For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a dandy, dressing in often eccentric ways for most every occasion. I was the only 11-year-old boy to sport an ascot (cravat in British English) in Albany, NY, to the bewilderment of friends. My bowties are custom made because if you wear the off-the-peg ones, your head looks like it’s gift-wrapped. My requests have flummoxed tailors in New York and London. Trilbys and flat caps are from Lock & Co, founded in 1676 in St James’s, the shop that made Napoleon’s famous bicorne topper. The two exceptions to this rule are my folding Panama from Ecuador, and my bespoke top hat from Brisbane, Australia, the last such item made in that nation. It would take a team of Viennese psychiatrists eons to make sense of all this, but one thing’s sure. I yield to no man in my clothes-related needs. Well, maybe one man.
© 2024 John Oliver
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