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The Oxford-Shoe-Worn-Casually Appreciation Thread

yorkshire pud

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Hmmmmm. I would have thought Britain is fairly homogeneous as far as CM clothing goes; businessmen in Leeds will be closer in dress to those in London than those in Missouri might be to those in LA. Perhaps I should have emphasised that instead of the frequency of travel to London!

Edit to add: I suppose I should explain that every group of British people I know, including some from remote parts of Wales, includes a few that moved to London and stayed, and a few more that worked for a good while in London and then moved back, or on to somewhere similarly remote. Landscape gardeners and farmers in Porth Call have old school friends in finance in The City. The UK revolves around it's capital city-which is massive compared to the size of the country-far more than countries that have smaller capitals and a greater diversity of large non-capital cities. It is more centralised, both physically and psychologically. So the average British person is more familiar with London than the average Australian is with Canberra; or the average Frenchman with Paris.

Now if you mean Society as in the upper class or aristocracy, yes someone from Yorkshire, even someone interested in clothes, may not be familiar with what they wear in their leisure time. I would hazard a guess that they wear a lot of loafers with their casual wear, but it is only guess, and I've no idea about suits.

Aristocracy isn't restricted to London, we have some of the most elaborate and beautiful country estates in England up in the North

Traditionally London was just a place the elite went to do business/politics, all the wealthy folk had homes in the country. Even the Royals try to spend as little time as possible in London and actually prefer Balmoral to Buckingham Palace

Princess Catherine's Father was born in Leeds into a titled Yorkshire family BTW
 

acapaca

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@acapaca I thought I had a general sense of where you were coming from but now I am getting confused.
I thought you had stated in the past that you didn’t believe in normative rules of dressing and that people should do as they please and inform themselves by what they see around themselves. Now I think you’re suggesting that being stylish is defined by NOT looking like most people? so on the one hand we have your original argument that wearing oxfords with chinos is acceptable because it’s worn widely but now this argument that you can only be stylish by comparison to the “average” in society (so one shouldn’t go by what one sees around them if the goal is to be stylish?)
My belief is that one's norms should include an awareness of what others around him are doing. (That is, if you want to dress in some way apart from simply mimicking a golden era or other style, as though it were costume.) I believe that norms are set by broad forces -- ones that move quickly in the case of fashion, but still move, if slowly, even in something so 'timeless' as CM. I believe that a willful ignorance or denial of present trends is...dogmatic to a fault.

I also believe, yes and absolutely, that no one has ever achieved 'personal style' by "looking like most people." They may achieve something, sure. But it's not what I think of as style, nor what I imagine most others would think of either.

And just so you know, I don't believe that oxfords with chinos is worn well widely. I do believe that oxfords with tailored trousers and odd jackets, with harmonious levels of formality in each, is worn well by (very) many good dressers, and without giving it much thought. (And certainly without giving any thought to whether they are violating sacred historical norms.)

Lastly, it's probably neither here nor there (because we are talking about clothes and not morals), but there is an implicit addition to "people should not kill other people" in your example, which is something along the lines of "if we want to live together in a just and orderly society." Soldiers in war, of course, would have a different frame of reference for their moral norms.
 

breakaway01

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My belief is that one's norms should include an awareness of what others around him are doing. (That is, if you want to dress in some way apart from simply mimicking a golden era or other style, as though it were costume.) I believe that norms are set by broad forces -- ones that move quickly in the case of fashion, but still move, if slowly, even in something so 'timeless' as CM. I believe that a willful ignorance or denial of present trends is...dogmatic to a fault.

I also believe, yes and absolutely, that no one has ever achieved 'personal style' by "looking like most people." They may achieve something, sure. But it's not what I think of as style, nor what I imagine most others would think of either.

And just so you know, I don't believe that oxfords with chinos is worn well widely. I do believe that oxfords with tailored trousers and odd jackets, with harmonious levels of formality in each, is worn well by (very) many good dressers, and without giving it much thought. (And certainly without giving any thought to whether they are violating sacred historical norms.)

Lastly, it's probably neither here nor there (because we are talking about clothes and not morals), but there is an implicit addition to "people should not kill other people" in your example, which is something along the lines of "if we want to live together in a just and orderly society." Soldiers in war, of course, would have a different frame of reference for their moral norms.
Okay thanks. I think this is all quite reasonable. Thought we were farther apart than we actually are (not that people can’t hold very different opinions about style).
 

Sirguywhosmiles

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Aristocracy isn't restricted to London, we have some of the most elaborate and beautiful country estates in England up in the North.....Traditionally London was just a place the elite went to do business/politics, all the wealthy folk had homes in the country.

Princess Catherine's Father was born in Leeds into a titled Yorkshire family BTW
Fair point, I didn't mean to use "someone from Yorkshire" as a shorthand for a rube, I'm sorry. Perhaps should have said that ".... if you mean Society as in the upper class or aristocracy, yes someone who is outside those circles, even someone interested in clothes, may not be familiar with what they wear in their leisure time. " with the clarification that I am far outside the equivalent of those circles in my own country.

I would ask if London was not only for business and politics for the aristocracy though; didn't they have "the season" where it was sort-of obligatory to spend time socialising in London? And then they would alight to the country for hunting season and the rest of the year, when it would be quite gauche to be in the metropolis.
 

