman's padded look, or Edward Sexton's strong, angular lines. While Fred has a signature style, he's much more adaptable, as evidenced by how his clothes fit like puzzle pieces into the worlds depicted in these shows. 

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No Man Walks Alone is an advertiser on this site, but also one of my favorite online shops. I've always felt that guys can build an excellent wardrobe if they simply set aside some money to shop here every season. The store carries everything from classic Italian tailoring to Japanese workwear to even some avant-garde. And from now until Sunday night, you can take 20% off all full-priced items with the checkout code FALL20. Note, since No Man Walks Alone is an East Coast retailer, this promotion runs until 12 midnight Eastern Time. Some things that I think are particularly worth checking out: 

Kaptain Sunshine Traveler Coat

If I had a reduce my outerwear wardrobe to just three staple pieces, I'd keep my Lee 101-J, Margiela five-zip, and Kaptain Sunshine Traveler. Actually, I have two Travelers. I bought one in navy Melton wool a few years ago, and found that I wear it so much, I purchased a lighter version for autumn (the Melton can only be worn in the wintertime). For me, this is the Ultimate Long Coat (ULC). It's the one piece you can always grab from your wardrobe and feel confident about how you look. The coat's power is all in its cut. Kaptain Sunshine's Traveler is roomy and voluminous, comes down to your knees, and has an A-line silhouette. When worn, it covers almost your entire body, effectively making it your whole outfit. I wear it with everything from chunky Inis Meain sweaters and tailored trousers to stained J. Crew sweatshirts and repaired RRL work pants. It's literally impossible to look bad in this thing. No one can do it, not even me. 

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