The Ivy Look, Reston, 1956

(click to enlarge) 

Source:

Sports Illustrated - 12/17/56

Army Style, 1956

(click to enlarge)

Source:

Cornell Daily Sun - 1/13/56

For men with a yen, 1956

(click to enlarge)

Source:

The New Yorker - 12/1/56

Ivy League Forum, 1956

(click to enlarge)

(click to enlarge)

 "I prefer the Ivy League because it has become high fashion. It is the radical look of today. It's the only way the radical dresser can go today."

(click to enlarge)

"My understanding of Ivy League as a boy was certain groups of schools. Period. Nothing to do with clothing. Now it suddenly has been developed and enlarged upon. It is a way of clothing we have been using for well over 100 years. We are stuck with it. Now the country has gone mad. Somebody latches on to a term and they call it the Ivy League. They can't very well call it the 'Brooks.'"

(click to enlarge)

"Whether to stick to authentic Ivy League is an individual problem. Some of us are faddists, some traditional Ivy Leaguers. Whichever it is is unimportant. The important thing is that we promote whatever we think Ivy League is. In the shirt field what is authentic Ivy League? An unlined collar and shirt with a button at the back. In oxford it is yarn dyed. It is a checked broadcloth, but it can't be a pink check, it has got to be red. In colored oxford it can't be mint or olive it has to be avocado. Maybe the guy who wears just the white shirt with the traditional Ivy Suit wouldn't be caught dead with a  red oxford shirt but both are in the category of Ivy League..."

(click to enlarge)

"The real Ivy League customer never went to the black or charcoal. He had deep tone suits, the Oxford gray. He had his navy blue in unfinished worsted for dressy occasions, possibly an olive shade for every day events. He may have clear cuts, also multi-colored tweeds. At an informal cocktail party this same guy might wear his chino trousers with a nice sport coat. The same fellow might have the smoking jacket, the cocktail type of clothing Brooks has gotten so much publicity on."

(click to enlarge)

"There is always a place for the double-breasted with the natural shoulders, flap pockets, tailored lapels."

(click to enlarge)

"The natural shoulder can be applied to either the two or three button coats or to the double breasteds, it is a philosophy of life."

(click to enlarge)

"We just don't want it misused; it's too good a thing. It isn't a fad, it is just (for most) a new concept of clothing. Why do people buy Cadillacs? Because they are different, outstanding. Hitch your wagon to a star, why not? But keep it straight, don't foul it up because it will be here for a long time."

Source:

Men's Wear - 2/10/56

Still think you're in shirtsleeves, 1956



(click to enlarge)

 Source:

The New Yorker - 5/26/56

Madison Avenue Sets the Style, 1956

(click image to enlarge)

"The clothing style now favored by the men of Madison av. is what is loosely referred to as Ivy. This trend is significant because Ivy has long been associated with the avenue. A group of tradition minded men's shops on Madison - on which Brooks Brothers is the most noted - have carefully nurtured, preserved and defended the style for more than 60 years."

Source:

Apparel Arts/Esquire - 1956

Our Hand-Washable Sport Shirts, 1956

(click to enlarge)

Source:

The New Yorker - 10/13/56

Hart, Schaffner & Marx, 1956

Max Roach, 1956

Max Roach

(photos by Francis Wolff - click to enlarge)

From the "Sonny Rollins, Volume 1" session, Hackensack, NJ, December 16, 1956.

Light Up a Lucky, 1956

"IT'S TOASTED"

Hart, Schaffner & Marx, 1956

Source:
plan59.com

France: Le Crocodile, 1967

They are known as "alligators" in the U.S. and "crocodiles" in 84 other countries. By any nationality or nomenclature, the French sports shirts, with a familiar-looking reptile embroidered on them, sell exceedingly well. Last year the Paris-based firm of Chemise Lacoste sold 1,700,000 of the shirts, 50% in France and the remainder in the crocodile-alligator world beyond. This month, as Lacoste's factories reopen after a vacation layoff, the order backlog has reached 200,000, and Chemise Lacoste has also gotten an unexpected bonus. Catherine Lacoste, 22-year-old daughter of Founder Rene Lacoste, last month outplayed the pros and, as an amateur, won the U.S. Women's Open golf tournament in Hot Springs, Va. "I don't know if it's because my daughter won or not," says Rene Lacoste with a smile, "but everybody seems to want our shirts now."

Complete article:

Time - 9/1/67

Additional images:

Gentry magazine, Summer 1953

Gentry magazine, Summer 1956

HS&M, 1956

(click to enlarge)

Source:

Jon Williamson - flickr

Men's Wear Looks to Color Trend, 1956

Like their counterparts in peacock ranks, the male animal this spring is strutting brightly colored plumage.

You have it from merchandising reports the world over, and the final authoritative word comes from the mouths of Suncoast men's shop owners.

They'll tell you this colorful trend comes from Italy, the Orient or first-hand from the young set's taste for loud colors, but whatever the origin, it's here.

