The timid steps which have been taken by the designers of male fashions to give today's man equal sartorial status with women, have been pitifully inadequate. A few Italian frills, some French ruffles, a bit of Riviera coloring and Basque design-these are inept gestures revealing a paucity of imagination and a slavish fear unworthy of the new leisure and the new emancipation from Ivy. Why should women's magazines have a lock on haute couture? A rhetorical question; as these pages show, they no longer do.
Pour le sports car owner, the influence is rugged American. Note the rich adaptation of black leather jacket and blue jeans (a tribute to our J.D.s), the styling of the Western buckskin shirt (a tribute to TV), the backlacing of ventilated sports pumps.
Functional is the word for the duck-hunting coverall, with its off-the-Adam's-apple rolled collar, smart rear venting, wrap-around zipper. The red flannel origins of the garment are a tribute to red flannel.
What golfer could fail to make a hole in one when wearing the new plunging neckline sweater, as rugged as the Scottish heath whence it came; the snooded cap, adapted from the Legionnaire kepi; spiked sandals with their ever-so-British tongues.
The world has been scoured to bring today's continental beachcomber its leisure-time riches. From coconut scuffs to Pan-American hat, this toggery will take smart beaches by storm – or hurricane.
Nautical niceties for the new man feature a daring use of hemp piping on shirt closure and cuffs, carried out in sandals modified from those sported by quaint, poverty-stricken Greek squid fishermen.
Adapted from the Lederhosen of Germany, the basic black gardener's romper gives the exurbanite the new "little boy" look, provides textural contrast to the gossamer shirt, smart foam kneeling pads.
The new leisure finds its ultimate apotheosis of self-expression in color-coordinated formal wear. What damsel could resist the nostalgic revival of the pink shirt, the casually rolled Edwardian cuffs, or the subtle matching of bows at chin and toes?
