So here we are already five days into the New Year and I am working hard to make my New Year's resolution a reality. With that in mind we'll dispense with the usual arts reporting in this space this week to reveal something that has been on my mind for quite some time now. It doesn't deal directly with the arts per se, but in a roundabout way it does...
I have always prided myself on dressing reasonably well and trying to look respectable when out in public. Oh sure, there are days even I let the bar slip a little bit, as we all do, but recently I have been making a concerted effort to raise the proverbial bar regarding my personal style and I hope I'll be successful.
If I have a particular style it is probably classic, traditional wear most days, save for the odd day when I just feel like wearing slim jeans and a sport shirt, especially on weekends.
But about a year ago I made a discovery. One of my longstanding guilty pleasures has been to scour resale and thrift shops for real vintage finds. I've done pretty well over the years, including one in Windsor, England in August of 2018 when I found a spectacular self-tie bow tie in bright red with white dots. It prompted me to finally learn how to properly tie a bow tie, something that had eluded me for many years.
With that small mountain climbed, let's get back to my find of about a year ago. I have always admired properly tailored formal wear, such as a tuxedo, and always secretly longed for a vintage set of full evening dress. I don't really have any reason to own full evening dress, but then so few of us do nowadays. In fact, if you poll most men they will scratch their collective heads and ask "what's that?".
In a nutshell, full evening dress is a proper black tailcoat extending at the back to about the knee, matching tuxedo pants with a braided stripe running down the outer seam of both legs, and the usual accessories that define the outfit as being "white tie": a marcella cotton white pique vest, formal wing-collar shirt and matching self-tie white bow tie. To complete the ensemble properly you add patent leather pumps or shoes.
I found the tailcoat but alas, no pants. The coat needed some alterations but otherwise was in exceptional shape considering it dated from about the mid-1940s and was tailored by the venerable Eatons store. Continued scouring of my local shops turned up the appropriate high-waisted pants at my local Goodwill for only $6. Then I had to work on the accessories. I had the shoes, but an online search revealed a great deal in the U.K. for the white pique vest and matching tie, which was promptly delivered back in the spring.
The proper shirt proved somewhat problematic, as good quality vintage shirts in my size seem to be hard to come by. But I did find a modern-day equivalent that works just as well I had my friends at Herzog's downtown order in for me, and voila, we were done!
Or so I thought.
The tailcoat proved to be slightly bigger than I would like it to be and although I was prepared to alter it properly, before I could fate stepped in and changed everything. Unbelievably at the very same thrift shop I found the first tailcoat at I found a second, somewhat better fitting one complete with pants. It was ridiculously affordable and so there I was with two sets of full evening dress.
My December visit to my local tailor revealed the second, somewhat smaller tailcoat was considered to be the better fit, so we went with that one and had jacket and pants altered properly. When I looked inside the inside pocket along with another Eatons label I found the custom tailoring information. It appears to be local, and dates from...November 11th 1940! The thing is way older than I am!
Now came the first wearing of the new/old ensemble. As I've reported in this space before I have hosted the Midnight Mass broadcast for CKTB Radio for over 30 years now and although it is a radio broadcast, from the very start I always opted for a tuxedo to add some elegance to the proceedings.
This year I upped that level considerably with my 1940-era full evening dress. I must say I felt completely comfortable in it and plan to wear it every year I am still able to do the broadcast on Christmas Eve at the Cathedral of St. Catherine of Alexandria.
For me it was an easy decision to rescue the ensemble from an uncertain future of possible halloween costuming or worse still, the landfill. I wondered how many society events this ensemble had been to and where. Last week on my Facebook page I posted a picture from the Welland House Hotel in downtown St. Catharines where in the once-celebrated Crystal Ballroom New Year's Eve revellers can be seen in full formal regalia: ladies in proper gowns and all the men without exception in full evening dress. I wondered if my outfit might actually have been worn that night as a first event. Who knows?
I have spent much of the past year researching the traditions of full evening dress so I could get it right and I think I did. But in my ongoing research I found numerous pictures of Hollywood stars at the Academy Awards show from the early 60s with all the men in full evening dress, and they looked fantastic. Just today I watched the 1935 Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers classic Top Hat and it was such a pleasure to see the men dressed so well. Astaire of course pioneered not only stylish dressing in formal wear but also in a suit and tie. He was classic and he was always correct.
And that brings me to my New Year's resolution. Inspired by my journey of the past year to get full evening dress right, I have now decided it is time to take my cue from Mr. Astaire whom I've always admired and simply dress better from here on in.
It doesn't take a lot of money to do it, as I proved this past year on my odyssey. But it takes a keen eye and style smarts and in the New Year I plan to hone my present wardrobe to reflect this newfound desire to look my very best whenever I'm out in the public eye. I have all the ingredients in my closet; now I just have to edit better and say goodbye to some trusted pieces that are showing their age somewhat.
And the original tailcoat that is slightly too large for me? My equally style-conscious historian Chris in Toronto wants it so we'll do the ceremonial hand off in the New Year sometime.
I have lots more to write about this subject and in fact I might just start work on a new blog entirely devoted to men's fashion from my perspective. But for now I will take the occasional detour in this space to look at the good, the bad and the outright ugly in men's fashion. I hope you'll indulge me.
Now, if anyone needs an emcee with a great full evening dress ensemble at his disposal, I'm your man...
Happy New Year!
January 5th, 2020.
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