MAN FRIDAY
ENGLAND STARS BRING HOME THE STYLE
Standing proud, with help from their tailoring, our boys get it right (most of the time), says Stephen Doig
Who would have thought, two weeks ago, that “Waistcoat Wednesday” would have become A Thing? Who could have imaged that a plain navy blue blazer from Marks & Spencer – its like worn at summer weddings up and down the country – would sell out on the back of its endorsement pitchside by Saint and Saviour Gareth Southgate? Tragically, its talismanic effect didn’t carry us all the way to glory, but searches online for waistcoats this week have risen by 292 per cent. Away from the waistcoat, English football has always kept up a dialogue with style.
Fashion has been known to cherry-pick the tropes of athletic uniform and elevate them, while footballers become style icons by dipping into the world of fashion (see that other deity of English football, David Beckham).
Southgate’s watch is a special edition from luxury Swiss house Hublot, which picked up the glint of the spotlights nicely.
It’s little surprise that there’s so much excitement over England’s exploits; amid bleak news, our boys behaved with impeccable grace and acted as ambassadors when our leaders faltered. And with that pride comes the nostalgia of 1966, and proof that even then our boys were switched on to style (photos of an off-pitch Bobby Moore could double as catwalk turns today, in his suede jackets and rustic-chic denim shirts).
It’s an era that captured the imagination of Kent & Curwen’s creative director Daniel Kearns in looking to vintage football for inspiration this season, looking to the uniforms of a more gentlemanly era (it stands to reason; David Beckham is the co-owner of the house). Football’s relationship with style has had its bumps in the road but for every Nineties Manchester United star in a shiny suit and curtain hair cut or crispy-haired Cristiano Ronaldo, there’s a Beckham in handsome tailoring or Thierry Henry in his signature cardigan. Over Mario Balotelli’s get-ups, we shall draw a polite veil.
So what do our boys get right? Beckham has moved on from the misdemeanours of outfits past and embraced pinsharp, exquisite tailoring (as seen at the recent royal wedding where he sported Dior Man), while Henry has shown how a man in his 40s can wear a cardigan and not look fusty (an athletic frame and neat denim helps). George Best was a proto-beckham in striking Sixties fashion – his knack for silhouettes such as wide-legged trousers with narrow, tucked in shirts could certainly educate men today – while Rio Ferdinand also shows how to update tailoring with sleek T-shirts or polo shirts instead of classic collared versions. Which, as the England team arrive home, might help them hold their heads high.