The II Earl

  Encouraging Others to Be Kind, Selfless, Giving and Openly Emotional Anger is a normal feeling and can be a positive emotion when it helps you work through issues or problems, whether that’s at work or at home. However, anger can become problematic if it leads to aggression, outbursts, or even physical altercations. It’s said a gentleman is a man with good manners, kind and honest… but I´m not sure many people would consider him a gentleman. In this article I would like to add quotes on enemies to flesh out a fuller picture of how I see it. “If a man does not master his circumstances then he is bound to be mastered by them.” ―  Amor Towles “Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.” ―  Confucius “Angry men are blind and foolish, for reason at such time takes flight ...

The Man in The  Brooks Brothers  Shirt I n 1993, five-odd years under new owners Marks & Spencer, now widely agreed to have veered the brand drastically off course, Brooks Brothers took out a six-page advertorial in The Atlantic Monthly celebrating its 175 years in business. Literary heavyweight  George Plimpton  was hired to write the text, which combines history with everyday goings-on at the Madison Avenue flagship. * * * Under The Golden Fleece By George Plimpton Asked to check out Brooks Brothers on its 175th anniversary, I thought it best to outfit myself for the visit from head to foot in their clothing. It was not too difficult, since I have been a patron for years, as was my father before me, and his father before him. I missed out only on the shoes. I have an unnaturally wide foot, a triple E, and their shoe department stops at a single E, shoes that would have caused a wince at every step if I could have squeezed into them. But the rest was all theirs ...

B ack in the 1950s, the bourbon industry was still very much recovering from prohibition in America which had ended less than two decades earlier. Nearly all distillers were focused on the arduous (and, some would say, idiotic) pursuit of making ends meet in a business model that demanded they invest fortunes to produce a product that required years and years of maturing before any return was realized. And the distilleries at the time reflected this single-minded pursuit. Like the whisky they were making at the time, distilleries were harsh, intense, and largely unappealing – as unattractive a place to spend time as any noisy, dangerous and intense plant in the post-war industrialized world. And yet one individual had a bigger vision for what a bourbon distillery could be. What if, instead of just a site where you produced and manufactured bourbon whisky, a distillery was a welcoming, charming place where you could host vis...

Perhaps considered a simple accessory in the modern era, the history of the handkerchief tells us it is anything but, where its multifarious symbolisms throughout historical culture is quite something to behold. The Effect of Principle, Behold the Man (Handkerchief) - c. 1806 - Attributed to John Hewson (American, born England, 1744-1821) After Gilbert Stuart. (Photo courtesy of Getty Images) W hen, in the 1930s, Kleenex produced their slogan “Don’t carry a cold in your pocket” the death knell of the handkerchief’s ubiquity had been rung. Once an object to initiate a meet cute, or a talisman of good fortune and sexual intention, it was soon to become an optional accessory lying dormant till, say, a global pandemic were to bring it back in from the wilderness. Like all the best stuff, the handkerchief’s allure lies not so much in its practicality, but in its history. Whereas its sartorial br...

from Country life Nancy Mitford has a lot to answer for. It was she who, in 1955, set out in print what had never been written before – the unspoken rules for being ‘U’ or upper-class, and ‘non-U’. Her article, published in the CIA-funded magazine, Encounter, provoked an outcry, not least from her old friend Evelyn Waugh. In an open letter denouncing her for lobbing this grenade into British society, he wrote: ‘There are subjects too intimate for print. Surely class is one?’  Reading Mitford’s essay now, you realise how quickly everything changes. Back then, her observations on class were based on language – whether you ‘took a bath’ (non-U) or ‘had one’s bath’ (U). Whether you said ‘chimneypiece’ (U) or ‘mantelpiece’ (non-U). Today, having a bathtub at all is a sign of leisure, and therefore U (showers being much more common in every sense), while having a fireplace has become similarly recherché – and therefore U – in an age of remotely c...

The whole point of being in your teens is that you wear clothes in a slovenly manner, kick a football around in it and go to the sheds for a cigarette, ready to leg it if a teacher comes. It doesn’t exactly foster good sartorial discipline and frankly there is no point in the process of growing up if you dress like a grown man in your teens. We all have to remember the punk movement happened for a reason, we should all go a bit bonkers in our student years, try everything we need to and see what works after. Tailoring can wait. But if there are any old Etonians reading (a test of loyalty here for my dear twin), do take my sympathy as genuine, there is no reason you can really know what morning dress can look like and who can blame you. Now that Ascot has kicked off, and weddings are optimum British - all the pew squishing and hymn singing with none of the dancing - I thought a reminder might be in order. When you put on your morning dress, you have to think of the three F’s, fit,...

In this realm we call ‘Earth’, the glorious diversity of God’s creation has led to the development of some eccentric traditions.  Many of these revolve around the peculiar relationship between mankind and the animal kingdom. For instance, the Spanish have developed a habit of dancing around bulls, the native Americans like wrestling alligators and the Chinese enjoy eating bats. Whilst these actions seem bizarre from afar, they represent an essential, irreplaceable part of the cultures from which they were born. The Spanish are flamboyant risk-takers who possess the capacity for lethal violence. The native Americans lived a more ‘hands-on’ natural life than almost any other people. And the Chinese, well, the Chinese are just weirdos.  They’ll eat anything. Literally… anything. Cats, dogs, bats, you name it, the Chinese will boil it alive and serve it as soup. As British people, we should not ...

Some texts are better left untouched, as I am sure that I’m not able to improve upon John Henry Newman’s words regarding what makes a true gentleman, from The Idea of a University (1852) . And so, with no commentary needed, we launch into the specific description of a gentleman, as written by Newman. This simple page containing Newman’s words regarding specific actions that refine a man, may require a number of visits before it is completely comprehended; but, the effort to learn and apply Newman’s recommendations can pay great dividends in the quest to develop the character of the man behind the clothes. WHAT IS A GENTLEMAN?  "It is almost a definition of a gentleman to say he is one who never inflicts pain. This description is both refined and, as far as it goes, accurate. He is mainly occupied in merely removing the obstacles which hinder the free and unembarrassed action of those about him; and he con...

Take Ivy is a fashion photography book which documents the attire of Ivy League students. The New York Times described it as “a treasure of fashion insiders”. Take Ivy has been the Ivy League bible for Japanese baby boomers, among whom the Ivy League look is very popular, though original copies are very rare in the West, garnering auction prices as high as $2000. Take Ivy was authored by four Japanese sartorial style enthusiasts and is a collection of candid photographs shot on the campuses of America’s elite Ivy League universities. The series focuses on college-aged men and their clothes, capturing the unique fashion of the student population of that time. Whether getting a meal on campus, lounging in the quad, riding bikes, studying in the library, in class, or at the boathouse, the subjects of this photographic compendium are impeccably and distinctively dressed in some of the finest American-made garments of the time. Shosuke Ishizu, the director...