I’ve settled into a bit of a rhythm with Korean tailors Assisi now. I love their soft-but-elegant style, I trust their fit and execution, and I know their double-breasted in particular is something I wear the hell out of.
So my next commission was a navy-cashmere double-breasted jacket. I’ve always been a fan of double-breasted in terms of what flatters me – I’m slim and tall but not broad, so anything that adds breadth to that is the perfect combination.
But I think I’ve realised in recent years that I also really like double-breasteds from a style point of view. I’m not the most adventurous dresser (consciously, deliberately) and a double-breasted rather than single often creates just enough interest for me.
That’s not to say I’d want all my jackets that way – variety is still nice, and interest can just as easily come from the rest of the outfit – but the average is definitely tipping in that direction.
In fact looking back, perhaps I always knew this: my problem was that I tended to commission DBs in unusual materials. My first real bespoke was from Anderson & Sheppard, and most of those were DBs. But I often went for things like royal-blue flannel, or very pale grey.
Those were dandy suits, and it’s not surprising that they haven’t survived where my tan cord and grey check have.
The key to a navy DB being useful, for me, is when it can be worn with both denim (shirt and/or jeans) and something smart like a white shirt and grey flannels. And then lots of things in between in terms of formality.
For a navy jacket like this it’s helpful if it’s a fairly soft make (so not too smart or unusual with jeans) and a material with a bit of texture. A textured wool or even shetland tweed could potentially have worked, but a blazer I saw on Ethan Newton in a navy camelhair (above) convinced me that that, or cashmere, could work too.
As I often say these days, most of my commissions are based on seeing things made up, in the flesh. I get so tired of making wrong decisions. In fact, now I think about it, I’ll give my Assisi pieces to them for their upcoming London trunk show, just in case anyone wants to see them in person. Like sharing good ideas.
The photos taken here, during Pitti, show the jacket in probably its most unusual combination in this vein: matching blue denim on the top and the bottom. (Bryceland’s sawtooth above Rubato jeans.)
This is great for Pitti, where the TPO (time, place, occasion) make double-matching-denim appropriate. But it’s not something I’d wear in quite the same way at home. There I’m more likely to swap in:
- A light-blue western shirt, to avoid the matchiness
- A light-blue denim-but-not-western shirt, if the first is too showy
- A blue oxford shirt, if that’s still too showy
There you go, a sliding scale of showiness, in terms of blue shirts to wear with jeans and a DB blazer. Pick the level that suits your style and TPO.
The jacket is then nice with grey or brown flannel trousers on the bottom. Any of the shirts above could pair with it, plus something as smart as a poplin.
I was a little unsure about the texture of the cashmere with jeans, but I think it works – a touch unusual, and it would certainly be more so with more beaten-up jeans, but it’s OK.
The combination is also helped by two things I think: the white T-shirt and the black shoes and belt.
We’ve talked about T-shirts under shirts before, and I understand why some people don’t like them. But it does help break up the mass of denim here, and give the eye something to focus on. The jacket doesn’t have anything else – no gold buttons, no raised seams or patch pockets – so it helps even more.
Black shoes, meanwhile, are a really good partner to navy on top – something we covered a year ago here.
In terms of the jacket itself, I went for the same style and make as the jacket from this summer suit that Assisi made me. There were very few choices therefore, and I knew exactly what I was getting.
Interestingly, the more I’ve worn Assisi tailoring, the more I notice things about it that I didn’t at first. The sleevehead, for example, has nothing in it – the shape is created purely by the way the sleeve is eased into the armhole at the top.
This pushes their style a little more towards Neapolitan in theory, but the shape they get in the sleevehead remains more central Italian – you could see it as the best of both worlds (shape but softness).
The other thing I noticed only recently was the way the bottom hem is made – it’s the same as the Michael Browne coat we discussed in detail recently, where the facing stops short of the bottom in order to prioritise a clean bottom edge. A small detail, but if nothing else it demonstrates how much Assisi consider every aspect of their make.
If I had to find a negative in the jacket it would be the buttons, which are a little small for a blazer and a touch more polished than I’d normally have. The size doesn’t bother me though, and if I want to switch to something completely unpolished and dusty in the future, that’s not a difficult thing to do.
I’ll show other combinations with the jacket in future posts. For the moment, the clothes shown here are:
- Bryceland’s sawtooth westerner shirt
- Permanent Style undershirt
- Rubato Lot Nr1 jeans, dark blue
- Rubato black woven leather belt
- Ralph Lauren vintage crocodile loafers
- Hermes oversized silk scarf
- Permanent Style navy watch cap
- Jacket cloth 84802 from the Harrisons Cashmere Overcoating bunch
Assisi are coming to London for the first time at the end of February. Details here. Prices for bespoke and their handmade-to-measure also listed there.
