WIW: We Few, We Happy Few...

And after four weeks being absent I am back.  A lot happened in that time: I got married, we went on the honeymoon, we got our home into order, and we went back to work.  And while that last point isn't our favorite, it's good to be back in the swing of things again.  We are pretty worn out, though.


I'll be making a series of posts showing different parts of the wedding and festivities but those will be coming a little later.

This is just a regular 'What I Wore' post.

You might remember the old 1930s Apparel Arts image showing how a safari or similar jacket can be worn in a casual manner:

I really like that image.  It portrays a stylish yet casual and laid back fellow enjoying a puff on a boat, something I'm sure many of us (including myself) wish we could be doing right about now.

What really makes his kit is the ascot, in my opinion, though I'm sure he would look just as dapper without it.

Now, I have a true-blue safari jacket that I've worn in the same manner as the gent above (more about that in the wedding posts), but I decided to put one of my old WW2 jackets to work in a similar manner.

It's an old U.S. Navy cotton twill warm weather dress jacket.  And while it is very similar to the regulation warm weather jacket, I believe it to be specially made.

The box pockets on the skirt have definite British influence and are different from the ordinary patch pockets on regulation jackets.  I really like the scalloped pocket flaps and the full belt that goes all the way around the jacket waist.

When I purchased it (along with its trousers, which are way too short for me) it lacked all but one of the buttons, which are removable.  I picked up some military-looking brass buttons that are very similar to the originals and attached them to the jacket.




So, with the jacket ready I paired it with some Ralph Lauren Polo trousers, GAP socks, vintage 1950s shoes, and a vintage ascot to create the kit below.

The arms are just a tad short but due to the construction of the jacket I'm unable to do anything about that.

I like this look, though it is a bit different than the original 'safari' interpretation of the Apparel Arts image above.  It is definitely a bit eccentric, especially in this day and age in 'fly-over-country'.  But nowadays when most people put very little to no effort in their dress, my thinking is that "we few, we happy few, we band of brothers" that do put in the effort just have to make up for everyone else's lack of it.

If that makes me eccentric then so be it.  Anyways, a little eccentricity is healthy in a man.

WIW: A Week to Go

We've a week to go before our wedding.  Things have been fast-paced and busy but organized thanks to Cassie, who's good with such things.

Today we took some pics at the new apartment.

I wore the following:
~1940s leisure jacket
~1940s Hollywood waisted trousers
~modern shirt
~modern brown on white spectators

I like how the purple shirt and the light blue trousers played together.  Combining the pastel colors with the black and white jacket really worked well IMO.

click photos to enlarge

Jacket fabric pattern:

We're excited for the new changes in our lives and are looking forward to our new life together that is soon to begin.



History in the Woodwork

You just never know where you'll find a piece of history and what it has been through.

Below are three bayonets I've had for several years.  I decided I'd like to display them in some kind of a frame to hang on the wall.

click images to enlarge

Top to bottom:

~WW1 German "sawback" bayonet

~WW2 Japanese "last ditch" bayonet

~WW2 German 1943 dated bayonet



I paid $30 each. The WW1 German and WW2 Japanese bayos were purchased at a garage sale while the WW2 German bayo was bought at an antique shop.

While the WW2 Japanese 'last ditch' bayonet (called such because it was a very crude, simply produced utilitarian bayonet made very late in the war of whatever little raw materials were available) and the WW2 German 1943-dated bayonet are very interesting and rare, especially the 'last ditch' bayo, it's the WW1 German 'sawback' bayonet that intrigues me.

It's called a 'sawback' because of the saw teeth on the spine of the blade, shown above.  These 16" (!!) bayonets were most often issued to German Pioneers (combat engineers) and machine gun crews to help them construct entrenchments, cut down small trees and in general clear obstructions.  The British, however, saw such sawback bayonets in a morbid light and, according to stories of the time, would sometimes execute German prisoners on the spot if they were found with such a bayonet.  It is for this reason that German sawback bayos are often found nowadays with the saw teeth ground down; German soldiers didn't want to be executed because of their bayonets!

This particular bayonet has some damage to its handle.  The steel portion has been bent and mangled enough that it will no longer fit onto the bayonet lug of a Mauser rifle and half of the wood grip on the left side is missing.  The scabbard is also dented.

This damage looks to be old (the wear and aging on the damaged section matches the wear and aging found on the rest of the bayonet) and must have taken quite a bit of force to create.  Combat damage?  I believe it to be.



Now we get to the interesting part.

The bayonet and scabbard are matching, meaning both pieces were issued together and have remained together for nearly a century.

On both the bayonet and scabbard we see a series of numbers and a letter.  These indicate a unit and weapon number.

After much research here's what I've come up with:

This WW1 German bayonet was weapon number 228, assigned to the 3rd Company of the 21st Pioneer Regiment of the 25th Division. From what little info I can find it looks like that company fought at the First Battle of the Marne, the Battle of Verdun and the Battle of the Somme along with the Third Battle of Ypres. They were right in the thick of it.

I believe this bayonet to be a battlefield pick-up from the damage that's been done to it.  Who knows when and from where it was retrieved and by whom.  It could have been during one of the battles listed above or during a smaller, lesser known one.  All I know is that somehow in the last 100 years it journeyed from France to, of all places, small town USA.

