His name’s Scott. The relationship between Larry Paul Scott as a model and as an artist is like that between Sean Connery and James Bond: like Connery has never succeeded in getting free from Bond, so Larry can’t purge him from the image of his face on the first campaign of Acqua di Giò. Then you search for him on Google and you find out that last June in Spain, in Girona, he has carried out his first photography exhibition. Scott’s photography is only in black and white, he has portrayed real people, focusing on the glamour and the trash of the nightlife of New York City, but I prefer his triptychs composed by nature, human beings and architectures, that emphasize perfection, beauty and nature. On Instagram, that by now is the most important agency for photographers in the world, you can find him as @larrypaulscott. Maybe we’ll see him again posing for fashion magazines, but as a talent, no more as a top model or, as he prefers to be defined, as an “ex top model”. Because today Larry is a great artist that deserves to be followed carefully.

Facing the style. “A well-cut suit makes you look thinner, taller and sexier” word of sir Paul Smith, a real expert of menstyle. Menstyle, one word that contains the emanation of what a man would like to be and own. The Style. One Style. One, because it changes depending on the person. But, overall, a Universal Style exists, and it refers indeed to the suit, that can even modify and improve the corporeality better than a plastic surgeon and has the power of adding an appeal that is not possible to reach otherwise. Fashion trends are almost a negligible detail; there’s the year of the narrow lapels, then the year of the peaked lapels, like in the 40s: here the proportions come into play. If you are short, the width of the “peak” worsen the situation, for example. Tricks that men have learnt to consider. I don’t think we still need the columns that teach how to tie a tie. We’re much sharper than in the past. Or not? We are, come on.

Preppy comes back in fashion. Colours and patterns of preppy style are a foundation of menswear, that sometimes comes back in collections, with marked references to sportswear and – obviously – to colleges and british style. It’s so timeless that we find it in a movie of 1965, Break Up by Marco Ferreri, in a period – the Sixties – dominated by plain colours and Beatles-Suit mania. The movie was cut (due to a controversial commercial procedure) by the producer Carlo Ponti and included as a 30 min. episode in the movie Oggi, domani e dopodomani, with two other episodes directed by Luciano Salce and Eduardo De Filippo. To make a preppy look convincing, it has to be worn by the right man: don’t be cheated by the mediterranean and refined look of Mastroianni (that reminds to Marriage Italian Style and Il bell’Antonio): it works only worn by very anglo guys.

Don’t forget the elegance of the past. … Continua a leggere →

In double-breasted. This week’s picture is a frame of the movie I believe in you, set in London during the postwar period. The main character wears with self-confidence the double-breasted jacket, that way of dress of the gangsters typical of the late 40s, that oriented the fashion of great designers such as Armani and Versace. The gangster figure – from Scarface (the original one, directed by Howard Hawks in 1932) to Borsalino, Chinatown and dozens of other popular movies – has a particular appeal that in the collective consciousness refers to a specific style. Today the double-breasted lasts and is the guarantor of an elegant and refined, not necessarily too formal, attire. The lapels are shawl or peak, but narrower than then. To respect the proportions, the shirt has to have a little collar. The same for the tie. A frame from the movie I believe in you, 1952