The Don Draper

I’m a clothes snob. This is something I have come to realise. For a time I would only buy shirts from the likes of Ermenegildo Zegna, because the quality of the cloth, the cotton weave, the cut and the designs are far superior to any ‘high street’ label (note, you must read ‘high street’ with a cruel, curled lip as if you are about to spit something revolting out of your mouth).

But in recent years I have purchased a few items from Next. You don’t know how hard it was for me to write that sentence. I am a closet-Next-wearer. It’s not something I like to admit. Luckily, men, or at least the men I know, don’t really talk about where they buy their clothes from. In fact they don’t talk about clothes at all. But women do, and I have been put on the spot by Mrs Jones when a friend of hers commented on the nice shirt that I was wearing, and before I could butt-in and claim (or rather, lie) that I bought it from Prada, Mrs Jones goes and spills the beans and I am left embarrassed, humiliated and trying to change the subject. Of course, I have no need to feel embarrassed, because her friends are not clothes snobs or fashionistas. They don’t think there’s anything wrong with buying a shirt from Next. But I do, and not least because the buttons seem to fall off within three hours of wearing it.

As you might imagine, my wardrobe is somewhat schizophrenic in its brand positioning. Besides a shirt by Ozwald Boateng you might find something a tad more ‘downmarket’ from Reiss, and next to that, the unspoken dirty secret from Next. At night I sometimes hear the shirts fighting. Ozwald is trying to strangle Next, and Reiss is keeping them apart. Then you have Ermenegildo “The Italian”, who gets his mob hands to do all his dirty work. I fear the day when I will open my wardrobe to find a horse’s head staring back at me, and the poor Next shirt covered in lacerated cotton fibres beneath it.

You may be wondering why I am so embarrassed by Next, and if you are, then you are clearly not a clothes snob. The Next brand is just an example. I would also not admit to wearing something by M&S or Gap (both of whom make very good clothes). Then again, now that brands like Prada have gone ‘street’, the exclusive club of fashion labels is becoming ever more blurred and confusing to the consumer. Luxury brands seem to fluctuate between appealing to ‘AB’ buyers with their yachts and their houses in the Hampton’s, and then they go and devise a PR stunt to get Fiddy Cent to wear their clothes in his next hip hop video. As a result, Viscount Pompenstein IV will find himself donning the same shirt as Trigga tha Gambla from the Bronx. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that, of course, in fact I quite like the idea, but would Trigga want to be wearing the same clothes as stuffy old Pompenstein, and would the Pompmeister be pleased to know that he’s half-dressed like a gangsta from da block? Now there’s an idea for a reality television show – ‘Block Swap’, Viscount Pompenstein swaps his holiday home in East Hampton for Trigga’s high-rise apartment in the Bronx River Housing project (“Uh, excuse me, ‘homie’, would you care to purchase some of this marvellous crack-cocaine?”).

So you want a nice shirt. You don’t want to be a fashion sheep, and you don’t want to wear a luxury brand that, because of the influences of pop culture and PR-gone-mad, is also seen as trendy by those you don’t wish to associate with (because, like me, you’re a culture snob too, and like to think that you’re superior to the average teenage hoodie, despite your in-depth knowledge of early 90s underground hip hop, which is also something that you keep quiet about). And you don’t necessarily want to spend your money on a tailored shirt from Savile Row either, which, incidentally, are becoming increasingly affordable. My advice is to look for exclusive but not entirely mainstream brands, Ozwald Boateng and Zegna being two prime examples. Boateng is incredibly trendy – but so trendy that only fashionistas would appreciate just how cool you are – whereas Zegna will appeal to someone of more classical tastes, and mafia dons. Or, you could buy one of the terrific designs from Next, and pretend that you bought it from somewhere else.

As a follow-up to this article, I will be visiting the old-world haunts of Savile Row. I shall be purchasing a few tailor made shirts and talking to the men behind the world’s most famous drapery district. Watch this space.

And if you want to dress like Don Draper from Mad Men, Brooks Brothers are currently selling a limited edition Mad Men suit, as seen in the series. That is either infinitely cool or hellishly tacky. I can’t decide which.