The Outfit: Gatsby

So we take our inspiration from a lot of places and this particular outfit is from a movie. Actually a trailer. A sweet trailer. Sometimes you see an outfit in a film and you wonder if it would look as slick in the real world and if you could pull it off in an affordable way?

That inspiration came in the form of this, one of the screen grabs from The Great Gatsby trailer.

(This happens in chapter five. Spoiler Alert, Daisy Buchanan needs to be slapped constantly. Maybe that’s not a spoiler so much as my opinion. Spoiler Alert, if we ever talk about The Great Gatsby i’m going to rant about how Daisy Buchanan needs to be slapped constantly. )

What I liked about it was that it came across super clean. It’s a black and white outfit that manages to still have a lot of warmth because of the feint barely there color to the vest, the shirt and then it hits with a strong pop of color from the orange tie. Plus its a great cut. Shoulders end exactly where they should and the ascot collar on that shirt is slick as all hell.

But could this be done affordable and beyond that, what would it look like in reality? I wanted to know. And here’s what I came up with.

Now these are all things I had on hand. No new purchases were required. That’s why having a versatile closet is such a vital thing.

Let’s break this down

The Suit– This is a basic white classic fit suit from JC Penny’s Stafford suiting line. Stafford is an incredibly conservative fit. So this suit required heavy tailoring especially on the jacket. I needed the sides brought in and some minor work on the sleeves. The pants needed to be brought up a little. I don’t like too much break in my pants. On a white suit too much break just leads to a filth edge on your pant leg after dragging on the ground or against your heel. This suit retails for about 180 bucks.

The Vest– Another Penny’s piece, this one from the hipper younger brother to Stafford, J Ferrar. Ferrar is all about sharp angles, high lapels and patterning. I like their fresher approach. This vest is a tone on tone black with some really edgy peak lapels. I don’t like the glossy backs that vests insist on having but I lived with it here. This vest retails for about 40 dollars.

The Shoes– I mention my Too Boot wingtips all the time. No need to do it again right? Now i’m not sure what kind of shoes Leo was wearing in this clip but brown just felt right. Brown always feels right. Now these shoes are pricey. Merely web searching for them says they retail around 400 dollars. I got mine at Nordstrom Rack for 160. Expensive, sure but beings that they work with almost any outfit and any occasion its a great purchase. If you haven’t read up on my approach to good shoes, please take a look. https://the-approach.org/2012/03/20/the-approach-to-buying-new-shoes/

The Shirt– So easy. Went with another Ferrar. Slim fit dress shirt I found on sale for 11 dollars. No brainer.

The Accessories– Again I tried to match the outfit as best as I could. In a few scenes in the trailer he does where a watch, a silver banded something. I don’t like silver with white. Just a personal preference so I went with a brown strapped Merona watch. It’s a simple ten dollar piece you can buy at Target. The pocket square is a twelve dollar silk pick up from Penny’s. In the trailer he wore a black one. I didn’t want to overload with black. I like my colors so I went orange. The tie is a Stafford silk. Another cheap fifteen dollar pick up.

All said and done this outfit cost about 430 dollars to put together IF you had to buy every piece and had none of this in your closet. The tailoring cost me about another forty. 470 in total. Seems high but consider this, a lot of suits cost about 300 by themselves and still need touching up from a tailor. And, absolutely every piece here can work with any outfit you can imagine. Nothing here is wearable only in this combination. The utility of each ingredient makes the purchase worth it.

Overall I do like the outfit and if not for the vest it would be very light and breathable too. I happen to wear it on a really hot day so it was a bit much temperature wise but honestly I got nothing but compliments all day. More so than with most dress outfits I wear and I do a lot of suits. I’d wear this again.

But I’d love to hear your approach to movie fashion and slick suit choices.