Lift Your Career With Bespoke Suits, Shun Capone Stripes: Books

Review by Mark Beech
Jan. 5 (Bloomberg) -- J.P. Morgan Jr. wore them. So did Napoleon III and David Bowie.
A tailored suit from London’s Savile Row typically features three and a half meters of fabric and two meters of thread. It costs as much as 10,000 pounds ($16,100).
These and other intriguing facts can be found in two new books that portray bespoke outfits as a means for getting ahead in choppy economic times.
In "Bespoke," Savile Row tailor Richard Anderson argues that the right jacket and trousers will make any man more credible. He sees the three fittings and two-month wait as a good investment.
You don’t have to take his word for it, though. Eric Musgrave, who has been writing about fashion for 25 years, offers less biased evidence of the power of the right threads in "Sharp Suits."
Musgrave has created a valuable guide on what to wear by packing the pages with photos of how the great and good dress to impress, from the impeccably cut numbers worn by designer Ralph Lauren to the sober outfits loved by President Barack Obama.
The volume is full of simple pointers. Understated suits, we read, are often the most acceptable, assuming they’re better than the anonymous office uniform worn by Gregory Peck in "The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit." As for what not to wear, Musgrave cautions against Al Capone stripes and other showy ensembles, including white suits (unless you’re Tom Wolfe). Zoot suits are fine for Elvis Presley and Kid Creole, not for hedge- fund managers.

Sartorial Disaster

Musgrave repeats the mantra that "clothes maketh the man." Yet sometimes it’s not what you wear; it’s how you wear it, as can be seen from two photos in his book. One shows singer Bryan Ferry looking effortlessly cool in an Antony Price suit, while a few pages later Price fails to save Duran Duran front man Simon Le Bon from sartorial disaster.
A suit also makes a statement, of course. Musgrave excels at illustrating just how varied the statements can be, from the Duke of Windsor to the Thin White Duke, a.k.a. David Bowie, and Frank Sinatra, who manages to look razor-sharp.
Where can you get the best suits? For many, Savile Row remains the only place to go. Anderson, who has been in the business for 27 years, offers a subjective view, spiced with waspish comments and insider stories.
The book opens on one snowy day in 1982, when Anderson arrived at age 17 for an interview to become an apprentice at Henry Huntsman & Sons. The salary: 2,000 pounds a year, or about $3,200 at today’s rates. He rises through the Dickensian tailoring world and is soon dressing celebrities such as Ian McKellen and Ferry.

Crowded Market

The market for suit books is crowded, it turns out. James Sherwood’s "The London Cut" (Marsilio, 2007) offers a more objective guide to Savile Row. Nicholas Antongiavanni’s "The Suit" (HarperCollins, 2006) presents a practical manual on how to choose the right suit for the right occasion and individual, tackling all those decisions on fabric, weight, number of buttons and whether to opt for single- or double-breasted.
Still, Musgrave and Anderson -- the two names together sound like a tailoring firm -- offer crash courses for sharpening up your act, bonus or not.
"Sharp Suits" is from Pavilion in the U.S. and from Anova/Pavilion in the U.K. (200 pages, $40, 25 pounds).
"Bespoke: Savile Row Ripped and Smoothed" is from Simon & Schuster (320 pages, $18, 14.99 pounds.) To buy "Sharp Suits"
in North America, click here. To buy "Bespoke," click here.
(Mark Beech writes for Bloomberg News and is the author of "The Dictionary of Rock and Pop Names." The opinions expressed are his own.)