Why did you sell your nearly new aero leather jacket(s)?

[KBlake]

No I’m not suggesting Italians can’t be stylish. I said that well dressed Italians have always pulled most strongly from a British influence (since the 1700s) in response to the suggestion that there’s no British style. Even Sicilian village wear came from this British influence.

What I did say is that the average Italian is pretty badly dressed, as is the average Frenchman, Englishman, or American. Because the other guy’s suggestion was “Italians know best therefore lamb skin is best”—when the reality is everyone except TFL types primarily has lamb skin. (I’m not even anti lamb skin!)

The “Made in Italy” (itself a marketing term) stuff is largely fraudulent anyway. It’s usually either made outside and gets an Italy label stitched on in final packaging there or it’s made in giant workshops of Chinese laborers, while the brands peddle an image of their local craft and so on.

“All major fashion designers are Italian” is has never been the case. Even as couture goes it’s been mainly a French endeavor. Yes, Italians got more involved since the 60s but not more so than the Americans or the English or in more recent years the Japanese.

The comparison of fabric to steel is doesn’t land. Fabric isn’t a raw material; it essentially tells you what the garment is and how it’ll drape. Half the art of tailoring is the selection of fabric, iron work, etc. And I gave you other examples as well of how Italian menswear directly grew out of British menswear.

I’m not going to continue arguing this, because I don’t care, but your arguments leave a lot to be desired, most of all consistency.

 

[Aloysius]

Wow, this is an awful lot of historical ambiguity. What era are you discussing and how far back to you care to trace the origins of fashion? I lived for a number of years in Italy and my impression was always that Italian fashion is distinctly different from British fashion.

I'll take this step by step. I was going to come back to it later with more sources on hand but realized that would just end up being a case of forgetting to respond after the initial delay.

So first off, basically all menswear, everywhere is downstream from early 19th century English clothing. Indeed the best fashion plates (these were reference images used by tailors) of what Englishmen were wearing were produced in France and Italy. This is because they were adopting these styles and therefore learning them.

Now of course these adaptations took different directions while staying within the general language of menswear. In some cases the changes were a matter of climate, even, or lifestyle.

The claim that "Sicilian village wear came from this British influence..." is incredible to me. I'm not even sure what it means. There is significant Italian folk fashion traditions in most areas of Italy and they have absolutely nothing to do with the UK. I'm so surprised anyone would make such a claim that I have to suspect I don't understand what exactly is being said.

I think you took it as a bit wider than I meant it. I was thinking of the example of the Sicilian coppola, which is an English-style country flat cap. I used this as an example because it's a relatively remote area compared to something like the more direct early 20th century adoption and codification of English style by Italian tailors.

And yes there are absolutely Italian folk clothing traditions of their own. I often wear bright Casentino cloth, a traditional weatherproof wool from Tuscany that's arguably an analogue to tweed–done up in Naples as an Ulster coat. The Neapolitan version of an Ulster coat maintains its range of coverage, but leans in deeply to the drape cut that came to Italy via Caraceni.

As for "the average Italian is pretty badly dressed..." that's totally subjective.

The average person everywhere is badly dressed today. I bought that up because the whole initial claim was "Italians know best". This doesn't really land, nor is the specific claim that was made actually true about Italy (that there is some special Italian preference for lambskin).

I don't know much about high fashion but certainly a LOT of the major fashion brands are Italian. A disproportionate number and enough to lend validity to it as a counter-argument to your position, which seems to be something like "Italians don't know anything about fashion and stole all their ideas from the Brits." Sorry if that's not your position but that's what it sounds like.

You have always struck me as far more reasonable than this, so I'm hoping to get some clarity from you because these remarks just don't hold water imo.

I didn't say "Italians don't know anything about fashion and stole all their ideas from the Brits." I'm making the point, which I'm surprised is not universally known on this forum, that menswear as we know it comes from Britain.

I did push back against the claim that all, or even most, designers are Italian. There are certainly a number of Italian fashion brands, of varying levels of quality.

And the whole reason I brought up the fact that Italians don't inherently know better was because of someone claiming that they do.

