He is remembered as the best dressed man of the Nineteenth Century, Beau Brummell, (né George Bryan Brummell 1778 – 1840), set the standard for male sartorial splendor and his name is to this day synonymous with the word “dandy”. Written at a time when American leisure wear was going through it’s birth pangs and slovenly attire was on the rise all over the fruited plain, it was thoroughly appropriate for the editors of Gentry Magazine to print this article which not only examined the clothing philosophy of the Beau but also paid heed as to which actors portrayed him on screen (oddly, there was no mention made whatever as to who the various costume designers were).
“He dressed simply, without ornamentation. What was it then that set him apart so ostentatiously from the crowd? What made him the best dressed man of the century? The answer lies not, as history has decided, in his clothes. It lay entirely in the way he wore them.”
“His boots were said to been polished with champagne, but they were restrained in pattern… Brummell never took less than three hours at his dressing, and he often dressed three times a day.”
Click here to read a Vanity Fair article celebrating the great dandies.
