Vintage Mania - The English Regency

To continue with my last post Vintage Mania. First of all, we start with the English Regency fashion for men. The first man in my dictionary in this period, is the Oxford undergraduate student George Bryan Beau Brummell(1778-1840), the 18th century model dandy.

He is considered as a 'celebrity' man chiefly known being a laconically witty clothes-horse and associate of the Prince Regent. Brummell is also credited with introducing and bringing to fashion the modern man's suit worn with necktie and led the trend for men to wear 'understated' but beautifully cut clothes, adorned with an elaborately-knotted cravat.


James Purefoy as Beau Brummell in BBC4 Drama 2006

He spends 5 hours everyday to dress himself and polishes his boots with champagne, and later he is recognised as the man who invented Dandyism. He's not only the man invented the modern suit, he also had led a revolution in European gentlemen's wardrobe. I am quite fascinated by reading how all the aristocracy chased after his style just to look like him, that include many people I quite like: Lord Byron, even Charles Baudelaire admired him. His name lingered in art and literature, and even in modern media. I could hardly recall any name in the fashion world nowadays could have the same profound reign like he had done.



Various neckties


For me, Brummell is truly a tasteful stylepicure.

Vintage Mania

All the people know me well knows - I am a big big Vintage goods lover. I constantly being asked by friends what on earth are vintage goods. The word Vintage is originally related to the process of picking grapes and creating the finished product in wine-making. So a vintage wine of one made from grapes that were all, primarily, grown in a single specified year. Then the word passed into general usage to mean the year a certain item was made. e.g. vintage car, vintage clothing.

By living in Europe for the last 6 years, I discovered that this land is THE VERY wonderland for any Vintage mania like me. Now while I'm writing on STYLEPICURE, I think it's time to gather some experiences for my vintage collecting readers.

It is impossible to describe vintage without mentioning the history. For any vintage purist will argue that anything within the past 20 years would be considered as contemporary. In my opinion, any item have the exclusive quality that represent the era can be called vintage, or I may put it in a more accurate sense - a vintage item with a contemporary twist, as being a twenty-something vintage-loving young man living in a metropolitan city like London, it's hard to say no to such panache.

English StylEpicure

Why I love this look?

The hat, the shirt, the overcoat. All of these represent many sense of Englishness. The boots, all the accessaries level up the look to a askew street look. This is what I call not trying too hard. Just could imagine some young chaps walking down London town looking like this.

The Starting Post

This is the very first post of The StylEpicure. From now on, I will post a bit of fragaments from my photo collections as I live and travel around the world. The things which are always surrounded me in a constant vividness - people, faces, books, poetry, food, cities, voices etc. so this is the place of my archive.

This is me in Hyde Park, London, 2006 Summer