Welcome back to the Gentleman's Gazette! In today's video, I'll share some of my
favorite old stuff with you. By that, I mean things I've had for 10 years or more
that stood the test of time, that aged well, and that I'm really glad I invested
money in. Fashion moves quickly these days and within a time span of five
years, you might have turned around your entire wardrobe. For me, I don't buy
something that I just intend to wear for a season or two and then throw it away
or donate it because I have a style that is classic and timeless and so I can buy
a tie and wear it for 20 years down the line, at least, that's my approach. Of
course, if something is stained or not repairable anymore, I may throw it away but I have a
hard time with it and you can learn more about what my wife thinks about that
here. One of the reasons I want to share this list with you is to show you how
good things age and that you too can invest in items that are not subject to
trends but simply part of your style. It may not be my style but it may be a
style that works for you, not just now, but in five years, ten years, or even more
down the line. Personally, I don't care if an item is a vintage, used, or new. All
that I care about is that it has quality, maybe some character, and then it works
for me. So without further ado, let's jump into 14 items. For each thing, I will talk
about when I bought it, how it has aged, its details, the maker, and everything
else of interest. Number one is a chalk stripe overcoat, single breasted, that I
bought in about 2004 or 2005, used. It's from Bally and it has a very nice
silhouette. It doesn't have much shoulder padding and it's very flattering and
that's what I wore when I met my wife and I still have it to this day. I just
recently had all the buttons replaced because they were coming off but I can
still wear it and it's just a nice overcoat and I have a lot of memories
attached to it. If you look at it, it isn't really worn out yet. The lapels
might be a little slim but overall, it has side vents which is unusual. It's
just a timeless garment that even looks stylish worn today. Number two is my rope
stripe suit from Ralph Lauren. I bought it on eBay, I think in 2004 or 2005, for
$340, it was one of my first suits that cost some money and it was just
wonderful, it was soft, had a soft interlining, soft shoulders, and it
had this kind of thirties inspired cut with a wider lapels that I really
appreciated. It also had the inward-facing pleats in the pants that
wasn't something I had up until then and it's a really great way to kind of
maintain your weight because if your old stuff doesn't fit you anymore, you have to
get rid of it but if you hate the idea of that, you'll
always make an effort to just wear those garments. It's, to this day, my wife's favorite
suit even though I have other bespoke suits and stuff but she just likes a
look of it and the way it feels and she's just very attracted to it and I
still love that piece. It's from Ralph Lauren Purple Label and at the time, it
was still made in Crewe, England by Chester Barrie. Today, they have moved
production to Italy but every once in a while on eBay, you can still find those old pieces
which I think are quintessentially British but they're very soft, more like
an Anderson & Sheppard silhouette, for example. At the same time, the cut is a
little different and so I liked it about those old Ralph Lauren Purple Label
pieces. Number three our list is the original prototype wallet from Fort
Belvedere. It was made around 2010-2011 and I've been wearing it ever since. It's
a deer skin wallet, kind of a really dark chocolate brown with a more like
sunflower yellow lining. It has the signature Fort Belvedere folded edges
and at the time, I just wanted to make sure that if we sell a wallet, it would
hold up and so I just wore it every day and you can still see, it looks so pretty
good for being dead old and used every day. To check our that our hallmarks of a
quality wallet, please check out this guide here and if you're interested in
the wallets we sell today, please check them out here.
Next up are my Augusto Caraceni suits. I bought them used in about
2003 to 2005 and it all started with eBay. Someone had just listed it as a
bespoke suit and I bought it for 30 euros which is
about 35-40 bucks. Now, I just saw a picture of the label and realized that it
was a high-end suit and since most people who have bespoke suits don't just buy
one, I asked them if they had more and that first one was this kind of pale
green fresco suit that I got, it had a wonderful color depth, single breasted
with two buttons, had a wider notched lapel and it was just a beautiful garment.
