Stuff I've found lately.

Thrifting is funny sometimes, and if you are a complete cloths whore, such as myself, it can be downright amazing. I'm a firm believer in the idea, that, everything you've ever wanted can be had at a thrift store. The key is going often, and having a bit of luck with being in the right place at the right time. I'm not talking vintage sports cars or gold bullion, I'm talking about clothes, furniture, and random stuff for your house. The general things that most thrift stores carry. And so it was that I happened upon this jacket today. I honestly believe I willed this jacket to myself today.

I was ebay stalking this exact jacket all winter and even checked them out at Macy's and the like. However, being the thrifty gentleman that I am, I was not willing to shell out upwards of $400 of my hard earned dollars at retail. I bought something similar from Topman last year at a deep discount, one in green and one in black, but they were just not the kind of quality I was looking for. Don't get me wrong, they did the job quite well for almost a year. But as I got a better grasp of what good clothing is, I realized that I needed to step my quilted hunting jacket game up. Eventually I stumbled upon an awesome, vintage Mackintosh for Barney's, green quilted version. This also served me well until I came across what I was looking for.

The Barbour Liddesdale, pretty much the grail quilted jacket as far as thrifting goes. I found this in the woman's section at one of the dirtiest thrifts that I frequent, all for the princely sum of $6 and in my size too boot! Needless to say, I was elated and I ended up selling my previous coats on ebay.  I thought I was all set with this type of jacket until I found this.

I generally avoid Coach products, mostly because all that I had come across so far were a bunch of fake purses and a fuck ugly button down shirt. This however, was different. Even before I saw who the maker was, it practically jumped off the rack at me. I could tell that is was lux from the hand of the fabric and the leather trim. Whereas the Barbour feels rougher and would be good with a tewwd sportcoat, the Coach is very soft. Something you could toss on over a sharp suit.
       At this point, I really thought I didn't need another quilted jacket, but then, the thrift gods feel the need to throw you a bone. Which brings be back to the original intent of this post.

 The Ralph Lauren jacket is the best of both worlds, in my opinion. It has all the bells and whistles. It's soft, like the Coach, but it has the leather shoulder pad, in case you need to rest that over and under you just discharged at a group of pheasants. The neck latch, so your neck wont get cold when the weather turns inclement. The corduroy collar, the plaid lining, etc. Basically what I'm saying, is I finally think I'm good in the quilted hunting type jacket. That is, until I find a red one. Happy thrifting everybody!

Style Forum

Over the past year and a half or so, I've become acquainted with a great group of people over at Styleforum.net, who also share an affinity for combing the racks at thrift stores for hidden treasure. It really is very unique, as there are people from all over the world that get together and post and brag about their thrift store finds. The really neat thing however, is that we regularly pick up nice things not in our own sizes to trade with other forum members straight up for something in our size or for future consideration down the road when something inevitably pops up. It's very remarkable and something unique in the world of #menswear as far as I know. Ask Andy About Clothes has something similar but not quite the same as the little community we've built for ourselves over at style forum.
      Case in point. I picked up a beautiful Barretta hunting jacket a few weeks ago, made in Italy out of a cotton and gore-tex blend, it had all the bells and whistles you could want from a traditional hunting jacket. On top of that, it looked to be very recent and never worn. As I usually do, I bragged about to the guy's over at Styleforum. Within the hour, one of my longtime trading buddy's messaged me saying he was interested in the coat, but that he didn't have anything to trade at the moment. No problem I said, as he usually finds some great shit. I knew it would only be a matter of time before he found something cool in my size. Low and behold, a package arrived on my door step yesterday.

The first thing I saw peeking out of the box was a vintage Hardy Ames 3 piece brown mohair suit, which, sadly, fit a bit too wide in the shoulder for me. The next item was a lovely Loro Piana linen button down shirt. Loro Piana is a great cloth maker based out of Italy who also makes some wonderful clothes of it's own. I've come across numerous blazers and sport coats made out of their fabric by the likes of Hickey Freeman and Brooks Brothers, but their own branded stuff is much harder to come by. I've only ever found a shirt for my wife, so this was a nice surprise, and it fits like a glove too boot! Rendered in a subtle white with blue stripes with thick mother of pearl buttons, this will be one of my go to shirts for the upcoming spring and summer!

