The last chapter. The city and work and shades of the first Thomas Crown Affair with straw hats and sunglasses. Despite a heat you can almost feel -- everyone looks crisp and cool. I wonder about the photo selection for the book and what was left out. Where are those images? Lost forever I suppose.I took a pair of Duck Head Khakis to Mr Peppino the tailor. I handed him this book and as he flipped though it I told him, "That's what I want these pants to look like, Mr Peppino. You know...1965." He smiled and said, "But I wasn't born yet."
Somewhere inside me there's a longing for these days I remember as a kid. It's like watching Anita O'Day on stage at the '58 Newport Jazz Festival. You wish you could've been there - -You would give anything to have been there. To reminisce about an impossibility is always sad. So, you do what you can. Like having a pair of khakis tapered and pegged and just a tad on the hi-water side.
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21 comments:
Can you say "mid-life crisis"?
Thanks for putting up the pics. A great public service!
The Andover Shop still looks exactly like that, except for the Phill Ochs poster. They sell a lot of the same stuff too. Would that I could afford it.(sigh)
Anonymous,
Mid-life crisis my foot. I'm only 32 and I pine for these good old days, too...well, at least the clothes.
Could you please explain "pegged" khakis?
Was the book worth the wait (and the money) or had all the really good photos already appeared on the web?
Just wondering.
Very nice, thankyou for uploading these.
I can only agree with Giuseppe: This has nothing to do with mid-life crisis and everything to do with objective facts: Those were the days!
Cheers for the photos, Tintin. Brilliant stuff. I've not seen all of the photos either. I can't resist a few translations of the captions.
The Brooks Brothers window display scan with the caption that begins with 'Brooks Bros.':
" Brooks Bros. Speaking of the corner of Madison Avenue and 44th Street, there is none other than Brooks Brothers. The window display is in character with the main house of Ivy, restrained real school Ivy."
The photo with the sausages. I'm not from NYC, and this may be self-evident, but where is this? Does it still exist? The caption reads (and this may not be the correct spelling) "Zum Zum. The restaurant where Madison Avenue boys have a glass at lunchtime. "Zum Zum" is famous for beer and sausages."
The page with the fellow sporting the black ray bans and 2B cuffs.
"And the Young at Heart. When one goes to America one notices that Ivy is not simply a fad. Of course there are serious Ivy Leaguers, but businessmen and executives are also in accord with this style. We think there really isn't any other real old school attire than Ivy."
I'm also "in accord" with Giuseppe. No mid-lifer here; rather, _there is_ a classic American style to go for .Go for it. Just don't go as high water as Mr. Thom Browne on those khakis. Cheers, HTJ
HTJ,
Zum Zum was a popular New York eatery located in the main lobby of the Pan-American Building in Manhattan.
See:
http://www.helmbolds.com/history.htm
Wonderful photos, Tintin, many thanks for posting these. I'm taken with the BB store front window photo, the 4th pic down. Love the jackets there. The ties, I think, feature a "Bulls & Bears" motif.
A little Googling turned this up:
"Zum Zum was all over town, and even spread to a few other cities. Then they all disappeared; can't imagine why. Best fast food ever. That bratwurst was my favorite too, with the sauteed onions on a caraway roll. And the decor was oh-so Bauhaus-meets-butcher-shop. The hanging wursts were made of wax; health department said they had to be. The smell was right, however."
OldSchool, Thanks for the information!
Thank you for posting these. Great 'slice of life' stuff.
TinTin,
Surely, the producers of Mad Men must be salivating to get at this little juicy morsel!
Thanks for funding and sharing!
MME
Zum Zum! I've seen references to it now and then in evocations of Sixties New York, but never actually saw a pic of it until now.
The '67-'68 AIA Guide to New York City, on the 74 Broad Street location: "Another in the happily spreading empire of Restaurant Associates. Soup, salad, sausages and beer are standard."
Please refrain from further posts containing pictures of store windows, particularly ones like the Brooks display.
It depresses me: the whole time-space impossibility of acquiring such goods with retail ease today.
Thank you.
When I was a kid at that time I was SO SURE that I would grow up to buy cool spy gadgets and drink martinis and dress JUST LIKE the adults around me. What happened? HIPPIES happened! I was crestfallen for decades. Okay, maybe not decades, but they hijacked the style I was supposed to inherit, and declared it dated and dorky.
Now I fight the urge to put on my "comfy" sandals each day that can only be described as "Hobbit meets Burning Man Festival!" Thanks a million.
Oh, and one more thing: I do drink martinis. And every time I do, I do so knowing that many boomers HATE them because it's what their parents drank (smiling, winking emoticon). -DB
Tintin,
Great work...Thanks for all the work you put into this!
Anon, you're dressing like the hobbit to piss off the hippies? Nice... especially with a martini in hand. Now that's cool! Wish I'd thought of that...I grew up having the same crestfallen feeling during my detention in Marin County...
For those like me, who are obsessed with identifying the pictures here that correspond to their school, the second-to-last pic in this set (ivy-covered wall, 493 above the door) is 493 College St, New Haven--where they're still holding classes today. Italian classes, but class nonetheless.
Thank you.
A nice post.
Just stumbled upon this blog in a desperate search for all things college-vintage, and I just wanted to say that I love you so much for posting these. Wow. Rushing out to buy this book.
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