I don't know how this landed on some Great War to defend Italy from me; in another thread, Marc and I were just talking about the high quality work done by the factory Caruso in Italy.

As should have been pretty clear from my examples in this thread alone there's quite a lot of Italian menswear that I admire (and own) myself. But the idea that there is some magic Italian quality to knowing best, as MadCat suggests, is simply misinformed.

Italian suppliers are infamous for unreliability in the fashion industry–this has caused a funny situation where often the Asian factories turn in better work and on time compared to the Italian equivalents but customers especially in China won't buy the Asian made stuff. In some cases they sent people from the Italian factories to go train at the Asian counterparts. And of course ironically the Italian factories themselves are staffed just about entirely by Asian immigrants (again, nothing wrong with that, but the Italians use "Made in Italy" as a form of branding to indicate mystical family ateliers, not unlike the watch industry uses "Swiss Made" for something that is simply cased in Switzerland.)

 

[MadCat]

No I’m not suggesting Italians can’t be stylish. I said that well dressed Italians have always pulled most strongly from a British influence (since the 1700s) in response to the suggestion that there’s no British style. Even Sicilian village wear came from this British influence.

What I did say is that the average Italian is pretty badly dressed, as is the average Frenchman, Englishman, or American. Because the other guy’s suggestion was “Italians know best therefore lamb skin is best”—when the reality is everyone except TFL types primarily has lamb skin. (I’m not even anti lamb skin!)

The “Made in Italy” (itself a marketing term) stuff is largely fraudulent anyway. It’s usually either made outside and gets an Italy label stitched on in final packaging there or it’s made in giant workshops of Chinese laborers, while the brands peddle an image of their local craft and so on.

“All major fashion designers are Italian” is has never been the case. Even as couture goes it’s been mainly a French endeavor. Yes, Italians got more involved since the 60s but not more so than the Americans or the English or in more recent years the Japanese.

The comparison of fabric to steel is doesn’t land. Fabric isn’t a raw material; it essentially tells you what the garment is and how it’ll drape. Half the art of tailoring is the selection of fabric, iron work, etc. And I gave you other examples as well of how Italian menswear directly grew out of British menswear.

No I’m not suggesting Italians can’t be stylish. I said that well dressed Italians have always pulled most strongly from a British influence (since the 1700s) in response to the suggestion that there’s no British style. Even Sicilian village wear came from this British influence.

What I did say is that the average Italian is pretty badly dressed, as is the average Frenchman, Englishman, or American. Because the other guy’s suggestion was “Italians know best therefore lamb skin is best”—when the reality is everyone except TFL types primarily has lamb skin. (I’m not even anti lamb skin!)

The “Made in Italy” (itself a marketing term) stuff is largely fraudulent anyway. It’s usually either made outside and gets an Italy label stitched on in final packaging there or it’s made in giant workshops of Chinese laborers, while the brands peddle an image of their local craft and so on.

“All major fashion designers are Italian” is has never been the case. Even as couture goes it’s been mainly a French endeavor. Yes, Italians got more involved since the 60s but not more so than the Americans or the English or in more recent years the Japanese.

The comparison of fabric to steel is doesn’t land. Fabric isn’t a raw material; it essentially tells you what the garment is and how it’ll drape. Half the art of tailoring is the selection of fabric, iron work, etc. And I gave you other examples as well of how Italian menswear directly grew out of British menswear.

I'll take this step by step. I was going to come back to it later with more sources on hand but realized that would just end up being a case of forgetting to respond after the initial delay.

So first off, basically all menswear, everywhere is downstream from early 19th century English clothing. Indeed the best fashion plates (these were reference images used by tailors) of what Englishmen were wearing were produced in France and Italy. This is because they were adopting these styles and therefore learning them.

Now of course these adaptations took different directions while staying within the general language of menswear. In some cases the changes were a matter of climate, even, or lifestyle.



I think you took it as a bit wider than I meant it. I was thinking of the example of the Sicilian coppola, which is an English-style country flat cap. I used this as an example because it's a relatively remote area compared to something like the more direct early 20th century adoption and codification of English style by Italian tailors.

