3-roll-2 with an awkward button stance?

[Captain Cosmic]

I loved reading through this thread. In true SF fashion, we have posters who have an irrational hatred for a minute detail in addition to those who love it.

Almost all of my sport coats are 3/2. Like others have said, I like the casual look of Ivy jackets: swelled edges, natural shoulders, 3/2 front, 3.5" lapels. I can take or leave patch pockets. Like all of my clothing decisions, I wear them because I think they look good. It's subjective but it's my cup of tea. They are simply the most visually appealing jacket style IMO.

Fun thread discussion. Of course, when talking about button stance, we should lay some ground rules, such as if the jackets are darted or sack? That changes the profile.

With everything, "Yesterday's avant-gard- experiment is today's chic and tomorrow's cliche." The "Ivy League" look started like all trends, as a youthful rebellion against established norms. Some college students took their 3 button jackets (suits or blazers [odd jacket] and slacks) being required dress, and ironed them to be like the more suddenly fashionable 2 buttons models. Unlike the raccoon jackets and the Charleston dance craze, the 3/2 roll lived on and over time went from the dorms and frat houses to the board rooms and Madison Avenue. As time went on, what constitutes authentic eclipses what gave birth to the trend in the first place. The trend itself becomes the point and soon gives way to rigamortis, as it becomes the norm. And as you can see from the tag below, a selling point. And then the cycle occurs again (1967). See this Ivy Style commentary on the what makes for "Authentic"

With that out of the way, I am tall and like being retro, so I don't mind 3 button and or 3/2 or 3/2r but I prefer (and mostly own) them in their vintage mid century style of sack and 2.5 to 3.25 lapels. No, I won't speak about "Jivy Ivy" and the 4/3 button suits (there was recently 1960s tweed specimen on ebay but it is mislabeled as a 3/2).

 

[Viatu]

My first 3 roll 2 jacket that is on the way. My tailor recommended the 3 roll 2 to me versus a 2 button for me.

 

[Nobilis Animus]

Almost every trend in history has started not as a rebellion against social norms, but as an innovation or status-signal from social groups which is then copied by other social groups. Even denim jeans, supposedly begun as a fad in the 1950s, were never a big deal except among the lower classes until they were made fashionable by an American socialite.

 

[dieworkwear]

Almost every trend in history has started not as a rebellion against social norms, but as an innovation or status-signal from social groups which is then copied by other social groups. Even denim jeans, supposedly begun as a fad in the 1950s, were never a big deal except among the lower classes until they were made fashionable by an American socialite.

So not a rebellion against social norms but social normies?

 

[Nobilis Animus]

So not a rebellion against social norms but social normies?

Sometimes. It could be a simple differentiation from what is already common, or an influential person who gets others to copy him/her and starts a trend within that social sphere. Other times it's a conscious reaction of personalities - like the affected Bohemian lifestyle in Europe and intellectual aesthetic movements, or even dandyism, if you like.

By the time most trends are recognizable to observant fashion-lovers, it is likely that that trend first has had time to manifest and take hold within a particular sociological group. Something like the 3-2 roll may well have begun as a differentiating style, but in way that was proclaiming insouciance as a result of status, not as a thumbed nose to the establishment.

There is always a signal - like with rubber wellington boots. What they actually said was: 'I spend time in the country,' long before they were seen as practical and cute.

 

[Parker]

I like true 3B jackets. Mods and Marcello style or even the just button the top button jil Sander style.

 

[Thin White Duke]

I like true 3B jackets. Mods and Marcello style or even the just button the top button jil Sander style.

Top button only was popular with skinheads in the early seventies. Probably just as a way to look a bit different from the norm, one lad did it then others followed and suddenly it became a thing.

In last year’s ‘Downton Abbey’ film I noticed Branson and Lord Hexham doing this too when wearing their country tweed three pieces which I hadn’t noticed with any regularity in the previous seasons.

 

[Mr Knightley]

Top button only was popular with skinheads in the early seventies. Probably just as a way to look a bit different from the norm, one lad did it then others followed and suddenly it became a thing.

In last year’s ‘Downton Abbey’ film I noticed Branson and Lord Hexham doing this too when wearing their country tweed three pieces which I hadn’t noticed with any regularity in the previous seasons.

Yes, definitely a skinhead look c.1969 / 70 @Thin White Duke . I recall the later Mods 'introducing' it in the late 1960s. I had a Saturday job in a very traditional menswear shop in 1968. My colleague was a Mod and, no doubt partly because he felt the senior staff would raise an eyebrow, one day he said he was going to button only the top button of his three-button jacket. At the time I thought this quite daring, but by 1969 at Ilford Palais everyone was doing it with their bespoke mohair or POW suit jackets.

You mention Downton Abbey. I believe buttoning only the top button was an Edwardian thing - Churchill perpetuated it and pretty good it looks to my eyes:

 

[aristoi bcn]

 

[Thin White Duke]

Yes, definitely a skinhead look c.1969 / 70 @Thin White Duke . I recall the later Mods 'introducing' it in the late 1960s. I had a Saturday job in a very traditional menswear shop in 1968. My colleague was a Mod and, no doubt partly because he felt the senior staff would raise an eyebrow, one day he said he was going to button only the top button of his three-button jacket. At the time I thought this quite daring, but by 1969 at Ilford Palais everyone was doing it with their bespoke mohair or POW suit jackets.

You mention Downton Abbey. I believe buttoning only the top button was an Edwardian thing - Churchill perpetuated it and pretty good it looks to my eyes:

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Great anecdote Mr. K - nice to have a contemporaneous source there so it’s not just conjecture on my part.

I think the Edwardian look may have its roots even earlier as I’ve seen pics of country tweed three piece suits from I’m guessing very early 20th C possibly even Victorian / Sherlock Holmesian with high buttoning three and four button suits having only the top button done to expose the waistcoat beneath.

 

[Thin White Duke]

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A lot of these look like two button paddock jackets which are cut with high buttoning stances to allow both buttons to be fastened and enough opening in the lower quarters to still be comfortable on horseback. I think a lot of ‘hunting pink’ jackets are cut in a similar way.

 

[polyfusion]

This has become a great thread . Fascinating images and anecdotes gentlemen

 

[An Acute Style]

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Someone tell these chaps to stop putting their hands in their pockets. They're ruining their clothes. They should sew the pockets shut. You don't want to have your pockets sagging.

 

[Thin White Duke]

Someone tell these chaps to stop putting their hands in their pockets. They're ruining their clothes. They should sew the pockets shut. You don't want to have your pockets sagging.

Couldn’t agree more. Looks awful and bad manners too!

 

[Nobilis Animus]

Great anecdote Mr. K - nice to have a contemporaneous source there so it’s not just conjecture on my part.

I think the Edwardian look may have its roots even earlier as I’ve seen pics of country tweed three piece suits from I’m guessing very early 20th C possibly even Victorian / Sherlock Holmesian with high buttoning three and four button suits having only the top button done to expose the waistcoat beneath.

It was quite fashionable at the time to show off the waistcoat. The way in which suits were buttoned also mimicked the effect of the tailcoats and cutaways of the time in a more casual way.

It's worth pointing out that the notion of suits having a particular, codified form and function - along with the wearers being mortified at the slightest wrinkle - is a very new phenomenon. They used to be worn with a lot more nonchalance (and not fake sprezz™).