It was a great summer suit. Fortunately, the lady who sold it got me in touch with
the owner of the suits and he had a bunch more and his son lived at the city
I was studying in in Hamburg, Germany and so he would come there every once in
a while and drop off a whole suitcase with ties and shirts and suits, he had my
height and weight and overall, it was a pretty nice fit, they're pretty
comfortable, they're not perfect but really hardly anything is. Other suits from
that lot included my double-breasted petrol blue suit, also in a fresco fabric,
it includes the charcoal brown pinpoint suit, three-piece with a double breasted
waistcoat and peak lapels, and also the brown double breasted Prince of Wales
check or Glen check suit with an over pane in a light blue. You can see I've
worn them gently but they're by no means worn out and I bought them used so
they're probably about 30 or 40 years old
but they still look great, they're in a timeless shape and it's just something
that I can always pull off and people always compliment me on it simply
because most men do not have suits in such unusual colors and patterns. Last
but not least, I also have a green worsted suit from Caraceni that I also got in
that lot that came with a three-piece single breasted vest and notch lapel and
is also nice to combine it as a sport coat with different colored pants.
The fifth item on my list is a pair of Ludwig Reiter shoes. It's
a Austrian shoe maker of Goodyear welted shoes and i have this full brogue derby
which has an unusual last form and an unusual cognac color. I bought it, I think,
400 euros new uworn at a vintage shop in Munich about 2003. It has a few
scratches these days, it has been resoled but I still enjoy wearing them and it's
still a cool pair of shoes that has stood the test of time. At around the same
time, I bought some vintage Church's shoes in black and brown. One pair already
worn-out, was literally like a big gaping hole in the uppers so I had to just
throw them away but the others, they are clearly worn and you can see them here
and I wear them not as often anymore simply because I have other shoes now.
The lasts are not perfect and the leather shows quite a bit of wear. The sixth
thing I'm really glad I invested in is cufflinks. I used to have an extensive
cufflink collection with gold that I usually purchased on eBay and other
vintage places in Germany. I had to sell most of them in order to
come to the US for good in 2009-2010 but I still have a few cufflinks that I
originally bought. One of them is this kind of green enamel pair that I
bought at a flea market in Budapest during my internship in 2006. It has some
blemishes but it's still nice-looking, it's unusual, and it's something I can
still wear to this day. This kind of spirit inspired me to design my own
collection of cufflinks which are all designed so you can hand them down to
your children, to your sons, even to your daughters and they can wear them and
enjoy them for decades, maybe even centuries to come. The seventh group of
things are my Siniscalchi Shirts. They came from the same guy who had these
A. Caraceni suits and I got a bunch of them. What I really liked about them was
they had very unusual high-end fabrics. Siniscalchi is a high-end
shirt maker from Milan, Italy and usually, a shirt from him costs around
500 to 600 euros which is quite pricey but he has a very unique process in how
you're measured, the collars are all custom in their shape, and I really enjoy
their fabric selection because they have very breathable fabrics for summer and
just very beautiful fabrics that you don't find elsewhere. I've worn many of
those shirts a lot and over time, you can see that the collars and cuffs are
wearing out. Now, I can either throw the whole shirt away or I can just exchange
the collars and the cuffs, which is probably what I'm going to do simply
because I appreciate those shirts for what they are.
