Top hat and lounge suit

[metropd]

Looking through many pictures of the teens through the 30's I can find many instances when the the top hat was worn with the lounge suit. Please post thoughts and pictures. I think when I get my new 2 button suit I will try it.

<a href="http://s144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/metropd/?action=view&current=3326417.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/metropd/3326417.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

 

[Alon]

Interesting concept, but it's been damned difficult finding such photos. Here's one of Mark Twain:

As much as I love the top hat, you'd be better served by a Derby or Bowler for formal occasions these days. The top hat is simply too retro to look elegant and not out of place. Compare:

That's a teens or twenties look that can easily be pulled off today - at the right occasion - with elegance and grace.

 

[Shaul-Ike Cohen]

If you really want to go there, a felt top-hat with a lower crown might be more apppropriate. Also, you'd attract lots of glances, but probably not many more than for a bowler.

 

[Feraud]

Looking through many pictures of the teens through the 30's I can find many instances when the the top hat was worn with the lounge suit. Please post thoughts and pictures. I think when I get my new 2 button suit I will try it.

<a href="http://s144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/metropd/?action=view&current=3326417.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/metropd/3326417.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

These are not Lounge suits are they? The men in the pictures look more business oriented.

Not an easy look to pull off. A person definitely needs a sense of gravitas to pull it off.
If you have it, go for it!

 

[Shaul-Ike Cohen]

Not an easy look to pull off. A person definitely needs a sense of gravitas to pull it off.

I think not necessarily, especially if it's not a very high and/or silk hat.

 

[metropd]

I like a top hat that is about 6 inches to 6 3/4 inches tall.

 

[metropd]

A lounge suit is what most people today refer to as a business suit. A top hat then was very often called a high hat.


I will post some pictures of me soon wearing this look. If I remember Tony in Tarzana did this in a black lounge suit with black neck tie and silk top hat.

 

[Feraud]

When were business suits referred to as lounge suits?
What were non business suits called at this time?
When did the term "business" become standard for the business suit?

Sorry about all the questions, just trying to get the terminology straight for the time periods.

 

[AlanC]

The 'lounge suit' was the original name for what we think of as simply a 'suit'. Its key feature was matching coat and trousers rather than the striped or checked trousers of full morning dress or stroller.

Note Churchill's striped/non-matching trousers here:

 

[Tango Yankee]

Wikipedia has an interesting article on the history of suits. You can reach it here. How accurate it is would be anyone's guess.

Regards,
Tom

 

[Alon]

Metropod, I came across this portrait of Manet and thought it may be of help to you:

 

[metropd]

See, it can work. Just depends on how you do it. Thank you Alon.

 

[AlanC]

^Not a lounge suit

Our good friend Manet is also wearing something akin to a stroller, or semi-formal daywear as evidenced by the non-matching trousers. The stroller is of the same formality level as the dinner jacket (aka, tuxedo), which is evening semi-formal wear. The lounge suit must have matching trousers.

This is a useful chart that our friend Sator has posted:

Of course, no one is stopping you from wearing the topper. I think you'd want to be selective about what sort of suit you were wearing it with (eg, I'd avoid, say, a seersucker or brown suit with it).

Metropd, have you considered putting together a stroller combination for daytime wear? If you have a charcoal or black suit with waistcoat then likely all you need would be the striped or checked trousers. I think it would be just the thing for you.

 

[Edward]

Interesting photos in the OP. I've never cared for the top hat with shorter jacket look myself - it looks somehow 'top heavy' to me, and can come over as being very affected. I can't dismiss, though, the possibility that that is subconciously influenced by the fact that it is so often seen sported as "novelty fancy dress" wear rather than a serious hat (alas!). I much prefer a homburg, though I imagine it could work with semi-formal wear - rather better with a stroller than with black tie, I think (purely personal taste). I really don't care at all for how they look with a lounge suit, though I imagine at one time that would have been a relative norm. In the Victorian era, as far as I understand it, they were a much more common hat, worn with the lounge suits of the day.

Any idea when the photo in the OP was taken? I wonder how common the top hat was in daily wear at that point. If the others in the photo are in contemporary dress, would the two gentlemen in the top hat have been wearing an earlier style of dress? The one on the right appears to be waering an earlier style of shirt collar than others - see particularly the guy in the foreground, second from left with the cigarette and extremely sharp overcoat. It's also interesting to see several men in the photo without hats - very much not the norm when the phot was taken, I should imagine, but further proof that there were men gonig hatless a long time before JFK!

 

[metropd]

The first picture of the 2 men in top hats is from 1929 on Wallstreet.

 

[dhermann1]

Along the same lines as this discussion, several years ago I bought a black fur felt top hat. It's not silk, but a decent black felt. Aside from wearing it when I played Mayor Shinn in Music Man, what are the appropriate situations for wearing this hat? Would it be OK with the stroller?

 

[metropd]

I would go on ebay and look for a silk one. That way if you were to wear a stoller or lounge suit the silk top hat would throw away the idea of it being novelty dress.

 

[ICannotPlayBass]

metropd, may I ask if you are still contemplating posting pictures of the top hat with a lounge suit? I have been intrigued by the idea since you won the auction; http://thefedoralounge.com/showthread.php?t=25662.

I apologize if they have been posted and I missed them.

 

[metropd]

Thank you, I forgot to do that. I will try and post pictures this week. The top hat is a very good height as it is 6 1/4 inches tall. A very moderate height without being short at all. if there is one thing I don't like it is short top hats.:rage: I will wear the top hat with my John Varvatos suit.

I ocassionally wear my silk top hat around little Italy and people love it, then again people know me. I think I am going to wear it to the fashion show.

 

[ohairas]

Can't wait to see Metro!
Nikki