What's the general consensus on structured shoulders around here?

[dreamspace]

Everything I know about menswear, I pretty much learned here. I used to think that shirt-like soft shoulders were the be-all and end-all to suit/coat aesthetics. The past year I've grown to love the more structured look, classic Brioni, Zegna, some English cuts, etc....and with a slight rope to it.
It looks clean, powerful and masculine.

I've noticed that a lot of guys that post in the WAYWRN have pretty sloped shoulders, and that natural shoulders doesn't look quite good on them, especially when the sleeve head is a typical spalla camicia. I have really sloped shoulders, and for some reason I dreaded structure...then finally tried a Brioni and saw the light. Much better.

I think a lot of people automatically associate "structure" with those horrible 90s suits that had an inch of padding all over.

 

[YRR92]

Trying to find general consensus on SF is like trying to walk a cat, in that Voxsartoria will make fun of you for it.

But I get the impression SF has moderated its position a little bit on jacket shoulders. I've seen fairly structured stuff that hasn't gotten dinged for being "too structured," which was something I recall seeing when I first started posting.

But if you like them, and they work for you, then I think you're set. After all, most people who dislike a certain style dislike it because it's often done badly. If you can do it well, the open-minded among them will admit that it's not that bad.

 

[comrade]

Structured shoulders are the burden which must borne by those whom the Almighty
failed to bless in sartorially-relevant areas of their anatomy.. Perhaps those unfortunates
have been compensated for these deficiencies with added prominence in other body parts.

 

[jrd617]

+1 to comrade

it depends on the person's shoulders bone.

 

[lordsuperb]

Structured shoulders that are well tailored can be quite flattering.  I have mixed feelings about soft tailoring after searching these threads looking for answers.  

 

[beyondmars2020]

i've spent far too much time debating whether i'm better suited for a natural versus structured shoulder.

thanks to several SF members for directing me to jeffreyd's classic post:
http://www.styleforum.net/t/245858/shoulder-expression

 

[heldentenor]

@dreamspace and all, take a look through the WAYWRN threads for fits by Betelgeuse, Cleav, Anden, and Pingson. They all frequently wear a combination of structured and soft shoulders, generally to great effect. Structure doesn't have to mean linebacker shoulder pads! I think most of us are moderate on shoulders, but some very well dressed dudes (and their emulators) preach the soft shoulder gospel rather vociferously. Works for them as a preference; doesn't mean it's a codified law.

 

[Claghorn]

Structured

Soft

 

[greger]

There are so many ways to make shoulders on coats. Some of them I haven't seen for 45 to 50 years. Seems like tailoring has been reduced to not much. And young guys today are afraid of anything new to them. Tailoring is an art, and few tailors, so not much to see for lack of imagination.

 

[knittieguy]

Not to get annoyingly technical, but a consensus is, by its nature, general. And thus a "general consensus" is something found in the department of redundancy department.