Yesterday The Boston Globe reported on the “Artist/Rebel/Dandy” exhibit, which the Rhode Island School Of Design somehow managed to pull off without us.

Still, we managed to get a few contrarian words into the story, sparked by the reporter’s question of whether NFL quarterback Tom Brady qualified as a dandy. We replied that there’s a simple way to find out.

Quotes the article:

But Christian Chensvold , founder of the website Dandyism.net, points out that a dandy is more than a well-dressed man. “The magic of dandyism resides in the interplay between the dandy’s temperament and his appearance,” Chensvold writes on his website.

He contends that a dandy isn’t just someone who dresses well — therefore he rejects the idea that many current celebrities are dandies. Instead, he sees a dandy as a package of personality and appearance. A dandy speaks eloquently and spends his free time immersed in cultural and intellectual pursuits. He even offers a quiz on his website to determine if you are a dandy.

“I think the real dandies are people we don’t know,” Chensvold said in an e-mail. “In other words, they’re not famous, though they may be celebrated to an extent, such as the English writer Nick Foulkes. I’m also biased in that I see the legacy of dandyism as largely literary in nature, and I’m more likely to vote for men such as Foulkes and Tom Wolfe.”

And on the same day the Wall Street Journal takes on the subject with this corker:

We know a dandy when we see one. Three-piece or double-breasted suit of ineffable, enviable fit, often in rainbow-trippy tweeds, tattersalls and velvets. Pristine collar, tie and pocket square. Vivacious socks. Shoes pampered and polished. A boutonniere, hat, walking stick—or all three—as grace notes. The dandy has the disciplined vigor of a Bach fugue, the ebullience of a male warbler in spring plumage.

Put down that walking stick, pull up a chair, and see the rest of the article here.

American readers of a certain age will remember the old TV commercial for Grey Poupon, a Dijon mustard now made by food-biz megalith, Kraft. (“So fine, it’s even made with white wine.” Fancy that!) In it, one chauffeured Rolls Royce pulls alongside another. The well dressed man in one leans out and asks the impeccable man in the other, “Pardon me, but would you happen to have any Grey Poupon?” The original ad aired in the 1980s.

Fast forward to 2013, when all things vintage — and faux vintage — are in style, from the new-to-retro Fiat 500 to Banana Republic’s “Mad Men” apparel collection. And Kraft and its agency CP+B have seized the day, back-filling the original with clever CG and new footage that tells the story of what happened after the first encounter, Bond-style.

Enjoy.

In this video, Sackville Street tailors Meyer & Mortimer appear on the BBC’s The One Show in 2012. Although it does make a few errors—we shall leave it to you, dear reader, to figure where they lie—it’s quite amusing and this episode’s host, Gyles Brandreth, is quite charming.

The first new survey book on dandyism to come out in several years has recently appeared on these occidental shores. It’s Nigel Rodgers’ “The Dandy: Peacock or Enigma” and, so far as we’ve read of it, it’s one of the best titles released on the subject. We recently sat down with Rodgers—virtually, at least—to ask a few questions. Look for a full review of to book in these pixilated pages anon.

Michael Mattis: When and where were you first hear the word “dandyism?” How did you react to it?

Nigel Rodgers: I first read T. J. Burnett’s book on Scrope Davies nearly 30 years ago—I reviewed it for a provincial magazine—which led me to read [Ellen] Moers. Earlier, in the late 60s/early 70s, when I was in my teens. I had “a touch of the dandy about me” as Byron (disingenuously) put it. So I have long been interested in the subject.

MM: You’ve written about subjects at disparate as “Philosophers Behaving Badly,” the Roman Empire and ancient Greece. Why dandyism now? What’s the connection?

NR: As mentioned above, I have been thinking around the subject for a long time. The links between all these books are tenuous, although philosophy began with the Greeks and Alcibiades (antique Greek) was a proto-dandy figure. There is a connection between Existentialism—“Man is nothing but what he makes of himself!” said Jean-Paul Sartre in Exisentialism is a Humanism (1945)—and dandyism, though I scarcely mention it in the book.

MM: You acknowledge your debt to Ellen Moers, author of the quintessential history, “The Dandy: Brummell to Beerbohm,” as we all must. How does “The Dandy: Peacock or Enigma” complement the work of dandiacal scholars like Moers, James Laver, Martin Green, et al?

