If “shoe porn” means a spectacular visual presentation of shoes, then let me show you one of the greatest shoe porn sites of all time: Centipede. A Japanese site started by a semi-anonymous blogger in 2002, and left untouched since 2009, it remains better than most of the dozens, if not hundreds, or classic men’s footwear sites that have come after it.

Much of the focus here is on English firms, including long-gone bespoke makers such as Wildsmith, Peal & Co., and N. Tuczek. For fans of Edward Green, there’s a nice sample of old historic lasts, such as the 88, 32, and 33. Here’s a pair of split toe Dovers, for example, built on the 32 and made from an unusually hairy Maple Stag suede. There are also special photo sets for J. Amesbury bespoke, A. Harris’ collection of rare shoes, and one enthusiasts’ tour of British stores. There’s no text to accompany the last bit, but the photos are enough to entertain.

The second half of the site is dedicated to makers from America (mostly Alden), Italy (e.g. Bemer, Ugolini, and Mannina), other parts of Europe (e.g. my friend Réginald-Jérôme de Mans' butterfly loafers, which were made for him by Anthony Delos), and Japan (e.g. Spigola, Otsuka, and some names hidden to me through that shroud of katakana, hiragana, and kanji). Lastly, the “etcetera” section is not to be missed. There, you’ll find some knockout, old catalogs from GJ Cleverly, Edward Green, and Foster & Son, as well as some curiosities, such as this miniature Berluti shoe (made so that a representative could easily bring models to a trunk show) and a special Globe Trotter shoe case from the 1940s. There’s even a pair of New Balances made from an undyed vegetable-tanned leather, making sure there’s something for everyone.

Enjoy. 

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The Irish knitwear brand O’Maille has an interesting section on their website explaining the different meanings behind Aran sweater stitches. Arans are densely patterned, vertically paneled, cable knits, typically produced from a heavy yarn made from an undyed, off-white wool known as bainin. The sweaters are classically associated with the Aran Islands, which is of course where they take their name. 

According to O’Maille, simple cable stitches represent fishing ropes, while more complex ones symbolize the interweaving of family life. Health and success are represented through the moss stitch (made to evoke the image of abundant growth in mossy soil), diamond stitches (made to reflect fishing net mesh), and honeycomb stitches. Finally, trinity and blackberry stitches are said to have ancient religious connotations, while lobster claw, spoon,and basket stitches are symbolic of the life of knitters.

A quick look around will bring up many sources that say similar things, but one should be careful about buying too much into these mythologies. Contrary to popular belief, these sweaters are not part of the Islands’ traditional dress. Instead, they were a fashion item that came out of the 20^thcentury, likely as part of the Republic of Ireland’s push in the 1930s for home-produced crafts. The meaning behind the stitches came from a German writer named Heinz Keiwe, who “discovered” some early prototypes and decided to wax rhapsodic about them in an article published in 1938, where he wrote about the ancient Celtic influences he supposedly found. Keiwe had never been to the Islands, however, nor ever met anyone who had knitted a sweater. Still, his work was widely accepted and later writers felt free to embellish and expand (early form of bloggers?). Even the often-told story that these knitshave been used to identify poor, lost fishermen drowned at sea likely came from John Millington Synge’s 1904 play Riders to the Sea, where some fisherman was identified by a sock with dropped stitches. Of course, sellers of such sweaters have never felt compelled to contradict any of this marketing magic, so these mythologies continue. 

Whether the sweaters hold traditional meanings or not, I still like to wear mine with ribbed corduroy trousers and heavy twill chinos. The best I’ve found have all come from Inis Meain, which you can buy from No Man Walks Alone, Barney’s, A Suitable Wardrobe, Inis Meain themselves, and (soon) The Hanger Project. Those will be made from softer wool-cashmere mixes, rather than the scratchier bainin varieties you’ll find elsewhere. 

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Except for Gianluca Migliarotti’s tributes to Italian tailoring, my favorite menswear films have all been BBC documentaries.  Unfortunately, they’re difficult to view unless you’re in the UK, but you can find clips here and there on Vimeo and YouTube. Someone in the Netherlands also once uploaded the full-video files on a server many years ago, and remarkably enough, they’re still there. He has Savile Row (parts 1, 2, and 3), British Style Genius (parts 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5), Tweed (parts 1, 2, and 3), Charles at 60, and Ozwald Boateng: Why Style Matters. The first three are especially good, with British Style Genius and Tweed being very difficult to find in full-length form anywhere else. 

