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SATURDAY, JANUARY 22, 2011
L9
Style TREND
A case for the shrinking collar PARAMOUNT/THE KOBAL COLLECTION
After skinny trou sers and jackets, it’s time for some size zero austerity around the neck
B Y D ARREL H ARTMAN ···························· he men’s shirt collar has been in a recession lately, thanks to a combination of slimmer fits, softening workplace dress codes and fashion’s ongoing Mad Men obsession. Imagine, for comparison’s sake, a time when the collar was in a more expansive mood. Inevitably, the 1970s come to mind. That era’s grandiose collars were the perfect frame for double-wide ties, not to mention gold chains and chest hair. Today’s reduced versions aren’t designed for heavy lifting: They buckle under meaty jowls and are often overwhelmed by neckwear. Some shirt makers have even experimented with convertible collars that, when tucked in, disappear altogether. Eric Jennings, men’s fashion director at Saks Fifth Avenue, points out that today’s barelythere collars are merely part of a larger trend. “I think it actually starts with this shrunken suit idea,” he says, adding that the vogue for shorter, skinnier pants and jackets has resulted in narrower lapels and neckties. Shirt collars have, so to speak, simply followed suit. “Our eyes have adjusted to a small silhouette,” Jennings says. Niche menswear labels such as Robert Geller and Shipley & Halmos—and Thom Browne, the designer frequently credited, along with Hedi Slimane, as the godfather of the modern skinny suit—have been making smaller collars for some time. But only more recently have big-name brands and mainstream retailers hopped on the bandwagon. Jennings says that when he joined the Saks team two-and-ahalf years ago, “We were talking about it, but we didn’t have a whole lot of it on the floor.” A tour of the store’s men’s floors reveals the extent to which that’s changed. Skip past conservative holdouts such as Charvet and Brioni and you’ll find that Burberry and Hugo Boss are making some of the teeniest collars on the market. Although the trend’s most recent period of reference is the 1980s, when demure collars topped many a blousy shirt, observers are quick to note that the more influential time is the early 1960s, when JFK (John F. Kennedy) led men’s fashion trends with trim collars that sat close to the chest. “If you look at neckwear and lapels of that era, it’s very much in line with what’s going on today,” says Jeff Blee, divisional merchandising manager of furnishings and men’s accessories for Brooks Brothers. But for its newer, even smaller collar styles, Brooks turned the clock back further. “We found old catalogues from the 1930s that listed our four most popular collars of the time,” Blee says. “Two were fuller collars, but two—the Cornwall and the Clifford—were scaled-down versions. That’s where the newness is for us.” Updated versions of both will appear in the company’s spring
MAESTRI DAVIDE/ COURTESY Z EGNA
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F MARTIN RAMIN/WSJ
Short and sleek: (clock wise from above) A Burberry Brit Stripe Shirt; the Alfred Dun hill look for Spring/ Summer 2011 supports short collars; John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever with a straightpoint collar; and a smallcollar look from Ermenegildo Zegna.
collection (at two-and-a-half inches, the Clifford collar measures nearly an inch shorter than the brand’s traditional Oxford button-down). Among dandies, the rounded and labour-intensive pin and tab collars of the 1930s and 1960s are making a comeback. “There’s a lot of good stuff happening with tab collars and pin collars,” notes Alabama-based designer Billy Reid. But the resurgence of the diminutive collar (which has historical ties to rugby and cloth rationing) has very little to do with dressing up—in fact, quite the opposite. “Now guys wear casual shirts with suits or sport coats, whereas in the past they’d only wear a dress shirt,” Reid points out. Jennings agrees: “It’s a sportswear thing. Fewer men need to worry about fitting a tie under their collar.” The store’s necktie sales were down last year, and according to studies done by Saks, not as many customers wear neckties to work as they used to. Some shirt makers have embraced the disappearing necktie as an opportunity to experiment. “We cut a collar that
stands up properly when it’s unbuttoned. When you go that route, you can think more creatively about how you make the collar,” says Patrick Grant, director of the bespoke London shirt maker Norton & Sons (where he says customers have asked for shirts with collars as short as an inch and a quarter) and the readyto-wear line E Tautz. The challenge in the age of the waning necktie, Grant says, may be to keep men from “looking like extras from Star Trek”. To some, now is the perfect moment for a little austerity around the neck. “I think there’s something decadent about a big collar. Look at the Regency period—it was all huge collars and excessive bows,” Grant says. “But we’re in an era that’s trim and utilitarian.” But it may not be long before the pendulum starts to swing the other way. “I don’t think that collars can get much smaller without looking extreme,” admits Frank Muytjens, head menswear designer for J Crew. For Michael Andrews, a former lawyer who
owns a sleekly contemporary tailor shop in Manhattan’s NoHo neighbourhood, the return to a more “dramatic, masculine” collar style has been a long time coming. “I think the whole short collar thing is kind of silly,” Andrews says—part of a “boarding-school look” that is only flattering to skinny men. “If you have a really long neck, it’ll make you look like a giraffe,” he adds. “At the end of the day, certain styles are going to look better or worse on some people.” Reid, the designer, concurs it’s not for everyone, but jokes that he sometimes worries about a man who’d rather wear an oversized collar than risk facing the world in one that’s too small. “That’s something that might need therapy,” he says. Write to wsj@livemint.com