NR: Moers, who wrote over 50 years ago, focused on just one century (1800-1900) in two countries, England and France. I have looked back to ancient Greece and Rome and forward through the 20^th century, at the U.S., Russia and Germany and finally the Congo, and end in the present century. This results in a book of far wider scope though one less scholarly and intensive. Laver is an acknowledged authority on dress but his book on dandyism is slim, though very good. Green’s “Children of the Sun” is a splendid book but does not examine dandyism per se in much depth. My book is an attempt to unite such often disparate threads and survey the whole phenomenon in a wider context.

MM: In describing Brummell’s coeval Scrope Davies you note that he was “true to the perennial dandy principles: independence, elegance courtesy, wit.” Those are surely still valid today, but they must naturally manifest themselves differently in the 21st century than they did in the early 19th. Describe your perfect dandy of today.

NR: Nick Foulkes could an obvious choice in Britain today. There may well be other even better dandies today who are almost unknown. Dandyism does not really thrive in the limelight of celebrity worship. Brummell was not really a “celeb”—he could have walked round most of London unrecognized even in his prime. Nor was Baudelaire. Wilde was a “celeb” in the modern sense, but he made a far from perfect dandy, partly because of that.

MM: The book’s subtitle asks the question, “peacock or enigma?” What’s the answer?

NR: Both peacock and enigma simultaneously at times—but seldom just a peacock. The true dandy remains a paradox.

When it comes to turning to Beau Brummell for inspiration, even people in the men’s fashion world get it wrong from time to time—and more often.

Popular misconceptions include:

• Beau Brummell invented the tuxedo (or at least black-and-white for men’s evening wear)
• That he employed several glove makers to make each pair of gloves
• That the Prince Regent broke with Brummell over the impertinent demand, “Wales, ring the bell!” during one of their late-night piss-ups. (Brummell denied this episode repeatedly while en Caen.)

Over time these legends and others have taken on a life of their own, in part because Brummell’s wit tended toward the exaggeration of trifles. He liked to mess with people’s heads.

Still, we were not quite aghast to read this piece on the website of GQ, that venerable organ of manly style formerly known as Gentleman’s Quarterly. We were, however, nonplussed.

It starts out all right:

“Every time baggy, pleated, and yet somehow tightly tapered pants come back in style, there’s a chance that cuff might creep up the calf inching our fashion standards back to the time when men wore tights and breeches and everyone had the plague… To know how we have have arrived at our current sartorial epoch — and why we must defend it — we need first understand how we broke from the ‘ballet look’ in the first place. And for that, we have one man to thank: Beau Brummel.”

True enough for those who care to “defend” such things, except for the repeated spelling of Brummell’s name as “Brummel.” We can’t fault the author, Micah Fitzerman-Blue, overmuch for this, however. The original French editions, as well as some English translations, of Jules-Amédée Barbey d’Aurevilly’s “Du Dandysme et de Georges Brummel” spell the man’s surname with only one “L.” It’s an easy mistake.

But then Fitzerman-Blue goes on to describe Brummell’s father as an “upper middle-class politician.” He wasn’t. William Brummell was in fact a bureaucrat, the private secretary to Lord North, Prime Minister of England from 1770 to 1782. Bill Brummell never held elective office.

Then there’s this:

“Between preening, plucking, polishing his boots with champagne (fact), and spending upwards of £800 a year (over $120,000 today) on tailoring, Brummel solidified his relationship with the Prince, and established his status as London’s style icon.” [Emphasis ours.]

No, not fact. As Nigel Rodgers points out in his soon-to-be-released book, “The Dandy: Peacock or Enigma” (of which more anon), “… the story that he used champagne as boot blacking is clearly a Brummell joke—champagne is sticky.” [Emphasis Rodgers'.] Anyone who has ever bungled an inebriated toast at a wedding should know this, and the apocryphal nature of this story has been pointed out in several previous works.

Finally, there’s the kicker:

“All that fuss actually resulted in something decidedly unfussy: full-leg trousers with matching jacket, a white linen shirt, and an ascot. In other words, a suit.”