And yes there are absolutely Italian folk clothing traditions of their own. I often wear bright Casentino cloth, a traditional weatherproof wool from Tuscany that's arguably an analogue to tweed–done up in Naples as an Ulster coat. The Neapolitan version of an Ulster coat maintains its range of coverage, but leans in deeply to the drape cut that came to Italy via Caraceni.



The average person everywhere is badly dressed today. I bought that up because the whole initial claim was "Italians know best". This doesn't really land, nor is the specific claim that was made actually true about Italy (that there is some special Italian preference for lambskin).



I didn't say "Italians don't know anything about fashion and stole all their ideas from the Brits." I'm making the point, which I'm surprised is not universally known on this forum, that menswear as we know it comes from Britain.

I did push back against the claim that all, or even most, designers are Italian. There are certainly a number of Italian fashion brands, of varying levels of quality.

And the whole reason I brought up the fact that Italians don't inherently know better was because of someone claiming that they do.

I don't know how this landed on some Great War to defend Italy from me; in another thread, Marc and I were just talking about the high quality work done by the factory Caruso in Italy.

As should have been pretty clear from my examples in this thread alone there's quite a lot of Italian menswear that I admire (and own) myself. But the idea that there is some magic Italian quality to knowing best, as MadCat suggests, is simply misinformed.

Italian suppliers are infamous for unreliability in the fashion industry–this has caused a funny situation where often the Asian factories turn in better work and on time compared to the Italian equivalents but customers especially in China won't buy the Asian made stuff. In some cases they sent people from the Italian factories to go train at the Asian counterparts. And of course ironically the Italian factories themselves are staffed just about entirely by Asian immigrants (again, nothing wrong with that, but the Italians use "Made in Italy" as a form of branding to indicate mystical family ateliers, not unlike the watch industry uses "Swiss Made" for something that is simply cased in Switzerland.)

All I said was Italians are on top when it comes to fashion. Are they not?

Also when choosing a garment, I will almost always choose the one that says “made in Italy”. They make quality products, sometimes the best even.

PS - I am European, but not Italian.

 

[Aloysius]

All I said was Italians are on top when it comes to fashion. Are they not?

They are not. They have a presence but even as womenswear goes the French and even the Japanese have a far stronger showing.

Also when choosing a garment, I will almost always choose the one that says “made in Italy”. They make quality products, sometimes the best even.

"Made in Italy" is usually a red flag unless you know more about the garment/factory (like Caruso, Sant'Andrea, and several others that are excellent). The vast majority of "made in Italy" things are simply imports that get a "Made in Italy" tag sewed on them, which counts as a production step and therefore qualifies it as Italian.

They actually very cleverly worked this scam into the legal system. There is a regulation that requires Italian production in order to label, but it's a trick. It isn't for the "Made in Italy" label, which explicitly by law can be granted just for a final step (which, yes, can be simply adding a label!)

It is only a product that is labeled «100% made in Italy», «100% Italia», «tutto italiano» (to use the three phrasings from the law) that actually needs to be made in Italy.

PS - I am European, but not Italian.

That was clear. I don't know any Italians in the menswear space who would disagree with anything I said in the above posts. It is Americans and non-Italian Europeans who get defensive about it.

 

[The Lost Cowboy]

I'll take this step by step. I was going to come back to it later with more sources on hand but realized that would just end up being a case of forgetting to respond after the initial delay.

So first off, basically all menswear, everywhere is downstream from early 19th century English clothing. Indeed the best fashion plates (these were reference images used by tailors) of what Englishmen were wearing were produced in France and Italy. This is because they were adopting these styles and therefore learning them.

Now of course these adaptations took different directions while staying within the general language of menswear. In some cases the changes were a matter of climate, even, or lifestyle.



I think you took it as a bit wider than I meant it. I was thinking of the example of the Sicilian coppola, which is an English-style country flat cap. I used this as an example because it's a relatively remote area compared to something like the more direct early 20th century adoption and codification of English style by Italian tailors.