The eighth thing that has aged well and stood the test of time is my Montblanc
fountain-pen. My whole journey into classic menswear started with an Omas
fountain pen and I bought it on eBay and sold it and made more money as a
teenager which then got me into collecting, buying and selling fountain pens
and I specialize on Montblanc fountain pens. It was all around 2002-2003 and while
I sold most of my fountain pens, I still kept some of them. They still write well,
they still look nice, and I particularly like it for signatures because you can
have a green ink with a wide O3B nib so no one can really fake your
signature or if they try, you know that it's not the right pen. The ninth item I've been
wearing for years is my black Burberry trench coat. I bought it used around 2007
at a vintage store in Hamburg called Rudolf Beaufays. He specialized in British
vintage things and it's just an experience to go into that store because
it's full of old English stuff, memorabilia, clothes, and it's just
wonderful to be there. At the time , I didn't have much money but I had sold a set of
Goyard suitcases that gave me a lot of plain money but the thing I bought
together with my wife Teresa was this trench coat because she really liked it
on me and I liked it too. Now, the only thing I don't like 100% is that it's
black which, on the one end, makes it good for travel because it doesn't pick up
dirt very easily unlike, let's say, the typical beige trench coat. On the
other hand, if it would have been like a dark gray or a navy, it would have the
same benefits but it would be a little more versatile. Number 10 is my cotton
Polo sweater. I really like cable knit tennis sweaters with a deep v-neck that
show off your tie and your shirt. It just makes me feel like I'm part of the 1930s
even though I don't wear them to play tennis at all because I simply don't
play tennis, except maybe leisurely with my wife in the summer or when on
vacation. Even though they're white, as such, they stain very easily, I've managed
to keep it in good shape. Because it's cotton, it can be washed. I also have others
in wool which are nice. What I like about this particular sweater is it has
navy and a light blue color accents around the collar and also some navy
blue around the sleeve and it's just a very preppy look that is very
distinguished and unique in this day and age. The other thing that stood the test
of time for me are a bunch of Calvin Klein underwear and that may surprise
you because it's more of a pedestrian brand but I remember when I came to the
US the first time in 2006 as an exchange student, Calvin Klein was the hot stuff
and so I bought a bunch of those underwear and I kept wearing them
and wearing them and they haven't really worn out. They are made
out of polyester mostly and it still looked good and these days, I have a bunch of
different underwear so I rarely wear them anymore but overall, they've really
held up superbly well and I was positively surprised by that. The twelfth
thing that I'm still wearing almost every day are shadow striped socks. I was
first introduced to them in around 2003 by my friend, Herbert Stricker, who is also known
as Grimod De La Reynière and he had these wonderful socks from Italy and I always
wanted them because they had these two tones and it was easy to combine it with
other outfits. It was very different than the solid socks
I had previously. Now, those socks were also what inspired me to create the Fort
Belvedere socks, shadow stripes, they come in many
different color combinations because it's just a wonderful pair of socks,
works with most solid pants, patterned pants, even with some striped pants, it's
so easy to combine unlike a solid pair of socks which is always slightly off. To
learn more about how to pair socks with shoes and pants, please check out
this video here and for an overview of the socks we offer now, head over to our shop.
The 13th thing that has stood the test of time is my Merkur slant razor. I got
it in around 2006 when I switched from a Gillette Mach 3 system to a double edge
safety razor and at first, I had a regular safety razor and someone told me, well
try the slant one with the feather blades and for me, it was a revelation.
I got a shave that was so smooth and soft and I just had not known that before.
The razor would cost about 55 bucks and it's still in good use today.
It works really well, I think it will go for many more years so it was a
perfectly great investment. Last but not least, one thing I really appreciate
about our wardrobe are my vintage overcoats. It's not just one because I
have many of them and I bought them vintage starting all the way as five
bucks up to maybe 200 bucks or a little more sometimes but it's something that
other people don't have, it's hard to find these days,
and sometimes, you can find them, if you're lucky but they have this
beautiful heavy fabric that drapes extremely well and keeps you warm. I
particularly like double-breasted overcoats and the little details they have
with the back belts and the back pleats or just the fabrics they use. And you can
see my entire collection of overcoats here. Ironically, in today's outfit, the
only real vintage piece is probably my pinky ring which is sterling silver with a
Tiger's Eye. My blazer is navy blue by the beautiful Vitale Barberis Canonico
fabric that was made for me. My shirt is red striped with French cuffs and
combining it with silver monkey fist knot cufflinks from Fort Belvedere which you
can find in our shop just like the pocket square
which is a red-and-white handcrafted linen which is a bit crisper and it has
contrasting white cross or ex stitches on the edges which are hand rolled. it
harmonizes well with my shirt as well as the red or burgundy red knit tie from
Fort Belvedere which likewise is in our shop just like the shadow striped socks
in brown and off-white which work well with my off white pants which are white
or off white winter flannel and I'm pairing them with a soft looking pair of
suede shoes in brown they're a Oxford brogue and they're from Velasca the
pants were also made for me