We have a few other words. Brummell didn’t invent the suit any more than he invented the tuxedo. In fact, men had been wearing suits—coat, vest and some form of leg wear (usually breeches) of one matching fabric or another—for more than a century prior. Brummell never wore one. His day costume consisted of a blue coat, white or buff colored vest, fitted buff trousers and Hessian boots. For evening, he wore a blue coat and black trousers that closed tightly around the ankle. Brummell never used the word “ascot” unless to identify the town of that name in Berkshire or the horse races that have been taking place there for some three centuries now. Brummell wore—and wore exquisitely—a cravat. The ascot tie did not appear until several decades later.

In his biography, Ian Kelly quotes Brummell as saying, “I, Brummell, put the modern man into pants, dark coat, white shirt and clean linen.” In that sense, Brummell is the progenitor of modern men’s dress, but that’s hardly the same as saying that he came up with the suit as we know it today.

We should note that Fitzerman-Blue is not a staff writer for GQ but works for a commercial outfit called Bureau of Trade. Its mission is “finding, curating, and selling quality goods, while educating guys on what it is they’re actually buying…” (In this case, a Tom Ford Black Fleece suit.) Here’s to “finding, curating and selling.” Now if Bureau of Trade would only get the education part right—or maybe GQ should hire Esky to do a little fact checking.

Regalia, acetate collage on inkjet print, 27.5 x 27.5 in., 2010

On Savile Row, the pattern cutter’s art has always been an invisible one. Essential but undazzling, it produces the humble brown-paper blueprints that are translated into the luxury of a bespoke suit. For one Londoner, a cache of decades-old patterns in a tailor’s storage room—forgotten puzzle pieces that recorded the measurements of a generation of gentlemen—became the basis of his own art. The collages of Hormazd Narielwalla have given a new life to those paper fragments of lapels, sleeves, waistcoats, and trousers that were once destined for the shredder. They also pay handsome tribute to the stylish but unknown men who wore the suits. Narielwalla uses the patterns’ penciled markings and measurements as part of his works’ visual texture, shaping pieces from the paper’s curving, stylized forms that range from the whimsical (portraits of a mustachioed Edwardian-style dandy he dubs Oscar Hodgepodge) to the richly evocative (opulent details from Raj-era military regalia set against a desert of brown paper) to the sculptural (Memento Mori, a collection of skulls displayed in clear boxes like vaguely sinister but oddly beautiful jewels).

Oscar Hodgepodge, series 8, digital pattern collage inkjet print, 31.4 x 23.6 in., 2010

Steps on Savile Row

Whether assembling a Union Jack from collar patterns or setting pattern scraps in an abstract study of negative space, the 33-year-old artist’s collages find tangible and emotional connections to the glories of male tailoring— and, in many of his works, to the nearly-vanished British world that gave birth to the Row. In 2007, Narielwalla was researching military tailoring at the archives at London’s National Army Museum for his master’s degree, when “the curator suggested I call a military specialist tailor in Savile Row. I suppose when I did and set up an appointment with the managing director [at Dege & Skinner], William Skinner, it was the first time I walked down the Row.” After learning about the fate of the patterns of deceased customers in that meeting, “I seduced the firm to associate with me to produce my first book, Dead Man’s Patterns, an artist’s book.”

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Nathaniel Adams, Amber “Hubba Hubba” Doyle, Mike Davis, Jake Mueser, or Dandy Wellington?

It appears that the event, Dandy Talk, fluffed by your faithful correspondent at the end of last month, went off without a hitch last Friday, October 5 in Gotham City. Presented by Rose Callahan, Matt Fox, Thomas P. Farley, David Zyla and Natty Adams, the event was attended by a veritable who’s who of Big Apple aesthetes, New Amsterdam dandizettes and boho bons vivants.

Among the dandiscenti were none other than fashionista Patrick McDonald (whose eyebrows must have come in a separate town car), menswear legend G. Bruce Boyer, our charming old nemesis, Allen Crawford (aka, Lord Whimsy), musician Dandy Wellington and designer Ignacio Quiles, among others.

Given the day-to-day sartorial splendor of these magnates of menswear, “who’s the dandy?” may seem a strange question to ask. So instead we’ll ask, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the dandy-most one of all?”

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The Fine and Dandy Shop’s Matt Fox. Courtesy Rose Callahan.