And yes there are absolutely Italian folk clothing traditions of their own. I often wear bright Casentino cloth, a traditional weatherproof wool from Tuscany that's arguably an analogue to tweed–done up in Naples as an Ulster coat. The Neapolitan version of an Ulster coat maintains its range of coverage, but leans in deeply to the drape cut that came to Italy via Caraceni.



The average person everywhere is badly dressed today. I bought that up because the whole initial claim was "Italians know best". This doesn't really land, nor is the specific claim that was made actually true about Italy (that there is some special Italian preference for lambskin).



I didn't say "Italians don't know anything about fashion and stole all their ideas from the Brits." I'm making the point, which I'm surprised is not universally known on this forum, that menswear as we know it comes from Britain.

I did push back against the claim that all, or even most, designers are Italian. There are certainly a number of Italian fashion brands, of varying levels of quality.

And the whole reason I brought up the fact that Italians don't inherently know better was because of someone claiming that they do.

I don't know how this landed on some Great War to defend Italy from me; in another thread, Marc and I were just talking about the high quality work done by the factory Caruso in Italy.

As should have been pretty clear from my examples in this thread alone there's quite a lot of Italian menswear that I admire (and own) myself. But the idea that there is some magic Italian quality to knowing best, as MadCat suggests, is simply misinformed.

Italian suppliers are infamous for unreliability in the fashion industry–this has caused a funny situation where often the Asian factories turn in better work and on time compared to the Italian equivalents but customers especially in China won't buy the Asian made stuff. In some cases they sent people from the Italian factories to go train at the Asian counterparts. And of course ironically the Italian factories themselves are staffed just about entirely by Asian immigrants (again, nothing wrong with that, but the Italians use "Made in Italy" as a form of branding to indicate mystical family ateliers, not unlike the watch industry uses "Swiss Made" for something that is simply cased in Switzerland.)

Thanks, these points make sense (thought I do wonder if 19th Century British fashion is not itself the result of some other place and time, such as maybe mid-18th Century Viennese fashion, but I have zero data to support such a hypothesis and will need to research).

All of your other clarifications make sense and are aligned with the kind of remarks I have come to expect from you, so thanks for taking the time.

 

[Bawheid]

Right then back to Aero jackets and "why did you sellum"

My first Aero Highwayman I bought used in Eastern Australia, unaware thatn it had been "custom tweaked" for an individual.

Hence it did not fit me particularly well. I sold it fairly quickly to a fellow who sent his son to my place to try it on (father and son same size thankfully) so I got all my money back and moved on. I was well made heavy steerhide, may have been Connolly leather

Then I bought a Blue Label Aero apprentice jacket, almost new from the first owner for half new retail price, out of Europe , no custom tweaking, and it fits "big" as the Highwayman is known to do.

It's now my go to winter casual jacket. Dresses up well for any circumstance, but not for riding my motorcycle.

 

[Tom71]

I'll take this step by step. I was going to come back to it later with more sources on hand but realized that would just end up being a case of forgetting to respond after the initial delay.

So first off, basically all menswear, everywhere is downstream from early 19th century English clothing. Indeed the best fashion plates (these were reference images used by tailors) of what Englishmen were wearing were produced in France and Italy. This is because they were adopting these styles and therefore learning them.

Now of course these adaptations took different directions while staying within the general language of menswear. In some cases the changes were a matter of climate, even, or lifestyle.



I think you took it as a bit wider than I meant it. I was thinking of the example of the Sicilian coppola, which is an English-style country flat cap. I used this as an example because it's a relatively remote area compared to something like the more direct early 20th century adoption and codification of English style by Italian tailors.

And yes there are absolutely Italian folk clothing traditions of their own. I often wear bright Casentino cloth, a traditional weatherproof wool from Tuscany that's arguably an analogue to tweed–done up in Naples as an Ulster coat. The Neapolitan version of an Ulster coat maintains its range of coverage, but leans in deeply to the drape cut that came to Italy via Caraceni.



The average person everywhere is badly dressed today. I bought that up because the whole initial claim was "Italians know best". This doesn't really land, nor is the specific claim that was made actually true about Italy (that there is some special Italian preference for lambskin).