The latest BBC project is The Fabric of Britain, a three-part series on British knitwear, wallpaper, and embroidery. I’ve embedded part one, The Golden Age of Knitting, above. Partly because it’s the beginning of fall, so knitwear is naturally on my mind, and partly because next to tailored clothing and shoes, I’m fanatical about sweaters. What’s not to like? You put them on, look great, and feel like someone is giving you a warm hug all day.

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Anyone around my age (mid-30s) probably spent much of their childhood in the late 1980s pouring over Neil Ardley and David Macaulay’s famous book, The Way Things Work. It’s an entertaining introduction to everyday machines, with informative, but playful, diagrams that nicely capture any child’s imagination. Who having read that book can ever forget those drawings of tiny woolly mammoths pulling levers and operating gears?

There was something similar around that time in the UK called The Secret Life of Machines. It was an educational television series presented by Tim Hunkin and Rex Garrod, in which the two explained the inner workings of common household and office technology. The show was developed from Hunkin’s comic strip, “The Rudiments of Wisdom,” and it had an instantly recognizable format. Hunkin would introduce some machine, talk about its inner workings and development, and then end on some social commentary. Interspersed would be some funny demonstrations and creative cartoons, which Hunkin would draw himself. 

Above is one of my favorite episodes: the one on sewing machines. In going through the development of the machine, Hunkin and Garrod also explain the difference between things such as a chainstitch and lockstich, which might interest a menswear blog reader. There’s also some cranky “they don’t make things like they used to anymore” commentary, which menswear enthusiasts can’t seem to get enough of. I think you’ll enjoy the show, and at the end of it, if you want more, there’s also a nice program on laundry machines.

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If it can be said that the Italians make good suits, the English make good shoes, and the Scots make good knitwear, then it can be said that the Japanese make good blogs. Some of the best around, actually. I recently found this one about vintage Ghurka bags made prior to 2004, when the brand’s founder Marley Hodgson sold the company. I suspect it’s maintained by a hobbyist, not Ghurka themselves (or so I hope). Google Translate isn’t very good at processing Japanese, but from what I can tell, the site has all the hallmarks of an enthusiast writing: the speculation of when and where things were made, the nostalgia over the “early days,” and the non-professional judgment of construction techniques. All stuff that speaks to my heart, really. 

The collection is simply awesome. There’s a range of popular models, such as the Expediter attaché and Express weekender (the second model Marley Hodgson ever designed, but the first he commercially offered), as well as some old paraphernalia and vintage catalogs. The best bit, however, might be the set of Examiner briefcases, of which our Japanese friend seems to have collected every variant. Check, for example, his documentation of details nobody else would have ever noticed, such as the differences in the brass studs used on the bottom of each these bags. I also love his eye for detail when he shoots those beautiful Talon zippers, and his sense for completeness when he lines up each product and shoots them as a set. It gives you the impression you’re looking at some serious anthropological research, and not just some guy with a crazy obsession for Ghurka. Normal people would call this unhealthy, and they’d be right, but it’s unhealthy behavior I can relate to.

You can still find vintage Ghurka pieces today on eBay and Etsy, as well as some Japanese trading sites (which I selfishly won’t reveal, sorry). Ghurka also sells vintage bags on their site, but at a higher price than what you’d pay if you did your own hunting. A bit cheaper is Ghurka’s mainline stuff made from “vintage army twill,” “vintage chestnut leather,” and “vintage black leather,” which I’ve heard are made to the same specs as the old line (though, I haven’t verified this firsthand). The vintage army twill collection was just put on sale last week. If I didn’t need to save up for a move in two months, I would have easily snatched up this Examiner. 

 

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Although I mostly rely on my Lotuff & Clegg briefcase, Ralph Lauren fishing bag, and Filson 256 for my everyday carry, I’ve been getting a remarkable amount of use out of this Brooks England backpack. I picked it up last December after attending an in-store event with Brooks England and Grant Petersen (who was there giving a talk about his book Just Ride). The showcase of Brooks products included, of course, those beautiful bicycle saddles for which they’re most known, as well as a small collection of their somewhat newly acquired PeDALED line - a Japanese label that makes clothes with practical, technical details for bicyclists, but in a way that’s bit more visually acceptable when you’re off a bike.

Brooks’ bags are similar in that they’re designed with a bicyclist in mind, but not necessarily limited to just bicycle use. This Pickwick model, for example, is made from a water-resistant canvas and has leather trim detailing, metal slide-in buckles, and a tidy-roll up closure. There are two smartly placed, well-hidden pockets - one at the back and one at the bottom - that allow for the convenient stowage of things such as documents and bike locks. Water-resistant zippers give those pockets added weather-protection.

