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Superfine Italian woolens basis for well-made clothing

The pearl gray cropped car coat (second from left) from Hickey Freeman’s Traveler collection was a favorite at Men’s Fashion Week in New York. Made of superfine Italian wools that not only resist creasing but are also treated to repel water, its elegance bore no resemblance to college-boy bulky car coats of old or to stiff raincoats that are widely available.
The pearl gray cropped car coat (second from left) from Hickey Freeman’s Traveler collection was a favorite at Men’s Fashion Week in New York. Made of superfine Italian wools that not only resist creasing but are also treated to repel water, its elegance bore no resemblance to college-boy bulky car coats of old or to stiff raincoats that are widely available.

Q. I'm a young jewelry designer and I like to show a bit of flair in my clothes. But I don't want to look like those fashion models who are pictured in outrageous new styles. My business associates are from conservative and artistic circles.

Do you think if I wear an off-white suit I will look up-to-date but not too avant garde? If not, what is a better option?

A. An off-white suit can be a sharp look in the summer, especially for social occasions. I don't think it is too avant garde, but it does take a certain amount of self-confidence to pull off. During my visit to the recent new Men's Fashion Week in New York, I saw far too many looks that I could not picture being worn by any man who was not a model in a fashion show. Many of the clothes were fun to see, but it was hard to imagine where a man might wear them. I kept thinking, "If I saw a guy on the street dressed that way, I would never dream his clothes were the result of a fashion designer's expertise." I'd be more likely to think that some artsy type guy had put himself together in a new, strange street look that just sort of happened.

But then, well-dressed men's styles, especially when it comes to tailored clothing (that is, suits, sport coats, dress pants, and formal wear), do not change much over the years. Men buy new clothes because they want (or lack) something new or specific in their closet, not because something in their closet went out of style.

Unlike women's clothes, a man's wardrobe seldom becomes dated. He shops for something that he is missing; something new and fresh, perhaps even fun.

This ongoing (and mostly unchanging) nature of men's style makes it difficult for clothing designers and manufacturers to come up with new looks that are wearable and desirable, but not outlandish. One of the fashion shows at this year's inaugural Men's Fashion Week that best exemplified how to solve this problem was the Hickey Freeman show. The company is a venerable one, known for its top-of-the-line traditional men's tailored clothing. But the clothes had a contemporary fresh appeal, with nothing stodgy about them. A lot of this was due to their high quality tailoring and beautiful colors (many blues and medium-pearl grays), but mostly it was their use of elegantly luxurious fabrics.

I have written previously about the versatility of wool for year-round wear, including summer. Among the various feather-light suiting materials featured in the collection were fabrics from Carlo Barbera and Loro Piana, two of the world's finest fabric mills. They included Super 180's wools, weightless summer blends of cotton/silk, linen/silk, and cashmere/silk/linen.

Carlo Barbera is a high-end textile manufacturer in Italy, near Milan. In 2010 the reported average price of fabric from the Carlo Barbera factory was $48.75 a yard, about twice that of their Italian competitors. The firm's fabrics are generally considered to be of the finest quality; the yarn, after dyeing, is rested six months while it regains humidity before weaving!

Loro Piana, a more widely known Italian company, also produces wonderful lightweight wool fabrics. One, called Tasmanian, was created in the 1960s in response to the growing need for new and modern clothing that was light, versatile, crease-resistant, and particularly suited for air-conditioned environments.

Tasmanian is now produced, using the most select wools from Australia's merino sheep, whose extremely fine fleece gives the fabric its unique characteristics of transpiration, insulation, lightness and comfort. Available in summer and winter versions, Tasmanian offers the lightest possible fabric for dressing elegantly in every season of the year.

Several of the jackets in the show were made of yet another hard-to-believe, super lightweight fabric, Panama cashmere. Touching it proved once again that today's technology can produce wool fabrics that feel as good as cotton, but that tailor and drape perfectly for luxurious suits and sport coats.

My favorite garment was a pearl gray cropped car coat from Hickey Freeman's Traveler collection. Made of superfine Italian wools that not only resist creasing but are also treated to repel water, its elegance bore no resemblance to college-boy bulky car coats of old or to stiff raincoats that are widely available.

Another favorite was a blue-and-beige-check sport coat; it comes with beige suede elbow patches that can optionally be sewn on by the tailor. A rather special and interesting option, but if I bought that jacket, I would leave them off.

Clothing of this caliber is not cheap, but then again, neither does it go out of style. Many of this year's Hickey Freeman sport coats (which cost about $1,300 and up) and suits (about $1,900 and up) are currently on seasonal sale at 40 percent discount. You can begin wearing the garments you buy now and continue enjoying them for years to come.

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High Profile on 07/26/2015

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