I didn't say "Italians don't know anything about fashion and stole all their ideas from the Brits." I'm making the point, which I'm surprised is not universally known on this forum, that menswear as we know it comes from Britain.

I did push back against the claim that all, or even most, designers are Italian. There are certainly a number of Italian fashion brands, of varying levels of quality.

And the whole reason I brought up the fact that Italians don't inherently know better was because of someone claiming that they do.

I don't know how this landed on some Great War to defend Italy from me; in another thread, Marc and I were just talking about the high quality work done by the factory Caruso in Italy.

As should have been pretty clear from my examples in this thread alone there's quite a lot of Italian menswear that I admire (and own) myself. But the idea that there is some magic Italian quality to knowing best, as MadCat suggests, is simply misinformed.

Italian suppliers are infamous for unreliability in the fashion industry–this has caused a funny situation where often the Asian factories turn in better work and on time compared to the Italian equivalents but customers especially in China won't buy the Asian made stuff. In some cases they sent people from the Italian factories to go train at the Asian counterparts. And of course ironically the Italian factories themselves are staffed just about entirely by Asian immigrants (again, nothing wrong with that, but the Italians use "Made in Italy" as a form of branding to indicate mystical family ateliers, not unlike the watch industry uses "Swiss Made" for something that is simply cased in Switzerland.)

If you don’t want a “war” over certain absurd discussions, don’t always start one.

For you, everything you don’t personally like seems to be a “scam”, a “fraud” and “has clearly been proven” to be this and that. You may want to go back to your positions on Japanese makers, wearers of them, Legendary USA or Himel. Now the Italians.

To take a contrary point in a debate is a discussion. To do so by lecturing or mocking the other side is bad style. To do so by “made-up-fact” dumps is just tiring.

You know an awful lot about clothing, style and how it affected certain periods in time. I have learnt a lot from that and continue to enjoy that.
As for your extreme language (“soiling their pants at the thought of…”), I always wonder what comes over you.

As to your current rambling about Italian design being a copy from British menswear. Ah well, everything has an origin somewhere (you have yours in Adam&Eve, and I don’t require you to run around naked).
Yet, it’s pretty strong to deny the obvious core differences in modern-day tailoring and/or design. Let alone to do so “plainly”.

 

[Bawheid]

Jeez enough already....

 

[MadCat]

They are not. They have a presence but even as womenswear goes the French and even the Japanese have a far stronger showing.

"Made in Italy" is usually a red flag unless you know more about the garment/factory (like Caruso, Sant'Andrea, and several others that are excellent). The vast majority of "made in Italy" things are simply imports that get a "Made in Italy" tag sewed on them, which counts as a production step and therefore qualifies it as Italian.

They actually very cleverly worked this scam into the legal system. There is a regulation that requires Italian production in order to label, but it's a trick. It isn't for the "Made in Italy" label, which explicitly by law can be granted just for a final step (which, yes, can be simply adding a label!)

It is only a product that is labeled «100% made in Italy», «100% Italia», «tutto italiano» (to use the three phrasings from the law) that actually needs to be made in Italy.

That was clear. I don't know any Italians in the menswear space who would disagree with anything I said in the above posts. It is Americans and non-Italian Europeans who get defensive about it.

Ask your wife what designers she prefers - gonna be Italian.

 

[Aloysius]

If you don’t want a “war” over certain absurd discussions, don’t always start one.

For you, everything you don’t personally like seems to be a “scam”, a “fraud” and “has clearly been proven” to be this and that. You may want to go back to your positions on Japanese makers, wearers of them, Legendary USA or Himel. Now the Italians.

To take a contrary point in a debate is a discussion. To do so by lecturing or mocking the other side is bad style. To do so by “made-up-fact” dumps is just tiring.

I didn't start the argument that "the Italians" know best. I pushed back against that claim because yes, it is a silly claim. Lambskin fashion jackets are the most popular leather jackets everywhere. It's not an Italian thing, per se by any means.

"Now the Italians"? I am talking about a specific (and extremely common) fraudulent business practice that has been discussed in the fashion industry for well over a decade at this point. It's not something I "made up"; indeed it is that very notoriety that led to the Italian law on the subject so they could say that they're doing something, however as I said the law itself is very cleverly worded, only requiring something to be made in Italy if it will be labeled one of those three thing I quoted directly from the legislation.

