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- Jan 18, 2007
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Bill, thanks for the thoughtful analysis. However, I don't see what's wrong with the sleeves. You see 'lifeless', but I just see sleeves that hang nicely. Rubinacci sleeves are typically quite full. Is it possible we are just disagreeing over a general matter of style?
Okay, I just emerged from being interviewed by a Korean television news crew (don't ask), and had one of the video crew snap a quick shot of what I am wearing today. It is not the single-button tweed coat that I mentioned earlier in the thread, but I think it is enough. Pardon the photographic quality and cropping, but I hope it is clear enough for what I am trying to say about the sleeves.
M's Rubinacci on the left, my DeBoise/Steed coat on the right.
Similarities: both are bespoke; both are draped coats; both have trumpeted sleeves; both have the sleeves worked into a smaller armhole.
Dissimilarities (attributable to posture, physiology, style, or fit, in unknown proportions): the front of the Rubinacci sleeve drops straighter from the shoulder in almost a vertical line to the cuff. The DeBoise curves with the hang of the arm both front and rear (sorry that the back of my arm is cut-off, but it also is fuller in the upper arm, like the Rubinacci, before going into that smaller armhole).
I'm turned a bit more to the camera than M., so if I were turned more away as he is, the curve of the DeBoise sleeve would be even more pronounced in comparison.
I think there is, in fact, a bit of a fit difference...and I feel, from M's photos, that the fit on his jacket could be improved in the sleeve. If, on the other hand, the straight down line of the sleeve is a stylistic artifact (e.g., a full sleeve not at the upper arm, but at the elbow), then it is a stylistic aspect of Rubinacci (at least in this specific coat) that I do not believe is most compelling attribute. That, indeed, would be a subjective matter. It seems to me M's arm is bent normally when looking at his elbow to wrist slope (it seems rather the same to my arm), but that is not reflected in the front sleeve line. I guess, now that I think about it, I do not like that straight sleeve line because I see it commonly in RTW.
I just have a hard time believing, however, that a tailor like Rubinacci would produce such a straight line on purpose, and that it is possible that the sleeve could be rotated a bit forward in future coats. I know M is maybe standing more upright that his natural posture, and this might explain the dimpling in the rear of the upper arm and below the elbow, but still, the front sleeve line is not my favorite, and I think it possible that if rotated on his left a bit clockwise, some or all of it would remedied.
But still: a very, very handsome coat worn by M with soignÃ
- B