I really like the design for its simple, streamlined form and reliance on quality materials rather than over-detailing. The canvas is somewhat rigid and helps keep’s the bag’s shape reasonably well. The generously sized main compartment has two interior pockets for organizational ease, but is otherwise free of any dividers. This gives me enough room to carry a bunch of miscellaneous things (such as the eBay packages one might need to ship in order to pay for such an expensive bag) when my briefcases prove too small. For practical use in the city with very causal clothing, it’s pretty ideal. 

I only have two complaints. One is that there’s no interior pocket for a laptop, which is surprising given how forward thinking Brooks England and the bag’s designer Andre Klausser seem to be. Not having a separate pocket means my laptop slides to the front of the bag when there’s not much else inside, thus making it slightly harder to carry. The second complaint is that Jon Moy over at Four Pins says it looks “like a giant lunch bag” … which, it admittedly kind of does. 

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I don’t know if I can still rightfully keep my blog’s name after this post, but let me tell you about one of my wallets - the one I use when I’m wearing jeans. Back when commerce still ran on cold, hard cash and people had to go to stores to buy things, truckers and bikers kept wallets like this one in their rear pockets. They were tethered to their owners with a chain so they wouldn’t be accidentally left at diners or fall out during a bumpy motorcycle ride. At some point in the 1980s, they were picked up by Japanese brands (first Redmoon) and remade for the niche market of Americana enthusiasts. As the Japanese are wont to do, these reproductions had incredibly high-end details, such as handcarved, sterling silver conchos and intricate tooling designs. 

My wallet is made by Flat Head, a Japanese company principally known for their denim, although they produce jackets, shirts, and other men’s accessories as well. The bulk of the piece is constructed from untreated steerhide leather, which originally came in this pale, natural color you see below, but eventually darkened to the beautiful, golden, honey brown you see above. All that was required was a few years worth of regular use, exposure to sunlight, and routine applications of Obenauf’s Heavy Duty LP. Additionally, the ring at the back is made from sterling silver, and the threads, which have been used to hand stitch the entire wallet, are made from intertwining strands of cow tendon. The interior is also lined with an exceptionally soft, yellow pigskin, giving the area where you’d actually store your cash a nice, smooth finish. 

I love my wallet, and find that it goes well with the kind of things I typically wear with jeans (e.g. leather jackets, motorcycle jackets, etc). My chiropractor hates it though. She noticed it one day and mentioned that I could really do damage to my hips from sitting on such a bulky thing. “Is there a reason why you always have to have it in your back pocket?” she asked. “Can’t you get something slimmer, like a card case?”

What could I say? That keeping this in my back pocket helps develop the crucial indigo stains you see below? That those indigo stains give the surface some real visual depth and character? That the threads are made from cow tendon? That the wallet was handstitched in Japan? That I’ve put years into this wallet so it would develop a beautiful, golden patina? That although this ring prevents me from leaning too far back in my chair (for fear that it will puncture the seat’s fabric), it’s made from sterling silver? 

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Fall collections are starting to finally trickle into stores and one that’s caught my interest is this new collaboration line between Barbour and Norton & Sons. Barbour ended their arrangement with Japanese designer Tokihito Yoshida last season (though Yoshida purportedly checked out well before that). Given how celebrated that line was, I’ve been curious to see where Norton & Son’s Patrick Grant will take it next.

The pieces are actually quite nice in person, but you would never know it from looking at websites. The problem is that none of the line’s good qualities come through in photographs. Whereas Yoshida’s jackets had complex designs and unique details (some would say “fakakta pockets”), the new incarnation is extremely simple – almost to a fault. There are few things that would capture your imagination if you were just scrolling through pictures in an online store, so you really have to try these on in person to see whether you’d like them (I know Barney’s is carrying the line this fall, but I don’t know which other brick-and-mortars).

The strength of the line is in the fabrication. The jackets, for example, have a real heft and sturdiness to them, and the materials make for nice, rugged silhouettes. There are also details, such as hidden layers underneath plackets, that sometime reveal themselves as folds in the lapel. Additionally, the low-gauge knitted sweaters are remarkably thick and warm. Some are a bit rough, such as the Shetlands, while others are quite plush, such as the rollnecks. You would never know any of this from photos though, and so far, all the online marketing has been fairly poor. The lookbook seen here gives the best view of the collection, but there are only four images and one is cropped from the chest up (who made that decision?). Photos from online stockists are worse, as they look like they were taken out of utility-wear mail order catalogs.