The real gem in this package however, is this incredible, 100% cashmere, hounds-tooth plaid sport coat.

 From Wikipedia:
Jordan Marsh & Company (or Jordan Marsh) was a department store in Boston, Massachusetts, which grew to be a major regional chain in the New England area of the United States. In 1996, the last of the Jordan Marsh stores were converted to Macy's. The store was formerly part of Allied Stores and then Federated Department Stores. Allied also operated a separate group of stores in Florida called Jordan Marsh Florida, which were disbanded in 1991.


What can I say, the guy knows what I like. I plan to replace the dated brass buttons with a set of tasteful horn that I'm going to salvage from this moth eaten Oxxford cashmere blazer. This is a lesson to always triple check your items before handing over your hard earned money to the thrift store employees. Such a beautiful jacket, such a waste.

So there you have it folks! I'm sure this isn't the last of my posts concerning my friends over at  the Style Forum, they are always coming up with the good stuff. Did I mention the Tom Ford era crocodile Gucci loafers or brand new in the box John Lobb monk straps? I didn't? Oh well, next time. Cheers!

Back in the saddle

                                                

All right ladies and gents, I know it's been a really long time since I rapped with you, but I'm posting to let you know, I'm still alive and thrifting! It's been about a year since my last post, and I've learned so much about clothing and quality and thrifting in general, that I thought it time to fire up the ol blog again. I would like to change the direction slightly, and post daily about my findings and show some up close pictures of fabrics and such. Ok, here we go.
   I went out to a few of my local spots yesterday, but since I didn't have much time before work, I was kind of in a rush. I passed on a wonderful Ralph Lauren Purple Label (RLPL) pink gingham shirt with what looked like a small spot of wax right below the collar. Such a shame, the cloth was really fantastic. What I did pick up however, is this beautiful Gitman Bros yellow gingham shirt with a button down collar and smoked mother of pearl buttons. Gitman Bros is up there with some of my favorite shirts, but remember, as with any clothing company, they went through a period (mostly the 90's) in which they turned out a lot of shit. So be forewarned. This is not one of those shirts, made in the USA with 100% cotton and an unlined collar, it doesn't get much better than this. Dig.

I believe Gitman shirts, new, retail around $200. So paying $3.99 for a mint specimen in my size was not even a question.
      I love paisley, just ask my wife. So when I spotted these two amazing scarfs, I immediately had to go in for a closer inspection. The patterns and detail are superb! The tag mentions that they are silk and wool numbers by Grant Thomas. Not a name one usually looks out for whilst thrifting, and made in China is usually a deal breaker for me, but these were too beautiful to pass up. Plus, all winter accessory's were half off at this particular store, so I snagged both for $3.

 And finally, I picked up this ipod dock for our kitchen. Usually when either of us it cooking and we want to listen to music, we would have to crank up the record player in the living room and even then, the sound was less than optimal. $5 and works like a charm.

So that's my first post back in the blog game, hopefully it wont be another year before you hear from me again. Cheers!

Boots....and Barkley......

 I was having a conversation with my wife the other day about how we both lacked proper winter footwear until recently, she, having had nothing but her rubber wellington's through the entire winter and I, nothing but Nike Dunk high tops. A sad state of affairs indeed. Well, that has all changed, thanks to the plentiful thrifting grounds that are the wonderful city of Chicago.
    I know I haven't posted in awhile, and I didn't even finish my last post, so please forgive me, I've been really busy working and watching Murder, She Wrote. However, what with the first substantle snow fall we've had so far this winter, I thought a post on winter boots, and boots in general would be timely. So, off we go!