For the standard "Made in Italy" label, a final step simply needs to happen in Italy, which is often the stitching of a label that says "Made in Italy".

As for Japanese jackets and their wearers, I dislike many Japanese jackets, like others and wear them.

The scam with Legendary USA is not something I made up; in fact, as you would see if you looked at the long thread on the topic, I was one of the people taken in by the scam where they were advertising one jacket but actually selling a different one. I may even have been the one who started the thread. TFLers refunded our orders upon finding out, and one of us managed to discover that Legendary USA (which was for years a very respected leather jacket seller) had been bought out by an embezzler.

I am not even mentioning the British influence on Italian menswear as a negative for either country. I even gave examples of where I have myself bought these things. I brought it up, again, because of the initial Italians know best thing. I am not actually elevating any country as having magically better style, just pushing back against a claim to that end.

I brought plenty of examples for the things that I did say, and the idea that I made them up is just strange.

Ask your wife what designers she prefers - gonna be Italian.

I don't know why you keep going back to this idea that the most well known designers are always Italian. If you ask a normie on the street you are likely to hear Dior, SLP, Hermès mentioned more than the Italian houses like Gucci.

Again, I'm not the one making the claim that all designers are Italian!

 

[Aloysius]

As for the Himel stuff (because I forgot to mention that in the previous message), I really don't care what jackets people are spending their money on (though if I think a jacket is bad I will say it.)

You're right, though, I probably involved myself far too much in those threads, but an aspect of it (not the stitching, but something else) hit a personal pet peeve extremely strongly.

What bothered me there was the use of the word "bespoke", given that tailoring has been an interest of mine since I was 15 years old (actually one of my big regrets is that I didn't go into the field myself, and I am rather too old to apprentice at this stage) and the craft of tailoring has been hugely damaged by places selling RTW and MTM while calling it "bespoke", which means at the very least that a personal pattern is drafted for the customer. I don't actually see this as particularly necessary for a leather jacket at all, but yes it very much bothered me that the term is thrown around like that.

So perhaps that is a personal bias of mine driven by my own passions in other areas, but I think it truly damages the whole world of craft that all of us enjoy in different aspects, when the terms are misused and devalued.

I want there to be a thriving world of people making workwear, tailoring, shoes, boots-- all of these incredible, dying crafts that have come down to us over generations. And contrary to the impression some have, I don't only mean British or American stuff. There is saccheto construction of shoes in Italy, an incredible Central European tradition of tailoring especially morning wear in Germany, Austria, and Poland and similar crafts around the world.

This summer for instance I spent a lot of time with a third generation tailor in Asia. None of his kids have taken over the trade and I don't believe he has apprentices. Meanwhile this man cuts and fits so well that his work (which really cost nothing by western standards) got praise from some of the best tailors in the world, when they saw me wearing it.

I don't actually think that there's anything inherently wrong with the Himel business model where he is basically the designer with machinists working for him; it's actually the way Rubinacci in Naples has always operated, albeit in a different trade. It was the word 'bespoke' that put me in a fairly aggressive tone which I apologize for.

 

[Monitor]

I don't understand where you guys are reading any animosity from @Aloysius posts???

Clothes with "Made in Italy" sewn into them are indeed, for the most part, a genuine fraud. It's a well known type of scam, just like "genuine leather".

Italian people do not dress better than the rest of the Europe which dresses abysmally badly. Italians that do dress well, dress as well as the British, French or Germans who dress well. Claiming otherwise is insulting stereotyping.
Do Japanese work more than everyone else, too? Are French the best lovers?

Italy is not a fashion standard. Good Italian tailors undoubtedly make God-tier clothes, just as do their British, French or German counterparts. I mean, freaking Savile Row.

The best, at this level, is so deeply personal and subjective, which is why the "Italians make best clothes" argument is ridiculously asinine and uneducated.

 

[MadCat]

I didn't start the argument that "the Italians" know best. I pushed back against that claim because yes, it is a silly claim. Lambskin fashion jackets are the most popular leather jackets everywhere. It's not an Italian thing, per se by any means.

