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Wrinkled Linen



Long time readers know that at the center of my personal style approach resides the idea of natural, organic, real life. I hate stiltedness, falseness and non-living in our clothes. Our clothes are designed to be worn and lived in, not worn in isolation like a mannequin. I love the natural wrinkles in an OCBD at the end of the day, the natural wear our collars accumulate over time and the character our shoes develop as the years pass. In that same vein, along the same lines as the OCBD (and some added), we have linen.


Seersucker, madras and linen are three of the great warm weather fabrics. I have shirts made of each and I love them all in their own way. Linen is certainly the most wrinkly of them all. If you aren't primed for wrinkles, if you have succumbed to a kind of sartorial OCD, one that is based in an unreasonable expectation of no wrinkles (the wrinkle - resistant shirt industry has helped this affliction take hold among many), you may not be prepared for linen. You will need to go through a period of brutalization and an encounter with the beautiful imperfection of the wrinkle.


There are linen pants, shirts and jackets although I primarily wear linen shirts and sport coats. I love the wrinkle of my linen shirts in the summer. Linen is very easy to iron, it is very easy to get a clean fresh press in the morning. And then after that press I love how as the day moves on, as time passes, shirt grows more and more wrinkly, taking on and remembering the activities of the day. It is the anti - fakeness, the anti bizarre chemical treated "wrinkle - resistant" shirt. It is impossible to "look perfect" (actually it is the wrinkles that make it perfect) if you are wearing linen, the fabric cannot be made to appear freshly pressed. I don't think any fabric forces you to embrace life, natural-ness and the simple act of living in your clothes more than linen. Linen helps (or rather demands) you live life as a man ought to live life in his clothes - naturally and without constant obsessive concern of "perfection".


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