First up: These made in Canada bad asses are the "Kaufman" by Sorel. These have been my go to winter boots so far. Whether it's to take the dog for a walk, or just running to the corner for some eggs and milk, these boots are super warm, comfortable and pretty damn cool looking. Sorel is known for making high quality boots that last a long time. I'd say I have to agree, I believe these to be from the 80's based on the inner tag. With a removable lining for easy cleaning, these boots can't be beat and all for the low price of $8.60! Which is kind of funny because just the other day, the new J. Crew catalog came in the mail and they had boots very similar to these in the $200 price range.

Picked these up for my wife for $4 I think, they are also Sorel's, the "Manitou". She says they keep her feet very warm, a huge improvement from rubber rain boots I'd say.

Next up: These are Eddie Bauer's, but made in Canada by Sorrel. I just picked these up the other day from the same thrift store that I got the first pair from, these were also $8.60. I believe these to be from the 90's and I/'m still deciding which I like better. (edit: I walked to work in these yesterday, about 6 1/2 miles, through the Chicago city street slop/mush, and my piggies were kept dry and toasty the entire way!)

These are my beloved Red Wings from the 70's. Ever time I wear them, I get a complement, I'm not sure if it's the color (which I've never seen another quite like) or what, but these shoes elicit comments and looks. I would recommend these to anyone who has never owned a pair, as they can go with anything short of a full on suit. These were also the most expensive of the bunch at $70 off ebay but, I still consider that to be a superb deal.

 These are the boots I probably wear the most. They are definitely the most versatile.  A pair of vintage mid 90's Timberland chuckka/boat shoes. I paid all of $4.00 for the beauties.  Not as waterproof as the others  mentioned so far, but super rugged for hitting the trail.....or the pavement, whichever the case may be. When I found these, they were pretty beat up, dirty, scuffed. I got them home cleaned and polished them and gave them a new pair of leather laces and poof!, they looked brand new. One mans trash truly is another mans treasure. And don't let a name like Timberland fool you. Yes they were known in the late 90's to early 00's to have produced some really shitty and or ugly clothing and boots, but they used to make really nice stuff and it seems as though they have been trying to get back to that as of late.

Winter Coats Part Duex: The Pea

For the second installment of our continuing series devoted to winter coats, we will turn our focus onto one of my personal favorites, the Pea Coat.

  No self-respecting gentleman who lives in a climate in which any sort of coat is required, be it a blustery Autumn day or a furious snow storm, should be without, at the very least, one pea coat and perhaps as many as two or three in his closet. I personally like to have a couple of different colors, at the moment I own two, a black and a blue but up until recently I also had a grey one. The first coat I would like to talk about is the one purchased from Urban Outfitters about 5 years ago. Back in those dark times, what I like to call B.C. (before Chicago) and before I started lurking around style forum, A affordable Wardrobe, and the many other menswear websites and learned what a quality garment looks like I actually believed that this was a coat of pretty high quality. It was cut short, how I liked it, and had the anchor buttons on it as well (something I always liked in a pea coat.

Winter Coats Part One: The Chesterfield

Of all the winter coat options available to the sartorially minded gentleman, the Chesterfield coat has to be one of the most elegant. Of course, one could don a tail coat or a morning jacket, but neither of these options are viable to the modern man living amongst savages who call "dressing up" putting on an ill fitting blazer from the gap. Of course, you would be hard pressed to find even that these days. From Wikipedia:
 The Chesterfield coat is a long, tailored overcoat. It arose along with the lounge suit as an alternative to the highly shaped coats it replaced, such as the frock overcoat with its heavy waist suppression using a waist seam. The Chesterfield has no horizontal seam or sidebodies, but can still be somewhat shaped using the side seams and darts. It can be single- or double-breasted, and has been popular in a wide variety of fabrics, typically heavier weight tweeds, or charcoal and navy, and even the camel hair classic. It has often been made with a velvet collar. These variations make it extremely versatile, so it can be worn with a city suit or even semi-formal dress, as well as casual sports jackets. It was a staple of smartly dressed men's wardrobes from the 1920s to 1960s, and is still very commonly worn.
   I can't remember where I first saw the Chesterfield, an old magazine or film perhaps, but I knew that I really liked the style and the way the velvet collar popped off the coat, so one of my first orders of business when moving to Chicago, was to acquire one for myself. This proved trickier than I first thought, you see, apparently Chesterfields were popular for women sometime in the mid 80's to early 90's, as I couldn't go into a thrift store without running into a couple of them. Alas, after a couple months of searching, I had come out empty handed. I was starting to think that maybe menswear company's had abandoned the style and that I would have to start hitting up actual antique shops in order to procure one. Then one day at one of my usual stops, I happen to stumble upon this bute:

A men's Chesterfield topcoat in a really beautiful grey wool herringbone weave, and in my size for a mere $15. It looked to be in near mint condition and judging from the tags, might be from the 80's or 90's as well, from Ashforde and Reede, made in England. The quality seems to be top notch and it will definitely keep me warm this winter as it is very heavy. I can't wait to bust it out.

I still have lots of coat styles to discuss, so stay tuned, I haven't even got to the suede double breasted top coat yet. Cheers, and happy thrifting, Ethan.

Duffle Shuffle.....

I can remember my first duffle coat well, made in West Germany, it was a tan beast that when wet, weighed about ten pounds. Don't get me wrong, I liked it, it kept me warm as hell and it was made like a tank. However, it had a couple of things wrong with it that I could never quite get over. The front left corner looked like it had been chewed by a dog at some point, it was about two sizes two big and it was missing the fucking hood. After I had it for a couple years and only wearing it a handful of times, I traded it for some cheap urban outfitter grey wool overcoat (which I later gave away). I thought that finding the perfect duffle coat was going to be a lifelong search fraught with many obstacles. I know what I want, I just don't want to spend upwards of three to four hundred of my hard earned dollars on one, although if I could it would probably look something like this:

 which come to think of it, looks a lot like my old West German made one. Or this

Never mind that the Burberry shot is of a woman's coat, you get the gist. Anyway, now that I'm in one of the thrift capitols of the world, my options of finding one have increased exponentially.  One of the thrifting mantras is that if you want something bad enough, and you are diligent and thorough in your thrifting ways, that eventually you will get what you are looking for. And so it was, I picked up this beauty from one of my spots in the dead of the summer (another thrift mantra is "always buy off season", because who the hell is looking for duffle coats in July?):

A vintage Eddie Bauer tan colored duffle coat with horn toggles, and it had the hood, for $6.99!  It just had one small problem problem, it was a woman's. No matter, it fit me like a glove and was in great shape, piss on the haters I say! And yet, it still was not the duffel that I sought, merely a stand-in, something to get me through until I found what I was truly looking for.
          It had been some weeks before I saw another duffle  in the wilds of the thrift stores, sure, I had seen glimpses, toggles sticking out from the racks of winter coats only to be put back when I saw they were either way too big or way too small, beat to shit old Gap and Ann Taylor wool/poly blends. That is,until I came across an International Scene, early 90's, black and orange monstrosity.  I grabbed this for three reasons, one, it fit me really well, two, it was in mint condition, and three, it was, after all, a duffle coat. Only one small problem, it was an early 90's black and orange International Scene duffle coat. I would post pictures but to save myself some dignity, lets just say that this thing does not photograph very well.
        I had now come to the realization that I would be forever doomed to wear an 80's vintage Woman's Eddie Bauer duffle coat, which in itself is not that bad of a thing, but being a person who is obsessed with clothing, this simply would not suffice. Enter my next duffle:

I saw this baby and nearly shat myself. Could it be, a knee length, black with plaid liner, hooded duffle coat? In my size? With the throat latch? It was, and for the very reasonable price of $12.06, from one of the most crowed and dirty thrift stores I frequent. Kind of looks like the Burberry one, no? Except it has no manufacture's tag, just a  good ol'  Made In The USA one and it was about $900 dollars cheaper. It just goes to show you that perseverance pays off. Happy Thrifting!