It’s no wonder The Fine and Dandy Shop’s Matt Fox has a both a flair for the dramatic and a keen business sense. After graduating from Ithaca College in 1995 he moved to New York City to pursue a career theatre management, where he spent 12 years on Broadway managing Jujamcyn Theaters. Always interested in men’s style, Fox, along with his partner, Enrique, had fantasized about opening a men’s shop of their own. Intimidated by the potential start-up cost of opening a physical store in pricey Manhattan they, like many entrepreneurs in the 21^st century, turned to the Web. “In 2008, given the explosion of menswear online from blogs to web stores (and sites like D.net) we decided to give it a try online,” says Fox. The Fine and Dandy Shop web store debuted shortly after, offering dandyish accessories for the young urban elite. It was both a stylistic and financial success. Fox left the theater in 2010 to concentrate on his e-commerce endeavor full time.

If publishing a hardback book is a kind of vindication for the blogger, then opening a brick-and-mortar shop must be something similar for the e-commerce entrepreneur. Suddenly, you’ve arrived. And The Fine and Dandy Shop is set to open in mid-town Manhattan later this fall. Fox, 38, has also been tapped to bring his knowledge of things dandiacal to an event entitled Dandy Talk this Friday, October 5 at the National Arts Club in New York City.

We recently sat down with Fox (virtually, at least) for a little dandy talk of our own.

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It’s been a while since we lasted posted. Your correspondents have been busy, mostly answering the dolorous call of that cruelest of pagan idols, Mammon. Such is the frenzy of the modern world. But we do have news of a dandiacal nature to impart to our faithful myrmidons around the globe.

First up, D.net founder and Ivy-Style.com impresario, Christian Chensvold, has re-invigorated the pages of The Huffington Post with a new style column. Last week, Chensvold posted a piece headlined “Old Hat: Broker’s Gin and the Fate of the Bowler.” It’s a charming column for a number of reasons. Written in the inimitable Chenners Deadpan Style™ one is hard pressed to know whether he’s serious or having us on for a lark. (We suspect a little of both.) The hook, which is that Broker’s Gin—capped with miniature bowler hat—is currently the fastest selling gin in U.S., dovetails nicely with a chat about the fate of said headgear in the contemporary world.  Your correspondent was honored to be gently pilloried for recently having bought and even occasionally wearing a Christy’s bowler (or derby or coke if you prefer) on the town and for special occasions.

Next, our friend, that redoubtable dandizette, Rose Callahan of The Dandy Portraits fame will be offering her unique photographic perspective at Dandy Talk, a seminar to be held October 5, 2012 at the elegant National Arts Club in New York City. She’ll be joined by Matt Fox of the Fine and Dandy Shop, manners expert Thomas P. Farley and Nathaniel Adams, a writer and the manager of Against Nature Atelier. Admission is free but be sure to RSVP. Nonplussed by idle dandy chatter? Never mind, the event is sponsored by Hendrick’s Gin, which will be providing cocktails.

And finally, if you haven’t seen it already seen it, the Ivy Style exhibit at the Fashion Institute of Technology opened in New York City on September 14. It explores the golden decades of upper-crust, Ivy League college style—that conspicuously casual and uniquely American form of dandyism. If the name sounds familiar, it’s because ol’ Chenners, noted above, is heavily involved in it. Also on the hook for the history notes is Richard Press (of J. Press fame), curator Patricia Mears, Christopher Breward, Masafumi Monden and others. Click over to Ivy-Style.com for more details and updates. The exhibit runs through January 5.

Can’t make it to the Big Apple? Watch the video embedded below…

…or buy the book.

The gold medal for dandyism at the 3oth Olympiad goes to Japanese dressage rider Hiroshi Hoketsu, who at 71 is the oldest athlete in the London Olympics and rides with the cold aplomb of an archetypal English gentleman.

Editor’s Note: Dandyism is, of course, a calling that knows no borders. As Ellen Moers noted in “The Dandy: Brummell to Beerbohm,” after the fall of Napoleon, dandyism—and Brummell himself—leapt the Channel to France, where it took on a life and literature of its own, one that still thrives there today. From there Le Dandysme took flight, was translated into Russian, German and many other languages, and implanted itself into many customs.

