Outfit Of The Week 6/9/24 – 6/16/24
This week’s edition of “OOTW” features an outfit I wore to the office earlier in the week.
It has officially become “linen shirt in the office” season!
There are a couple reasons why I wanted to highlight this outfit.
One, I was jazzed about wearing this linen, button-down shirt. Summer is a perfect time to bust out of your color rut. I wrote an article a couple of years ago about how it’s important that our kids see us wearing a whole spectrum of colors. It will help them see past silly stereotypes about masculinity and hopefully make them less likely to tease other kids.
Two, this outfit helps reinforce that even though the weather is warm, you can still wear a jacket to the office. Happily, I was able to keep my jacket on the whole day, since the AC was pretty formidable. But even if I doffed the jacket as soon as I stepped inside, I was still “wearing a jacket” that day which elevated my attire above simply wearing a collared shirt and not-sneakers. Even having your jacket draped over your chair indicates that you went the extra mile, style-wise. I also love wearing jackets for practical purposes, namely, having a multitude of pockets to carry my wallet, phone, pocket knife, train ticket, and handkerchief.
As I already stated, the star of this outfit was my pink, linen, button-down shirt from Brooks Brothers. This particular shirt is their Regent fit in large, which is a pretty good shirt fit for me. I got this shirt on sale maybe six or eight years ago and it’s one of my summertime go-tos. While I usually wear it tucked in a business casual setting, the hem of the shirt is fairly short, which makes it look decent (and not too sloppy) untucked, as well.
Over the shirt, I wore my navy blazer, also from Brooks Brothers. Again, I got this piece on sale a few years ago. It was $248, which isn’t cheap, but I think a decent price for something I will have a for a long time.
While we are on the topic of the blazer, I want to touch on the issue of gold buttons. There was a time, early in my sartorial journey when I hated the look of gold buttons. I even replaced the buttons on my first navy blazer with brown, horn buttons. Now, that wasn’t necessarily a BAD decision. Horn buttons look great, too. But the reason I replaced the gold buttons on that blazer was not because I had some inherent distaste for the look of them. It was because I let the opinions of others on the internet sway me!
Ten years ago or so, gold buttons were considered stodgy and old-fashioned. Anyone who was ANYONE had brown, horn buttons on their navy blazer (or so I was led to believe). Having gold buttons on my blazer was one of those things I had no particular opinion about, initially, but I was curious to see what the menswear community thought of them. So, I took to the ‘ol internet machine and did some sleuthing, only to discover that gold buttons were certainly NOT in favor.
Ok, I thought, I guess they’ll have to go.
It wasn’t until I was a little older and more mature that I realized… I LIKE gold buttons on my blazers! I think they look cool. I think they look classic. I like the way they jingle when I rest my hand on my desk.
It took me until I was a bit older and wiser to realize that I LIKED that old, stodgy, ivy look. I realized that that was kind-of-sort-of becoming my uniform. And they’re really not even all that stodgy looking to begin with!
And what do you know? Nowadays, gold buttons aren’t viewed with nearly as much venom as they were a decade ago!
My point with all this is that you should trust your instincts. If you like something, then wear it. Don’t let the internet sway you (unless you’re gleaning insights from THIS site, of course).
Moving on down, I wore my familiar khakis from Lands’ End and my burgundy Bass Weejun loafers.
Accessories consisted of my Lorier Zephyr watch, a mid-brown belt from Men’s Wearhouse, and my checked, linen cap from Stetson via JJ Hat Center.
If you read this site often (first of all… thank you!), I hope you’re starting to see that dressing well doesn’t mean endless variety or spending a ton of money. I wear those khakis almost every time I go into the office. I rotate through maybe ten or twelve shirts. I have only about a half-dozen sport coats/blazers (which cover me for all seasons). I have three pairs of office-appropriate shoes (black oxfords, brown derbies, and the burgundy loafers you see here). Since whenever I buy anything for myself (which is exceedingly rare), I buy it on sale, the most expensive thing on my person (other than my wedding ring) is that Lorier watch, which my wife got me as a gift for about $500.
Not counting the watch, my outfit probably cost about $478 and more than half of that is taken up by the blazer (blazer-$248, shirt-$50, khakis-$40, loafers-$100, belt-$40).
So, don’t get snookered into thinking that the more you have or the more you spend is what’s going to make you stylish. That’s the trap many of us have fallen into along the way, mostly due to the influence of social media.
Anyway, the weather in the city really was gorgeous that day and I wish I had some time to take a walk. Alas, my day was busier than usual so my commute to and from the train station was all the time outside I was able to manage.
Have a wonderful weekend (and a fabulous Father’s Day)!