"Now the Italians"? I am talking about a specific (and extremely common) fraudulent business practice that has been discussed in the fashion industry for well over a decade at this point. It's not something I "made up"; indeed it is that very notoriety that led to the Italian law on the subject so they could say that they're doing something, however as I said the law itself is very cleverly worded, only requiring something to be made in Italy if it will be labeled one of those three thing I quoted directly from the legislation.

For the standard "Made in Italy" label, a final step simply needs to happen in Italy, which is often the stitching of a label that says "Made in Italy".

As for Japanese jackets and their wearers, I dislike many Japanese jackets, like others and wear them.

The scam with Legendary USA is not something I made up; in fact, as you would see if you looked at the long thread on the topic, I was one of the people taken in by the scam where they were advertising one jacket but actually selling a different one. I may even have been the one who started the thread. TFLers refunded our orders upon finding out, and one of us managed to discover that Legendary USA (which was for years a very respected leather jacket seller) had been bought out by an embezzler.

I am not even mentioning the British influence on Italian menswear as a negative for either country. I even gave examples of where I have myself bought these things. I brought it up, again, because of the initial Italians know best thing. I am not actually elevating any country as having magically better style, just pushing back against a claim to that end.

I brought plenty of examples for the things that I did say, and the idea that I made them up is just strange.



I don't know why you keep going back to this idea that the most well known designers are always Italian. If you ask a normie on the street you are likely to hear Dior, SLP, Hermès mentioned more than the Italian houses like Gucci.

Again, I'm not the one making the claim that all designers are Italian!

I don't understand where you guys are reading any animosity from @Aloysius posts???

Clothes with "Made in Italy" sewn into them are indeed, for the most part, a genuine fraud. It's a well known type of scam, just like "genuine leather".

Italian people do not dress better than the rest of the Europe which dresses abysmally badly. Italians that do dress well, dress as well as the British, French or Germans who dress well. Claiming otherwise is insulting stereotyping.
Do Japanese work more than everyone else, too? Are French the best lovers?

Italy is not a fashion standard. Good Italian tailors undoubtedly make God-tier clothes, just as do their British, French or German counterparts. I mean, freaking Savile Row.

The best, at this level, is so deeply personal and subjective, which is why the "Italians make best clothes" argument is ridiculously asinine and uneducated.

I said “top”. Like a top 5 sorta thing. When it comes to fashion, Italy is on top. And sometimes the best.

What are they, on the bottom?! I didn’t even talk about Italian people. I am talking about Italian designers and brands like Brioni, Versace, Fendi, Armani, Canali, Kiton, Isaia etc.

 

[MadCat]

I don't understand where you guys are reading any animosity from @Aloysius posts???

Clothes with "Made in Italy" sewn into them are indeed, for the most part, a genuine fraud. It's a well known type of scam, just like "genuine leather".

Italian people do not dress better than the rest of the Europe which dresses abysmally badly. Italians that do dress well, dress as well as the British, French or Germans who dress well. Claiming otherwise is insulting stereotyping.
Do Japanese work more than everyone else, too? Are French the best lovers?

Italy is not a fashion standard. Good Italian tailors undoubtedly make God-tier clothes, just as do their British, French or German counterparts. I mean, freaking Savile Row.

The best, at this level, is so deeply personal and subjective, which is why the "Italians make best clothes" argument is ridiculously asinine and uneducated.

Oh look, i’m lookin at Riri zippers for my next jacket! Made in Italy

 

[Monitor]

What are they, on the bottom?! I didn’t even talk about Italian people. I am talking about Italian designers and brands like Brioni, Versace, Fendi, Armani, Canali, Kiton, Isaia etc.

Who said they're at the bottom? I said it's personal and subjective and consequently yes, if I do not want to wear an Italian style suit or anything by Armani, these options are always going to be at the bottom of the list for me.

Also, Tom Ford? Alexander McQueen? Ralph Lauren? Yves Saint Laurent? Ann Demeulemeester? Yohji Yamamoto?