Sirguywhosmiles

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We also Don


I used to travel down to London quite often for work, so I got to see regular people in bars, restaurants, hotels and railway stations etc.

We meet lots of people from London visiting our little bit of Yorkshire.

London is only three hours from where we live by rail despite our proximity to the National Park.

I personally would say Manchester (famous for it's music scene and two world class soccer teams) is more Stylish than London, it's just cooler and more laid back than London, which is a shadow of it's former self because the locals have been increasingly forced out of the city thanks to high property prices

Leeds/Bradford and Manchester were vitally important in the development of modern clothing, Textiles from these mill cities were shipped across the Empire and they were at the forefront of the industrial revolution along with Birmingham.

In fact originally London (Londinium) was only the capital city of the Southern part of Brittania, The Romans had another much more beautiful Capital in the North now called York (Eboracum) in Yorkshire (it also has a famous city in the USA named for it), many famous battles for England took place in Yorkshire and it is the largest county, it's rural but it isn't a backwater, many famous Artists originate here, and it has it's own culture to some extent.
If we are comparing London to New York City, then Rochester, NY might be a better comparison point for Yorkshire than Missouri is.
 

yorkshire pud

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Fair point, I didn't mean to use "someone from Yorkshire" as a shorthand for a rube, I'm sorry. Perhaps should have said that ".... if you mean Society as in the upper class or aristocracy, yes someone who is outside those circles, even someone interested in clothes, may not be familiar with what they wear in their leisure time. " with the clarification that I am far outside the equivalent of those circles in my own country.

I would ask if London was not only for business and politics for the aristocracy though; didn't they have "the season" where it was sort-of obligatory to spend time socialising in London? And then they would alight to the country for hunting season and the rest of the year, when it would be quite gauche to be in the metropolis.

I suspect "the season" revolved around the opening of Parliament, when it would be prudent to be in the city to vote in the House.
 

Sirguywhosmiles

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I suspect "the season" revolved around the opening of Parliament, when it would be prudent to be in the city to vote in the House.
Maybe originally, but a whole social calendar revolved around it, including for example the presenting of debutantes to the Queen, if I name it correctly. When fully evolved it was not solely political, any more than sitting in the country house was solely for the purposes of managing the lands of the estate.

Also, when does Parliment open? September? Wouldn't that be hunting season?
 

yorkshire pud

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Maybe originally, but a whole social calendar revolved around it, including for example the presenting of debutantes to the Queen, if I name it correctly. When fully evolved it was not solely political, any more than sitting in the country house was solely for the purposes of managing the lands of the estate.

Also, when does Parliment open? September? Wouldn't that be hunting season?

My Yorkshire History is better than my knowledge of London to be honest, but I would think your right, as the Restaurant and Theatre scene developed (along with the construction of closed sewers) the hereditary peers (The Lords) would have found London more agreeable and taken town houses in the City. The Elected MPs (commons) are required to live in their constituency but have an allowance for a second property in the City to be in London to attend Parliament and vote.

The Financial district may have had a large role to play??
 

JohnMRobie

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Hey siri - show me what it looks like when someone wears their “nice shoes” (read: oxfords) out to dinner with jeans at Applebee’s on a Friday night.
The basic idea is that people in lower classes -- and by that I mean all classes lower than the highest class -- will imitate the dress/style/fashion of those in the/a class above them.
I’d imagine we have a decent amount of evidence if we look that this isn’t the case. Maybe not as much in CM but when we cross over to the incredibly broadly named SWD we see this completely fall apart but from grunge to punk, boho chic, workwear, western wear etc.
Those in the higher class will respond to this, because otherwise it may not be apparent that are indeed actually in a higher class than those below them (who now look like they do), by wearing something different from their imitators.

And that's why things keep changing. Again, that's just a simplified version, but you get the drift. (And already know this, I'm sure.)
 

Sir Jack II

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I think there's a lot of derbies/blutchers (same thing despite Gentleman's Gazette, which I think is the main source for people who want to distinguish them)
Is this generally accepted terminology, that derby and blucher are interchangeable? To me, they look so distinct from each other.
 

UrbanComposition

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I could be wrong, but would seem as though all those in favor of oxfords worn casually are from the UK or Commonwealth. If so, regional differences are perfectly understandable.
 

yorkshire pud

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Money talks, doesn't it!

Yep, and they had it all their own way for a long time!!

It appears that the opening of Parliament occurs most often in May, but it can vary if a crisis or snap election occurs, and historically it has moved around.

I don’t know anything about hunting as it has mostly been banned or become unfashionable during my lifetime. They still shoot Grouse up on private land on the moors near us, Fox hunting thankfully is a thing of the past, I do see Deer now and then in the Yorkshire Dale's National Park, but you wouldn't be allowed to carry a loaded rifle on public land.

Most of the old country Estates (maybe all) belong to the state nowadays (National Trust) as they became prohibitively expensive to run, although some aristocrats still manage them and live in quarters by farming or hosting events to help pay the bills.
 

JohnMRobie

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I could be wrong, but would seem as though all those in favor of oxfords worn casually are from the UK or Commonwealth. If so, regional differences are perfectly understandable.
Pretty sure one of the chief proponents lives in a small college town in middle America. But he spells like a Brit.
 

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