As I wrote earlier this yr, I’m normally fairly conservative on the subject of robes. They’re very sensible for me, thrown on early within the morning to rise up with one in all my three daughters.
They’ll nonetheless be luxurious, and fantastically made. I’m good at taking care of good supplies, and may address the occasional stray soggy Corn Flake. However I’m not a person of luxurious leisure, and robes which can be overly fancy or fussy simply don’t match my life.
Nonetheless, I nonetheless recognise {that a} ornamental silk dressing robe is a gorgeous factor. Should you like menswear, you’ll admire a woven-silk necktie; additionally, you will love the dimensions and stream of a terrific overcoat; and a dressing robe such because the silk pictured above is a mixture – a maximisation – of these two issues. You’d be a idiot to not be tempted.
Luckily, a reader just lately requested what sort of silk dressing robe I’d advocate. A basic navy spot? A quilted-lapel smoking quantity? And this gave me the excuse to think about the choices vicariously.
Anybody that spends time strolling round Mayfair could have had their eye caught, in some unspecified time in the future, by the New & Lingwood robe retailer on the finish of the Piccadilly Arcade.
There’s such a riot of brightly colored material: black and gold; pink and inexperienced; in the course of the summer time a procession of sugary linens in pale blue, yellow and pink. The one actual native competitors is from Favourbrook, and even they’ve fairly a couple of attire and waistcoats in plain cream or black.
I wouldn’t be stunned if the show makes everybody that walks previous rethink whether or not they’d put on a silk robe. Or wish to take into account it. Wish to need it.
I believe there’s fairly a giant distinction between a few of the choices although.
A black silk robe embroidered with skulls and crossed bones can look a bit foolish, at the least to me. Are you attempting to look harmful and difficult? In a silk robe? I do know there’s the Eton connection, however extra than simply Previous Etonians are shopping for them.
Equally robes in gold, with quilted facings and tassels. It’s a bit an excessive amount of, too showy.
There’s nonetheless a query of style, in different phrases. Simply as there can be should you have been shopping for patterns and hues for an additional space of your life, like curtains or tender furnishings.
Should you’re going to put on a brightly colored dressing robe, my recommendation can be to keep away from different facets of ornament. Keep away from the quilting and the tassels, focusing merely on colors and patterns that you just like – as you’ll the silk in a necktie.
I just like the peacock-patterned silk above, for instance. Though it’s clearly a daring sample, and makes use of sturdy color, the distinction is quite lower than the inexperienced and gold above, or orange and navy. In comparison with these, the pink and turquoise is sort of refined.
I additionally like the truth that the piping is low distinction. Its tender gold is just like the cream used within the physique, and each mix with the pink and inexperienced quite properly.
To me, the bright-white piping on some robes could make them look low cost, significantly with darker colors. Which is why the piping on the robe I coated earlier this yr was so tonal.
The New & Lingwood robes are all finely made, after all.
I significantly just like the huge, rounded form of the facings, and the best way they roll open all the best way all the way down to the hem everytime you depart the robe unbelted. Take a look at the stomach on it within the picture beneath – it’s virtually as huge because the chest itself.
Additionally necessary is a belt that holds its form, and doesn’t collapse when tied. Whether or not achieved by stitching or lining, it makes a giant distinction to how elegant the robe appears. Nothing makes a dressing robe look previous and ratty greater than a belt that has change into mainly a shoe string.
Most of the N&L robes are additionally made within the basement of the principle store on the opposite aspect of the Arcade – one thing I’m undecided many individuals know.
This makes changes pretty straightforward, which is sweet. It’s simple to do one thing like take off the fold-back cuffs and shorten the sleeves, for instance, earlier than reattaching them.
Curiously, N&L solely had a medium and an extra-large within the retailer on this sample, and I discovered the latter suited me higher.
A medium was extra of a ‘true’ match, with the tip of the shoulder sitting proper on the purpose of my shoulder bone. However I believe a robe must be free – luxuriously so – and consequently have fullness within the physique once you cinch it on the waist. The additional massive, pictured right here, did that higher on me.
Extra energy to people who put on silk robes and luxuriate in them. They’re actually great – and now that Vanners has gone, there might be fewer round which can be made within the UK.
From what I perceive, the tried rescue of Vanners – which had been weaving silk since 1740, and which I coated for PS again in 2009 – has now fallen by, leaving Stephen Walters the one mill doing this weaving at any scale.
Let’s hope there are sufficient dandies round to maintain manufacturing going there, at the least.
The silk robe pictured is £1,250. Linen robes are a great various, beginning at £595. Bespoke robes are additionally potential, from a variety of silks and different supplies.
The pyjamas pictured are brushed cotton from Anderson & Sheppard. I discover gray a great foil for sturdy color, in a lot the identical manner as a gray flannel go well with. The sneakers are Sagan Lunes from Baudoin & Lange.
Images, Alex Natt @adnatt
