The Pocket Handkerchief

[Old Hippie]

I thank the lads here who are helping clods like me transfer our scrunged kilt wearing lives into something more sophisticated and proper. You remind me of how my grandfater helped me as a boy--good on ya!

'At's the thing, i'nt it?

My father was a career soldier. A place for everything and everything in its place. I inherited a compulsive habit of cleaning my nails when I think nobody's looking. (Which means when it counts, they'll be a little dirty...)

My mother grew up poorer than dirt. She put great emphasis on being "neat" in one's dress and presentation. I learned it's easier to dress "up" the social scale than it is to dress "down" the social scale. I also manage to scrape by in a place where the standards of dress are quite relaxed -- which suits me as I often stop on the way to work to feed sheep, and again when I get home in the evening (as well as dumping accumulated buckets of compost before heading up the hill to the house).

I'm not alone here in having an interest in becoming a better dresser. I am uncomfortably aware that I don't own anything more formal than "business casual" at the moment, and while I have not attended a truly formal occasion for 10 years, I have lately begun to conceive the need for what I believe is called "daywear" -- items at least a little dressy-looking for events to which I may be called. Maybe "evening" wear, though what I see of that looks far more formal than my life calls for.

So thanks to our Fashion Brigade for giving us lots of "teachable moments."

:ootd:

[Jack Daw]

I think the best advice I've heard for folding a pocket square came from another gentleman's website. They suggested that it should placed in the pocket with casual indifference - as if added at the last possible moment before leaving one's home...

I quite like that.

I believe you and do it myself, too; but, I couldn't help but think of....

[Ancienne Alliance]

I was taught by my grandfather that you weren't fully dressed without a 'kerchief in your suit. It could match the tie exactly, match the shirt or coordinate--that wasn't the thing--the thing was to WEAR one with a suit if you wanted to look properly turned out. Along with this, he included:

-Shining your own shoes
-tying your own tie--neck tie or bow tie
-having your nails in order
etc etc etc

When I got out of the military and bought my first few suits to re-enter the civilian work world. I remember the young salesman a bit perplexed when I asked for coordinating and matching squares. An older salesman came over and smiled and said he'd take care of me.

I then went and bought a new straight razor, mug and brush.

Its funny how somethings you are taught just stay with you. I thank the lads here who are helping clods like me transfer our scrunged kilt wearing lives into something more sophisticated and proper. You remind me of how my grandfater helped me as a boy--good on ya!

Great story and testimony.

Thank you.


Best,

Robert

[csbdr]

AAAAARRRHG!! You just reminded me of pocket squares and I had to get on ebay and buy some (3 actually) I found 2 possibles for my outfit I will wear to my brother-in-laws wedding, and one which will be stunning with my IoS.

I didn't own a single one and had forgotten how wonderfully they complete an outfit.

[Stratherrick]

What a fabulous thread, Robert, and thanks for starting it!

I must admit, I am chap caught between two worlds. My late dad, born 1928, was in the Royal Navy at the end of WW2. His dad had been a naval gunner in WW1. From both of them I got a sense of turning out 'properly' when the occasion demanded.

Now, through my school days in the 60s, in a UK still reeling from the recent war, and only just past rationing, I saw it quite proper to keep my shoes well shined and my school clothes neatly pressed, and that was just for a state school of no standing. It would have been inconceivable to have done otherwise, for a whole host of reasons. At polite family gatherings, hatching, matching and despatching mostly, a hankie 'tossed' into your jacket pocket was de rigueur and quite the norm.

I think, if I remember correctly, that I stopped wearing a pocket kerchief as I left my 20s behind, in the 1980s, for reasons I've forgotten now. Mind, before I was a Registered Nurse, I worked for Barclays Bank for a number of years in fashionable Covent Garden in London's West End. Now there was a place for a hankie, or three as others have said!

These days, when I'm out of uniform, you're more likely to find me in combat trousers and T-shirts, or woolies come the autumn. But, mind, when I need to go to formal get togethers, my son's rugby summer ball comes to mind, or if I'm about to go shopping in posh-ish shops like House of Fraser, then I can spruce myself up in a flash. A clean, sharply pressed Chester Barrie, Jasper Conran or Van Heusen double cuffed shirt with my Hugo Boss jackets need a pocket hankie or they get lonely!

So, here I am, a 60s hippy child with a wartime influencing of my upbringing. I must admit, I feel happy in either world. Mind, your clothing certainly affects how you're dealt with in shops etc. If I want that bit of special attention while buying presents, on goes the jacket and out comes the running around you by shop assistants. If I want to go as a street medic on antiwar demos and the like, you'd think I'd spent the past few months living in makeshift tarpaulin benders!

Style is sooo personal, and so well displayed in this thread in particular. We can all put stuff on, but not quite as many can 'wear' it, at times. I'm as guilty as the next guy or lass at making fashion faux pas, but I've also had some resounding triumphs too!

Once again, a marvellous thread, mon ami.

Slainte

Bruce

[pdcorlis]

My mother grew up poorer than dirt. She put great emphasis on being "neat" in one's dress and presentation...

Its funny the lessons we learn. My mother and father also grew up dirt poor but always stressed to us kids that "Good manners cost nothing." A lesson I passed on to our children.

[thescot]

Its funny the lessons we learn. My mother and father also grew up dirt poor but always stressed to us kids that "Good manners cost nothing." A lesson I passed on to our children.

Anyone my age probably has parents who grew up poor; it was the Great Depression after all.

But, my grandfather, a railroad engineer, and my other grandfather, a railroad engineer, and my father, a railroad engineer, always dressed appropriately and insisted on good manners as well. Being "tacky" was a great crime according to one grandmother.

When I was a small boy, my living grandfather would come to collect me, and we would "go downtown" wearing our best coats and ties if not suits, have our shoes shined at the barber shop, and attend to our affairs while wearing very smart snap brim hats. (I was about 5 or 6 when this started.)

And I think we always had pocket handkerchiefs.

[Deil the Yin]

Yeeeah... I can remember as a youngin' my dad using a cotton handkerchief and thinking how disgusting it was! Now I've grown up to think of nothing but kleenex or other tissue for such purposes. I guess I'm a wee bit too anal-retentive and practical to wear a real hanky for show, though they do look smart, I must say.

And an excellent thread all the same.

That is why I carry 3 with my two in the sporran one in the pocket.

Too right.

We have to keep the saying in mind about silks "one for showin and one for blowin".

Har, har! That's a guid ern!

I agree. That's what the tie is for.

Ah, the good ol' days, eh wot?

[Standard]

Very interesting thread, keep the advice flowing.

[kiltedinUSMC]

Robert, This was a great thread. I'm am always complaining to people at work about how todays man does not dress the part of a polished gentleman of years before. I was raised with the notion of sweatpants are for the gym not for going around town. The Marine Corps only help me dress sharpper for everyday wear in or out of uniform. I love to wear suits and kilts and this thread has help me look the part of a well dressed man in today society. Its all in the details and I cant wait to apply the pocket hanky the next time I wear a suit.