Sweater weather

Winter has been particularly ruthless this year in my neck of the woods, and while it would be easy for me to pile on my heaviest clothes day after day for ventures into the tundra, it simply wouldn't work for me. The main reason is that the temperature control system in the building where I work is, shall we say, charming?

Temperamental might be a better word, and because of that I've learned to not wear any one layer of clothing that is too thick in order to compensate for cold temperatures outside, because I know that once I'm inside it will often have to come off. Instead, I've taken to dressing in multi-layered outfits that can be peeled off and still look semi-respectable if I have an impromptu meeting or run into a higher-up that might wonder why I was either sweating profusely indoors on a winter day or kicking it in a white t-shirt and slacks as I wait for temperatures to stabilize.

A fairly routine outfit has become a dress shirt or an oxford of some sort coupled with a tie and a light to medium weight sweater which I then cover with a coat of varying weight depending on the temperature. If it gets hot in the office, I can take off the sweater and not look too silly, but a light breathable wool usually suffices for a wide range of temps.

Not one, but two dummys. Zing.

This week, I turned it down to brown with a pair of dark Eddie Bauer chinos ($2.00), a orangish-brown Puritan v-neck sweater ($3.00 - featured here), a cream-colored J Crew dress shirt ($1.00), and a shiny tie ($1.99) that really popped out the color in the sweater.



The tie itself had a cool enough design that I hated to hide it, but alas, I did.

I'll break this out in spring again, in full glory.

Most of my ties are silk or wool, but I've let a few synthetics slip through into the massive collection simply because there's something in the design that I love. This is one of them. And really, who am I to argue with Beau Brummell?

Just knight him already. Mr. Brummell is not to be trifled with.