...why exactly are we listing fashion designers, again?

 

[RDS]

Fellas,
Enough ! Do you want to take this ‘debate’ about the various origins of fashion off to your own private thread ?
It’s completely off topic, very tiresome and has descended into nothing more than ‘willy waving’


Bartender Edit: Indeed. Everyone's had their say on this and the only place it can go from here is round inn ever decreasing circles. Let's draw a line under it here. Those of you who wish to carry it further are welcome to do so via other channels. (DMs are good for that too...)


It’s also very distracting as I’m trying to achieve the higher plane of consciousness or Zen-like state required for me to gain the ‘maturity and understanding’ to realise that the CXL my favourite jackets is made from is not ‘great garment grade leather’

 

[Monitor]

No, I’m good. I was just saying some of the top Italian designers. They choose lambkin for their leather jackets for a reason.

Also, I just want to apologize to you as I didn't mean to say "asinine" in the context I did or rather, I always think this word means something entirely else, which it doesn't but in any case, I didn't mean to say that what you think is stupid.

That you lack deeper understanding on the matter, you do, but your opinion is not stupid.

 

[Cyber Lip]

I've sold 2 that were basically like-new when I sold them, a cafe racer and a premiere highwayman, and the reason was both were super uncomfortable in the neck area, due to two reasons....each has a strange pattern in that (neck) area combined with unforgiving cxl which exacerbated the issue. They both literally hurt to wear lol. Both of them wouldn't feel too bad when I 1st put them on and left the house, but after about a half hour or so I just couldn't wait to get the f'ing things off me

 

[NamoAmituofo]

Thank you for everyone's replies on my naive question. True most new/near new aero jackets on secondary market are made from CXL HH or SH, but I do see the occassional ones in Baladassi, Vincenza or Pinnacle, or even goatskin.

There is of course not a single cause but I gather: 1) pattern doesn't fit body, 2) CXL too stiff would be the most common reasons.

When I first took delivery of my KoTR in natural CXL HH - I actually felt a bit self conscious wearing it to some occassions, and have said to myself it would be a 'sunny Sunday' jacket or a twice a year holiday jacket. As the jacket began to break in my level of comfort, and confident in it grew - soon it also became a 'rainy Saturday' jacket, and a 'mid week evening Tesco grocery shopping jacket'. I still don't have the courage to wear it for school run but it may happen one day! I absolutely love CXL and so happy I followed aero's advice for choosing a rigid hide for this crosszip style, and the changes in colour is noticeable each month.

Each to their own - and this is just me!

I reckon we should close this thread here. I did not mean to shine any unfavourable light on aero.

Many moons ago as a young man I bought my first proper leather jacket and it was an almost new zipped sleeves HWM in black HH - it was very heavy and I loved it, and the girls I went out with all complimented about it. I then wanted to relocate to warm south east Asia, and sold that jacket. Since that day each time I opened my wardrobe I missed that jacket. My relocation effort didn't work and I stayed in the UK. I became a vegetarian and also a Buddhist, so had many years of no-leather-jacket. I tried all kinds of fleeces, soft shells, hard shells, down, etc - they all make me sweat in the wet and cold UK weather which lasts surprisingly long in spring, autumn, winter. And when I sweat bucket loads , the cold wind blows and I catch a cold easily. One day I got fed up and bought another aero HWM in CXL SH - the moment I received it (it was second hand) I realised two things: 1) it felt surprisingly light VS the HH HWM I sold many years ago (and that's why I got rid of it!), and 2) I realised HWM comes in storm cuff as standard, not the zipped sleeves I was used to. That triggered me to order my KoTR. It's heavy, it's stiff, it's thick, it's warm, it's totally wind proof, it's damn cool, and it brings me back memories from my younger days. And no sweat, no catching cold

Now, I have seen the odd 'new or nearly new Lost Worlds jackets' on sale in Classified too! And for the life of me I can't understand, why the original owner (who paid new jacket prices or custom ordered them) would ever sell them?! So I may start another thread on this equally interesting topic in the future.

 

[TartuWolf]

@NamoAmituofo Thank you for sharing that wonderful story!