Evidence of this enthusiasm is in new slacks in a color range which includes light tones, bright hues and dark shades. You'll find such shades as rust heather, blue heather, tan heather, hemp, sky, pine, charcoal gray and even black.
...

The cut of this fabric is a gray horse of another color, though. In this department, the fellas are going conservative, looking to the Ivy League or Brooks Brothers for inspiration.

Three-button, single-breasted suits are getting votes for "most likely to succeed" for Easter parade and after, while lapels have been pared down to the barest minimum.

Straight lines are the shortest distance to smartness in the silhouette, providing they are properly proportioned to the wearer's own individual measurements. Shoulders are natural, lapels are cut with a high-placed notch and trousers tend toward slender, more tapered lines. Waistline pleats still are popular in many circles, but some trousers are tailored without them, with back-strap and buckle details replacing the pleats.

Complete article:

St. Petersburg Times - 3/15/56

Dennis Hopper, 1956

Dennis Hopper as 'Jordan Benedict III' in Giant

Inspiration - FNB Talk Ivy

And Now for Something Completely Different*, Chipp, 1956

Silk is the perfect suiting for summer, but for men it has always had one big drawback. It has never had the adaptability of woolens and worsteds on the designer's drawing board and the weaver loom. Fine glen plaids have never been successfully incorporated into silk for the men's suits - until now. Gentry's stylists, working hand in hand with the master silk technicians of the Japanese firm of Kanebo, have finally licked the problem. Under this tissue you see a swatch of the first bolt of silk ever made with a glen weave. Superbly different in design, the material has still other remarkable qualities. It is a 4 1/2 ounce cloth, which makes for great lightness and coolness. It has fine wearing qualities, with a life span that will stretch through many hot seasons. Its wrinkles expired overnight on the hanger. On the facing page (above) you see the first jacket ever made of this cloth. We had it designed and executed by Chipp, custom tailors of New York East 44th Street, under the supervision of Robert DiFalco. It's a three-button model, buttonable at the top or middle. Its lapels are extra narrow. Its patch pockets are smaller than usual, in deference to the fabric's design. Its coin pocket is not patch, to stop your loose change from bulging. (The flap on this pocket can be worn inside or out). The jacket is lined with silk black pongee, full-lined to make it hang with perfect aplomb, and it has a long back vent. We consider it a handsome addition to nay man's summer closet; if you concur, you can take this blueprint to your tailor.

Source:

Gentry Magazine, No. 19, Summer 1956 from Gypsy Wear Vintage


*as in..."Tailored by Chipp, but it's not exactly Ivy, is it?"

IZOD presents the Famous Lacoste, 1956

(click to enlarge)

Source:

Gentry Magazine, Summer 1956, via Gypsy Wear Vintage

The Izod "India madras look":

HS&M, Shetland Tweed, 1956

click to enlarge

Source:

Time - 9/17/56, via The Retro Press blog

Suntans and flat-fronts

Cornell Daily Sun, April 5, 1956

Watching 'The Graduate' (1967) the other night on Turner Classic Movies, I coveted Dustin Hoffman's wardrobe, his preppy button-downs and flat-front chinos. Steve McQueen and Sean Connery's James Bond set off similar pangs of sartorial envy.

Looking for a little historical perspective, I asked John Weitz, the 77-year-old designer, about pleats versus flat-front.

"Obviously, it all goes in circles," he said. "The modern-day circle started after the war, when the men came back wearing what are now unfortunately known as chinos but were then called suntans, because they were a tan pant and they were flat." Until then, Mr. Weitz continued, "the only people who wore flat pants were the upper classes. You saw them in Brooks Brothers and the Ivy League. The rest of the country wore great big pleated pants in a rather bad imitation of the Duke of Windsor."

Source:

NYT - On the Pants Front: The War of the Pleats

The Opulence of the Orient

Although it may look like a scene out of Kismet, the extravaganza above is actually a first look at what the American man at play will be wearing this summer. On a wave of color (firecracker red and temple gold), the Far East has swept over the men's sportswear scene. Indian madras, the bright hand-woven cotton plaid long popular with English colonials and winter resorters, is now available in almost every sportswear item a man looks for when the temperature climbs. Long thought of as a luxury fabric, it will hit its greatest volume this summer. Other aspects of this Far Eastern look are just as exotic: Oriental Paisley and Japanese fish prints appear in mandarin-collar shirts and in beach jackets designed like Japanese hopi coats.

The Far East look, as developed by such designers as Around-the-world Traveler William Doniger of McGregor Sportswear, was introduced by the 200 exhibiting manufacturers at the National Association of Men's Sportswear Buyers show at New York's Waldorf-Astoria (above). If the public responds as readily as the 1,500 buyers who came to the show to stock their stores with merchandise, East will give West its most colorful sportswear year so far.

Source:

Sporting Look - SI - 1/23/56