Fresco Suit Battle: "Tobacco" Brown vs. "Wheat" Tan

[jrd617]



I hear a lot of women in their teens to early 30's telling guys, "Oh you MUST have a black suit".

Is it possible they're mistaking black for dark navy?

 

[Gus]



Is it possible they're mistaking black for dark navy?

Not the ones I'm thinking of. They come from the fashionista, chic = black, female fashion demographic. It is rare that a female makes the distinction about midnight or navy.

 

[radicaldog]



He approves of the brown suit but I prefer tan. It all depends on the use

The white shirt with the brown suit is atrocious.

 

[poorsod]



Not the ones I'm thinking of. They come from the fashionista, chic = black, female fashion demographic. It is rare that a female makes the distinction about midnight or navy.

In my experience most don't differentiate between black and midnight navy blue. Even I can find it hard to tell apart without the two colors side by side.

 

[TheFoo]

A brown suit can look fantastic. Depending on how you wear your suits, it can be a worthwhile addition to your wardrobe. After you know all the caveats, that's your call. However, Reagan's brown suit and the way he is wearing it is honestly not worthy of emulation. It is most notable for the fact it is brown, not that it is worn particularly well or stylishly.

Also, this debate is totally aside from whether a brown fresco is advisable. It isn't. Wrong fabric for the color.

To show you my money is where my mouth is, I'm going to get myself a tobacco brown linen suit. Single or double breasted?

 

[cptjeff]



To show you my money is where my mouth is, I'm going to get myself a tobacco brown linen suit. Single or double breasted?

Single, IMO. Double breasted linen suits look cool, but they've always seemed a little incongruous to me. It's a warmer option with a fabric intended to keep you cool. and you can't open the DB while wearing it without looking stupid, and on a hot day, that's a nice option to have.

But that's just coming from someone who's lived with hot, muggy summers all of my life. If you find it comfortable to wear double breasted summer suits in NYC, more power to you.

 

[ter1413]



A brown suit can look fantastic. Depending on how you wear your suits, it can be a worthwhile addition to your wardrobe. After you know all the caveats, that's your call. However, Reagan's brown suit and the way he is wearing it is honestly not worthy of emulation. It is most notable for the fact it is brown, not that it is worn particularly well or stylishly.

Also, this debate is totally aside from whether a brown fresco is advisable. It isn't. Wrong fabric for the color.

To show you my money is where my mouth is, I'm going to get myself a tobacco brown linen suit. Single or double breasted?

I also say single...

 

[dieworkwear]

Just to throw my two cents in here, I agree with @gdl203: that shade of brown, IMO, is better as a sport coat, unless you have a somewhat unusual lifestyle that warrants such a suit. I also think tan looks better in cotton.

The Slewfoot Fresco is being made up again, this time (hopefully) with a slightly less reddish cast. I've been working with HFW to get the project done, but it's taking forever. For what it's worth, I'm not taking any profit on the project, so the cloth will be whatever HFW charges. Last time I did an interest check, there was something like 100-120m worth of interest. I imagine once this run is done, it will be hard to find any more buyers.

@mafoofan, I recently had a single breasted tobacco linen suit made. W. Bill has some nice fabrics for this. I believe Eddy has some nice photos of the same fabric being made into a single breasted suit in the NSM thread. I forget the exact number of the fabric, but if you need, I can dig it up.

 

[Blackhood]

I gotta say I don't understand the issue with brown fresco.

I've worked at conservative houses [redacted to preserve anonymity] and fashion forward houses [redacted to preserve anonymity] and have no problem with brown as a colour for a summer suit.

Not everyone wants linen, I certainly understand that, and fresco is a nice alternative.

Brown is a great casual colour - though I'd prefer it without the rusty-hue - and I'd gladly wear it to a summer event without feeling self conscious.

Mafoofan, I admire your willingness to step up to the plate, but as with so many elements of style and fashion I'm not sure how your commitment impacts on whether a brown fresco is right for Arch'.

Maybe it's in my nature as a tailor to please the customer rather than impose my own will, but I feel like a brown summer suit that is made from fresco cannot be the worst crime ever committed.

 

[dieworkwear]



Not everyone wants linen, I certainly understand that, and fresco is a nice alternative.

To my mind, fresco isn't really an alternative to linen. Cotton is, but not fresco. Where would you wear a linen suit, where you could otherwise wear a fresco suit?

 

[poorsod]



A brown suit can look fantastic. Depending on how you wear your suits, it can be a worthwhile addition to your wardrobe. After you know all the caveats, that's your call. However, Reagan's brown suit and the way he is wearing it is honestly not worthy of emulation. It is most notable for the fact it is brown, not that it is worn particularly well or stylishly.

Also, this debate is totally aside from whether a brown fresco is advisable. It isn't. Wrong fabric for the color.

To show you my money is where my mouth is, I'm going to get myself a tobacco brown linen suit. Single or double breasted?

Brown DB looks better than SB if you don't mind the heat.

 

[Blackhood]

I don't mean alternative in that they are interchangeable as such, but on a hot day one might be planning to meet a friend for a light lunch at a marina restaurant. I cannot see linen or fresco being inappropriate, however (racking my brain to come up with adequate role models here) David Bowie might go with a linen suit replete with wrinkles, and George Clooney would counter with a little sharper looking fresco suit. Neither is wrong, neither will be asked to leave and both will stay cool. Neither will pay the bill, the proprietor is far too happy that you brought celebrity friends to lunch at his restaurant.

In a more personal example I'm often invited to various business-social events at Cambridge colleges. In these instances formalwear is expected, and linen feels too relaxed, but I'm certainly not going to stand out in the sun for several hours unless I can wear something unlined and breathable. I can't pull off brown due to my pathetically pale skin tone, but I'm confident that anyone of Mediterranean, Indian or Asian heritage would be fine.

 

[archibaldleach]

Count me in as a vote for a single breasted tobacco linen suit vs. double breasted.

 

[dieworkwear]

Now that we haven't settled JRD's question about what color he should get a Fresco suit in, I look forward to turning this thread into one about Mafoofan's single vs. double breasted linen suit choice.

 

[JLibourel]



Indeed, and I've often seen olive described as a 'difficult' colour to wear, which seems either somewhat overstated or perhaps it is because the people making such statements assume they are talking about wearers with pale northern European skin tones. Even so, I don't see at as intrinsically difficult, I think, once again, it is often another way of saying the colour isn't 'in' while trying to maintain the illusion that it's not about fashion at all.

Interesting point about olive being incompatible with pale northern European skins tones, which I am sure it is true. However, it does become curious that olive has fallen so far from favor when a much larger percentage of the American male population today do not have "pale northern European skin tones" compared to 50 years ago.

On another note, the ascendancy of the black suit is a rather dismaying phenomenon. I know that all Bloomingdale's all sales personnel must wear black. At Chase Bank I believe all male staff have to wear black suits. A few years before I retired, one female co-worker asked me, "What about the blue suit?" I was somewhat taken aback and replied that it was a standard, bedrock staple of classic menswear. She said she had thought the black suit had that role. I wonder if her being a Filipina may have skewed her perspective on this matter.

The thought just crossed my mind that perhaps one reason for the ascendancy of the black suit, at least among those who do not wear suits regularly, is that one of their major reasons for acquiring a suit may be to wear to funerals. However, at all the funerals I have attended in the past decade or so, suit wearers have been a distinct, often small minority.

Were I to get a brown suit, it would be a dark brown winter-weight flannel. However, it would be very hard for me to justify the acquisition of an additional "cold weather" suit.