In the spirit of that enlightenment—and in the spirit of “hands-across-the-sea”—Dandyism.net publishes its first article in French. In it, Pierre De Bonneuil, who publishes the French dandy site, La Loge D’Apollon, discusses Monsieur magazine, which began publication in 1919. Even if you don’t read French, you’re sure to enjoy this magazine’s marvelous—and very dandyesque—illustrations.

« Revue des élégances, des bonnes manières et de tout ce qui intéresse Monsieur »

Fondée en décembre 1919 au 4, rue de Tronchet à Paris, la revue procéda à une édition spécifique de son  premier numéro : un tirage de 100 exemplaires numérotés et signés par l’éditeur. C’est Jacques  Hébertot et Paul Poiret qui créèrent cet éloge du maintien et de l’esprit.

Dans sa présentation, Abel Hermant, rédacteur prolifique de la revue, évoquait l’esprit de Pétrone qui  considérait l’élégance pour l’une des catégories sous lesquelles on peut envisager tout ce qui existe  sans nulle exception. Ce périodique insuffla son exaspération à partir du numéro XIV en dernière couverture :  Monsieur n’est pas le Magazine des Snobs, c’est la Revue des Hommes Elégants.

Les écrivains des années folles élaborèrent des articles en estimant les variations du temps et en annonçant une érudition arbitraire sur l’essence élitiste. Ils signèrent des manuscrits savoureux où Monsieur rivalisait en distinction :

Un Dandy – Le Jeune homme bien élevé – Monsieur Reçoit – L’Elégance de l’esprit – L’Evolution du col – La cravate et la politique – De l’influence du chapeau sur la politesse – Gilets – Parfums pour messieurs – La chemiserie – Le veston – L’art de causer – les cannes – les mouchoirs – La bibliothèque de monsieur…

Les meilleurs illustrateurs de l’époque font du style un point d’honneur et une quête permanente de la beauté. Ils embellissaient l’ensemble éditorial. Voici une liste particulière de certains pinceaux : Eduardo Garcia Benito, Bernard Boutet de Monvel, Maurice Taquoy, Pierre Mourgue, Pierre Brissaud, André Pécoud, André Dignimont…

Cette revue devient, en quatre années, la référence absolue de l’homme au manièrisme intemporel dont le prestige est au prix d’une certaine lenteur et d’un mépris apparent de la médiocrité.

—Pierre De Bonneuil

1. Rupert

Rupert was finally determined to be ready if Peter once again brought up last summer in Capri.

Editor’s Note: L. Fellows is arguably one of the two greatest men’s fashion illustrators of all time, the other being J.C. Leyendecker. Unlike Leyendecker’s straight-up ads for Arrow brand shirts, however, every Fellows illustration seems to tell a story—the details of which are left up to the observer. One such observer is our own contributor, Robert Sacheli, the Passionate Spectator. Recently, on his Facebook page, Bob began posting his own, Saki-style vignettes based on 11 of Fellows’ most famous illustrations. They were so priceless that we asked to post them here on our home page. Please enjoy this, our first foray into the genre of illustrated novella. (Not familiar with Fellows? See Mr. Thompson’s superb write-up on the illustrious illustrator.) — M2

2. Everett

Since their arrival in Palm Beach, the only evidence that Everett had seen of Roy’s celebrated acting ability was the number of variations on a pout he could produce.

3. Elyot

That letter so carelessly tossed on the cabaña floor had freed Elyot from even pretending to care about Clifford’s choices in swimwear or companions.

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When one considers the classic dandyish modes of conveyance, the bicycle does not at first blush top the list. Rather, one first thinks of the horse (either actually ridden or merely wagered upon), followed down through history by the yacht and the doomed first-class ocean-liner, then perhaps in the air by the Graf Zeppelin, the private plane, the China Clipper and, finally, the Concord. On the ground, the classic roadster springs to mind (as does the racing car (à la Porfirio Rubirosa), followed by the chauffer-driven Rolls and the Town Car.

But the bicycle? Not so much.

There is, however, a growing movement afoot that may change this common conception. They’re called “tweed rides” or “tweed runs” and they’re happening periodically in cities across the Occident. At these events, participants get decked out in their tweedy Sunday best and take their classic (or neo-classic) bicycles for a leisurely cruise across town to some designated pastoral spot or watering hole, where the party really begins.

