“Clothes project an attitude about who you are and how you live,” Ralph Lauren has said. “Getting dressed can be a pleasurable experience. It’s your time to decide on who you want to be and how you want to look.”
Which raises a few questions: How do you want to look this spring? Who are you, and how do you want to live? And how do you make that daily experience of getting dressed, as Mr. Lauren says, a pleasurable experience, particularly in a time like this?
One not-so-modest proposal: Dress as loudly as you can. Embrace what you might call preppy maximalism, daring to bring together bright colors and bold patterns (mixed, if possible). Proudly adorn yourself with vivid stripes and unexpected details. Patchwork madras over a rugby shirt and go-to-hell pants with derby shoes? Absolutely. Dress, well, a little like what you see in Polo’s spring collections. After all, we all need a bit of fun in our lives—especially now. Getting dressed, even if it’s just for yourself, can offer an escape, a chance to experiment, an opportunity to reinvent yourself—or all of the above.
Perhaps you’re not convinced. Or perhaps you’re convinced but not sure where to start. One place to begin is taking the rules of style, then playfully twisting them. In some cases, this might mean the actual rules. Consider Eric Twardzik, a Boston-based, prep-forward style and spirits writer for Robb Report, InsideHook, and others. In high school, he and his friends competed to see who could dress the loudest while still staying within the technical confines of their dress code—wearing seersucker jackets in February, for example, or a loud pair of yellow pants with a louder plaid tie. Eventually, the headmaster instructed the crew to dial it back, but this timeless tale of sartorial rebellion produced a useful lesson that Twardzik carries with him to this day. “When I want to announce myself, I’m going to color outside the lines a little bit,” he says.
One not-so-modest proposal: Dress as loudly as you can. Embrace what you might call preppy maximalism, daring to bring together bright colors and bold patterns (mixed, if possible). Proudly adorn yourself with vivid stripes and unexpected details. Patchwork madras over a rugby shirt and go-to-hell pants with derby shoes? Absolutely. Dress, well, a little like what you see in Polo’s spring collections. After all, we all need a bit of fun in our lives—especially now. Getting dressed, even if it’s just for yourself, can offer an escape, a chance to experiment, an opportunity to reinvent yourself—or all of the above.
Perhaps you’re not convinced. Or perhaps you’re convinced but not sure where to start. One place to begin is taking the rules of style, then playfully twisting them. In some cases, this might mean the actual rules. Consider Eric Twardzik, a Boston-based, prep-forward style and spirits writer for Robb Report, InsideHook, and others. In high school, he and his friends competed to see who could dress the loudest while still staying within the technical confines of their dress code—wearing seersucker jackets in February, for example, or a loud pair of yellow pants with a louder plaid tie. Eventually, the headmaster instructed the crew to dial it back, but this timeless tale of sartorial rebellion produced a useful lesson that Twardzik carries with him to this day. “When I want to announce myself, I’m going to color outside the lines a little bit,” he says.
And that’s just it. Maximalist dressing is a way of saying you’re not afraid to act and think differently—especially in a videoconferencing era where you only get a small slice of someone else’s computer monitor to make an impression. During a time of social distancing, a conversation-starting piece of clothing can also help bridge that distance. “Make the items count,” advises Benton Nilson, an Ivy style writer and self-described sartorial archaeologist in California, whose vintage-centric Instagram feed has attracted thousands of followers. “Double down on it during this time of Zoom calls and FaceTime hangouts. It’s a dark time for a lot of people; take advantage of the limited real estate on the screen and brighten someone’s day. You might even see yourself in the screen and smile.”
As for how to do it, your options are as infinite as your imagination (and wardrobe). You can start small, with a loudly patterned sock or a shirt in an unexpected color (might we suggest pink?). Or go all-out, with a madras jacket or Nantucket red pants. Or split the difference, and mix in some of your loudest pieces with something more traditional, creating that timeless blend of conservative and daring that discerning gentlemen have turned to for decades. Ultimately, it’s very Ralph Lauren to understand that clothes are a vehicle for personal expression, so you’ll want to start by learning where you want to set your personal volume knob on any given day. If you’re worried whether too much of a good thing is just, well, too much, heed the words of Micah Parker, the dapper voice behind the Instagram feed @MrParker1967, a veritable fount of maximalist inspiration: “To me, I don’t think there are any rules. You just have to trust your eyes. If you put it on and look in the mirror and it doesn’t pop, it doesn’t make you yourself feel like it’s a great thing, then it’s not a great thing.”
But let’s not overthink it: The point here is to let loose, invite the colors of spring into your wardrobe, and use a particularly eye-catching garment, or three, to put someone at ease. (Perhaps even yourself.) Your actual execution might vary day to day, week to week, mood to mood. Start by making sure you have the pieces in your wardrobe you’ll want to reach for next time you’re feeling a little loud; finish by putting it all together in a way that feels right to you. Nilson says that you can think of it as a musical composition, a way of playing around and improvising with the different elements of style. “Like Miles Davis said to John Coltrane, you don’t have to play all the notes all the time,” he says. (Great advice, then and now.)
Whatever notes you play, whatever key you’re in, remember you’re projecting an attitude, as Mr. Lauren says. In this day and age, if you’re looking to project a little more positivity and confidence—and who wouldn’t be?—maximalism is the ultimate way to do it.
- © Ralph Lauren Corporation
