My Wool Bowtie

Ha ha hat hair from the newsboy cap I borrowed from the sister.

I'm an avid bow tie wearer. I typically only wear silk in very eccentric designs. I only have 3 in conservative design and don't really plan on taming my rotation of bows any time soon.

Recently, I've noticed that bow tie makers are experimenting with pretty interesting designs and are staying away from the regular designs. They usually seem to just be adapting straight tie designs or using the same fabrics from straight tie designs. Well, I wear bow ties to make things more interesting and change my look. Even though I have plenty of bow ties, I'm usually wearing a straight tie.

Now that you know of my bow tie preference let us consider this bow tie. I really enjoy wearing my conservative blue striped shirts and then throwing on a crazy colored bow tie over the collar. The clash is an instant expression of my personality. I adhere to tradition but have no issue with improving or evolving it. Sort of a respect for the past and a desire to make history of my own.

Cricket Bat Shaped Bow Tie about 2 inches wide all the way through

Collar detail shot. I'm wearing a medium spread collar. Most wouldn't but I like it to wear medium spreads instead of BDs, button downs, with bow ties.

As always I like to leave something for you to chew on. Here is some food for thought. The bow tie is a tweed tartan. Tweed is more appropriate fabric for winter because it is warm wearing. To be honest with you, it doesn't really make a difference for the bow ties; my neck is no warmer just because of a 3 inch strip of wool instead of silk. Also the dullness of the fabric is in line with the less than bright conditions of Fall and Winter.

*Note ignore this paragraph if you just want some style tips and don't care for the nuances of mens classical attire. Some will harp on and on about the correct fabrics for ties according to the seasons. Know that they are mistaken or quoting sources that are not accurate. For instance Winston Churchill wore a silk bow tie pretty much his entire premiership. I will save you other examples and get to the point. The only difference is that silk fabrics were worn in town or the metropolis, as Jeeves would put it, and rougher fabrics were country attire. For examples of both watch Jeeves and Wooster on you tube. Jeeves adhered to traditions and held his charge to a higher standard than he himself, Wooster of course, cared to do.

I wore it with today with a cardigan(old worn in cardigan with massive piling) and a blue ground shirt with pink, white, and tan stripes in a fairly large scale. This is a common combination for me. Conservative until you see the tie, square, and socks on me at the time. I maintain a rather dandy set of accessories.

Allow me one more short paragraph and a moment of nostalgia. I chose this particular tie because it reminds me of simpler times. When I was younger we lived in apartments, in Fall we would await the leaves falling on the ground. Why, well we raked them and played in the piles. We would throw each other in the piles. These leaves were similar to the tie; some were orange, yellow, red, maroon, and green. Just like the tie the two sides of the leaf could be different colors depending on the way you look at it.

Farewell and I hope your enjoying your Fall!

Orange & Brown

Let us consider wearing orange and brown together. In Fall, these colors really work well together and if it works for the leaves it can't be half bad.

Esquire photo: brown checked tweed and orange shirt with a contrast collar

Some tailoring Shop. The light brown tweed jacket on the right with an orange pocket square and a navy with orange stripes tie. The dark, grayish-brown tweed on the left is matched with a bright orange silk tie.

This photo is from a Swedish blog I can't recall: another brown checked tweed matched with a dark orange tie and an orangey-brown square. It looks like paisley.

Here a famous abdicator wears an orange pastel shirt paired with a brown odd jacket with an orange over check.

In this German ad, the gentleman on the left is wearing a dark brown jacket with an orange tie.

Photo Credit: Credited under the photo unless I can't remember. Again, if they are yours and you want them down shoot me an email or leave a comment.