College No.9
Just finished reading Geoffrey Aquilina Ross’s book The Day Of the Peacock, 144 pages about the birth of men’s fashion and the peacock revolution. Well written by a man who was very much on the crusp of mens wear during the period the book covers with lots of great pictures of garments. Aquilina Ross was an editor for the magazine Vogue and he shares his memoirs of all the great designers of the time that sprung up
Founded in 1899 in Rushen, Northamptonshire, Alfred Sargent have been producing well made shoes for over 100 years. As with all good shoe makers A.S like to give you information you need and information you don’t need. Dressing up the dress shoe I like to call it, for your information. This shoe model, called Moore comes from the AS Exclusive range. It’s an Adelaide brouge cap Oxford made on the 724F Last. I don’t really care if they were made on the last bus from town. They look fantastic, I’ve just ordered a pair from http://www.afinepairofshoes.co.uk/ , UK size 10 for your information.
Not content with designing clothing, shoes and accessories Claudio De Rossi has ventured into the world of fabric design for his company DNA Groove. The independant label following in the footsteps of high end Italian brands like Ermenegildo Zegna, Loro Piana, and Corneliani by not only designing clothing but also fabrics. Just like those world famous brands DNA has looked to the Mills of Biella for its cloth. Unlike those brands DNA Groove will offer its Mohair tonics, retailing at 32 euro’s per meter. Claudio takes us though the history of Tonik and the spec on his exclusive cloths.
Tonik fabric (pattented by historic French fabric house Dormeuil in 1957) was The fabric used for many suits in the 60’s by early modernists eager to wear the most luxurious, the most flash fabric at the time. The 3 ply wool – mohair mix (fabric woven with 3 tightly bounded single threads, one of these with a contrast colour to the others, giving the distinctive ‘hidden colour’ to the overall base colour) was heavy weight, coarse, and as all old school fabrics of the time, hard wearing but not too comfortable for todays world. 40 years later Dormeuil updated this fabric with the Tonik2000 with a lighter weight 2 ply, more suitable for modern use, but keeping the distinctive 2 tone colouring.
As with all top-of-the-range labels, the Dormeuil Tonik comes with a price and is not easily available, so seeing a demand in the market for quality but reasonably priced tonic fabrics, DNA has filled this gap by offering a tonic mohair blend made in the famous Italian wool-capital, Biella. With bronze and avio blue (both with a black contrast shine), these are the first of what will be a series of colourful choices that will be made available starting winter 2011. As with all DNA clothing, quality, style and exclusivity are applied to these luxurious fabrics, made with 85% merino super 120s wool and 15% mohair (as where many other tonics are blended with man made fibres). The wool is on the warp of the weave (vertical) and is the one that absorbs the main colouring (the natural colour is a beige with black flecks) whilst the mohair is on the warp (horizontal) and is plain black and gives the distinct black shade to the tonik shine. The mohair also gives the fabric elasticity (its crease free characteristic) and the shine. The relatively light weight of these (240gr/8.5oz) makes them ideal for mid season, in -club and open air use.
The first 2 50mt rolls are now available in electric blue and in bronze, and in the near future more colours will be introduced which will include a personalized DNA selvedge signature. Also on the drawing boards are a few check and stripe patterned colourful l tonics, which should be ready for spring/summer 2012.
Mary Quant offers “The worlds first great post-atomic make up collection”. It included nail varnish in PVC white and crome as well as shadow in unobvious colours to “gear the eyes”. Groovy!