If this bayonet could talk I'm sure it would have quite a story to tell.

Necessity is the Mother of Invention

Nutella is indispensable when blocking a hat.

A Bold Look for the Summer

It's that time again: Summer.  Warm weather, outdoor activities, BBQing with friends and family, cruisin' around in cars with the windows rolled down.  It's a great time of the year.  But it can get really hot.

How did guys stay cool and stylish back in the 1940s?  The following images from a 1948 "Look" magazine (64 years ago, when the "Bold Look" officially began) answers that question.  And interestingly enough there was a bit of a debate about it.

click images to enlarge

Cover:

Article Page 1:

Article Page 2:

Article Page 3:

Article Page 4:

Article Page 5, the "Aztec" inspired clothing is rather wild:

Article Page 6, I'll take one of everything, please:



Where do I stand in the debate about summer material?  Do I prefer loosely woven fabrics or light-weight tightly woven fabrics for warm weather? 

I like loosely woven materials, like linen.  I find that allowing air to flow through a garment makes it much cooler than a light-weight tightly woven material.  For example, I have a heavy-weight three-piece tweed suit that is super warm in the winter.  Even so, its tweed material is surprisingly loosely woven and at times will allow a gust of wind to cut through.

Your experience may differ along with your preference, but that has been my observation.



Hollywood: Inventor of Legend, Destroyer of Vintage

Hollywood has been an important force in the American social scene for about a century now, often giving us inspirational, insightful and, no doubt, entertaining films and television. Rocky, It's a Wonderful Life, The Best Years of Our Lives, Gone With the Wind, Rear Window, etc. The list goes on.

Those films and many others are legends, a normal part of popular culture. That's what Hollywood is known for: creating and changing popular culture.

Kid Galahad



Something Hollywood is not well know for is destroying vintage clothing but it is second to none in that regard.

It may or may not be common knowledge that Hollywood regularly uses original vintage clothing in the making of its films and TV shows. There are two main reasons for this: first, modern reproductions are often unable to capture the look and feel of Golden Era clothing and, secondly, real vintage clothing is often much cheaper to buy or rent than it is to reproduce. And that second part, the price, is the main reason Hollywood opts for the real deal.

And here's the rub: film and theater are rough business and things get destroyed, especially 70-year-old clothing. Look at the recent movie "Hugo" by director Martin Scorsese. According to the costume designer for that movie, Sandy Powell, hundreds of vintage pieces were destroyed during filming:

"There were literally over 1,000 costumes, so it took us a long time. We contracted costume rental companies, and we actually did a lot of buying, we sort of scoured markets and secondhand stores both in London where it was filmed and also in Paris; there are great flea markets there. And then we were filming so long, some of the extras were wearing the same clothing for weeks on end, and a lot of the original vintage pieces actually ended up falling apart, disintegrating."


The movie "Titanic" was just as bad, using many original vintage pieces during filming, especially dresses and gowns.  These were unfortunately shredded by the end of filming, just like the pieces used in "Hugo".
　
History disintegrating and being destroyed just to make a movie. If an architecturally important building or a valuable piece of artwork were purposely destroyed for the filming of a movie there would be an outcry from the media and the public. Yet when hundreds of historical pieces of clothing are allowed to fall apart for the same reason there is nothing.

Vintage fedora ruined in "Boardwalk Empire".

Several months ago I was approached by a costume designer from a popular and well known cable TV channel. They were looking for original 1940s/early 1950s pieces of men's clothing for an upcoming series about a detective in 1950s Los Angeles.  I was enthusiastic about supplying vintage to be used in the production of the TV show but soon remembered the horror stories like those above.  As a result, although I would have loved to participate in and supply the filming, I denied the studio both the sale and rental of my vintage (many of the same pieces found at the haberdashery).  I was even told by the costume designer that pieces rented were not guaranteed to be returned in the same condition and may not be returned at all, having 'disappeared' from the set.  And anything bought might be thrown out after filming.

That is unacceptable.

Vintage is a non-renewable resource.  Once it's gone, it's gone.  Reproductions will always be around and plentiful but collectors of vintage clothing are like the Hollywood studios: we prefer the real deal.  And while vintage is still fairly easy to find it is getting more difficult.  Eventually it will be impossible to find.  The days of large costume departments are gone: it's much easier (and cheaper) to buy 'new' costumes for a movie and throw them out at the end of filming.  It's the result of our disposable society.

What can be done to stem the destruction that Hollywood is sowing?  Little if anything.  No one really cares, except for those few vintage nerds like ourselves.  All we can do is watch history disappear piece by piece, right before our eyes. 

And all of it caught on film...

Sale at the Houndstooth Haberdashery and Other News

The Houndstooth Kid blog has hit the 500,000 visitors mark!

As a "thank you" for helping us reach 500,000 visits, select items found at the Houndstooth Kid Haberdashery are on sale for a limited time.  This sale will end June 14th.  Don't miss out on some great deals.

Also, you may have noticed a recent slow-down in posting here on the Houndstooth Kid blog.  Not to worry, it is merely temporary.  I am currently getting ready to move within a month and preparing for my wedding in August.  Posting is unlikely to pick-up again until at least September.  So hang in there and keep your eyes trained upon this space.

And don't miss out those deals over in the Haberdashery.  We couldn't have done it without our faithful readers.