This may be fair to the venerable velocipede. The first “bicycle” – that is, a two wheeled, human powered transport – was invented in 1818 by a German baron. Aptly nicknamed the “dandy horse,” this bone-shaker was simply a wooden frame over a pair of in-line metal wheels and a handlebar for steering. The rider straddled the contraption and pushed it forward like a kick scooter, setting off his tight-fitting, instep-strapped “inexpressibles” admirably to the ladies. (Talk about sacrificing comfort and practicality on the altar of style.) Later in the 19^th century, bicycles more or less as we know them today were all the rage among fashionable urbanites wanting to zip around town rapidly. The bike-riding Oxford student in tweed jacket, flapping robe and mortarboard cap is among the most classic images.

Through the magic of the googling engine, we were recently apprised of an article in the Washington Post about an upcoming “Seersucker Ride” (June 9) sponsored by a D.C. outfit calling itself “Dandies and Quaintrelles.”

The article quotes a Ms. Holly Bass, identified as a “performance artist” who organizes D and Q’s cycling events. “It’s as much about an attitude as it is about a style of dress,” she told the Post. “It’s about harking back to an era when the way in which you presented yourself was viewed as a reflection of respect, courtesy and manners.”

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It’s not often one happens upon a gem in the papers, especially one with something poignant and propitious to say about the body dandiacal. Well, at least not in the papers these days, anyway.

So we were pleased to stumble across, via a blog called The Esoteric Curiosa, a 1910 appreciation out of The New York Times of Charles Guillaume Frédéric Boson de Talleyrand-Périgord, more commonly known as the Prince de Segan.

Born in 1832, Talleyrand-Périgord, grew up to become a cavalry officer. That in itself is unremarkable, though it is telling. Like many a future dandy, Talleyrand-Périgord was an officer of horse, which, unlike the navy, the courts, or the clergy affords the kind of exercise that makes for a “well-turned leg,” while avoiding the drudgery of the infantry.

One cannot say that Talleyrand-Périgord, who became Duc de Segan in 1845 (and who was also Duc de Talleyrand, Duc de Périgord, and Duc de Valençay) rose to anything. He was born on high though in a country subject to constant (and sometimes deadly) revolution and change. Rather, he became the arbiter elegantarium of Parisian capital-S Society and its demi-monde — through power of style. As the anonymous author of the Times article writes:

It was the sovereignty of fashion — that is to say, of fashion in the broadest sense of the word, and in which the mere question of clothes played a very small part. He was no mere Beau Brummell, but rather an Alcibiades, in this sense, that he dictated the tastes, the prejudices, the fads, and the crazes of the hour. And not content with setting the fashion, he made people fashionable, for a briefer or a longer period, according to his caprice and his interest.

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Last night your correspondent went to the theatre to see a new play, “Maple and Vine,” put on by the American Conservatory Theater at the Curran in San Francisco. Written by Jordan Harrison and directed by Mark Rucker, the play – as the liner notes say – explores the lives of Katha and Ryu, who “have become allergic to their fast-paced modern lives. After they meet a charismatic man from a community of 1950’s re-enactors, they forsake cell phones and sushi for cigarettes and Tupperware parties. In this compulsively recreated world, Katha and Ryu are surprised by how much they are willing to sacrifice for happiness.”

That’s the pitch, anyway. The “charismatic man,” Dean, belongs to an organization called the Society of Dynamic Obsolescence – which may or may not be a not-so-subtle reference to the American quasi-medievalist Society for Creative Anachronism. The SDO, it turns out, owns a “Truman Show”-style gated community somewhere in the Midwest, which is permanently ensconced in the year 1955 – the era of Eisenhower, cars with fins, A-line skirts, mayonnaise slathered casseroles and Lucky Strike cigarettes. Everyone is expected to play their part and the community even has its own Authenticity Committee to enforce the retro “experience.” But, as in any good suburban melodrama – from “Babbitt” to “Lolita” to “Blue Velvet” – our heroes uncover the dark underbelly of their seemingly perfect and balanced “Ozzie and Harriet” community, replete with sexual repression and racism. In the end, Katha (now Cathy) and Ryu decide to stay on, while Dean, like a shunned Amish, eventually retreats to the outside world to pursue his gay lover.

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