Not everything in the collection is great. This waxed coat, for example, is a bit too stiff and columnar to be flattering, in my opinion. On the other hand, the Barra jacket (available in sandstone and navy) would look nice with a pair of jeans or some beat up corduroys, and the Guernsey-inspired pattern on the Baleshare crew knit would do well layered underneath … well, a Barbour jacket. As with much of the line, that sweater unfortunately doesn’t photograph well. You can’t see the pattern in many stock images, and Oki-Ni (the one place where you can appreciate the pattern) for some reason pulled the sweater so far down that it looks like a women’s knit (in reality, the hem can stop at the hips, like a regular men’s sweater). My guess is that the poor presentation will result in every piece making it to end-of-the-season sales, and at half off, some of these will be great buys. 

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Drake’s released their fall/ winter 2013 collection yesterday. It hasn’t received that much fanfare on blogs yet (even in the ever-quick Tumblr-sphere), which is surprising given how many fantastic things there are.

Like last season, this collection seems to have a nice focus on textured neckwear. There are the traditional things, such as raw silks and tussahs in both solid and patterned designs, as well as plays on standards, such as variations on the traditional grenadine. In addition, there are some nice designs with a 1950s/ 1960s sensibility, such a fuzzy mohair blend and a range of boucles. The word boucle comes from the French word boucler, which means “to curl,” and it refers to how the yarns are formed. The fabric is made with a series of looped threads, typically with one being a bit looser than the others. This looser thread forms a small curled loop in the fabric, while the others form the anchors. The effect is a fabric that looks very textured and interesting, and feels slightly rough to the touch. I think of it as a fall/ winter version of raw silk and like to wear mine with tweeds.

Alongside their neckwear is Drake’s usual mix of other men’s accessories, such as their beautiful, finely woven scarves, which this season comes in a range of tartan, Fair Isle, Navajo, and Kelim patterns. I also lusted over their knitwear. Some of their Guernsey and Aran sweaters looked very much like those sold by Inis Meain, which makes me wonder if that’s not who manufactured them. There are also some Shaggy Dogs, cabled lambswools, and Shetland knits in birdseye and Fair Isle patterns. Oh, and the four-ply cashmere shawl collar cardigan pictured above, which is not new, but so great that I’ll use any excuse to use the photo.

Two big highlights for me include their sport coats and pocket squares. I believe this is their first season offering tailored jackets online, and I suspect if it goes well, we’ll see an expansion of offerings in the future (previously, the only way to really buy their sport coats is to go to their London store). This season’s selection of pocket squares is also quite exciting. I think it may be their best yet since their medieval prints many years ago.

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I’ve been daydreaming about what kind of sport coat I’d like to get next, and somewhere on the list is a Shepherd’s check, which I’ve long thought of as a very Italian pattern. It may have something to do with this old photo shot by The Sartorialist. That jacket isn’t technically a Shepherd’s check, but if you squint hard and use your imagination, it’s close enough. 

A true Shepherd’s check is a simple black-and-white pattern that looks something like it’s familiar cousin - gingham. It’s one of the oldest checks in existence, and it known to many as a Border tartan for its association with the Anglo-Scottish border. In its most primitive and traditional weave, it’s comprised of six black threads and six white threads, with the white threads being made up of untreated sheep’s wool, and the darker threads being the same, but taken from black sheep. 

The pattern is so old that it’s been the basis for a number of other Scottish patterns. The ever popular houndstooth, for example, was originally made in the Lowlands as a Shepherd’s check variant. There are also a number of Scottish estate tweeds, such as the Glenfeshie, which is essentially a Shepherd’s check decorated with a scarlet overcheck. That was made in 1840 to help distinguish men of the forest from shepherds, and there have been many other estate tweeds based on the simple Border tartan since. 

Despite the strong Scottish roots, I still think of the check as being very Italian. Maybe it’s because the few times I’ve seen it, it’s usually worn by Italian men or used in ready-to-wear Italian garments. Either way, I’d like to get my own one day - ideally in a mixture of a mid-brown and tan, or mid-brown and chocolate, like you see below. I think if I wore it, I’d have to talk to people like Luciano Barbera is doing above. With one hand up, in a pose that seems to say “I’m telling you about the handsomeness of Shepherd’s check, but will you listen?" 

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