As Britain’s beleaguered Prime Minister faces more criticism, more Treasury money being pumped into Northern Rock and more manoeuvring from his cabinet colleagues, Hadley Freeman, deputy fashion editor at The Guardian has some advice for him. She says ‘For heaven’s sake, Gordon, take off your jacket! … buy some shirts in colours other than “starchy white”, maybe even a loose polo-shirt for your off-duty moments, ruffle your hair up a bit and don’t be afraid of showing a wrist or two. Perhaps even consider switching your facial expression from “bitter glower” to “friendly smile”.’
Would it work? It’s a certain fact that recent political stars on the world of the Western stage: Barack Obama, Tony Blair, Bill Clinton – all have the ability to dress down in their more relaxed moments without looking like a complete prat. But each has had their own moment of sartorial disaster too: the anti-Obama campaign chose to use a photograph of him in West African dress at a ceremony to suggest he wasn’t really ‘American’ while we can all remember Tony Blair’s sweaty armpits on the conference platform in that light blue shirt, can’t we? As for Clinton and clothing, well … the least said about his ability to deal with his trousers, the better! There are dozens of examples of wardrobe failure in politics – for example, William Haig wore a baseball cap to a festival and lost public confidence immediately.
But there is something important about being able to dress down without looking daft. We see our politicians much more these days, and much more often when they are off duty and supposedly relaxed, but they don’t have the right that we all have to schlep around the place in old trackies and flip-flops: they have a duty to give the impression of power even while at rest. So I echo Hadley’s call, and will go a step further: by all means sport a polo-shirt, but why not also show yourself in a hoody and reveal your inner class victim, or take to the streets in an organic sweatshirt and show that what’s closest to your heart is a bit of fair-trade and social equality in purest cotton!
Gordon Brown courtesy of fotologic
August 5th, 2008
It is that time of year again. The bin men (whom I should probably call domestic waste removal engineers or something) coming down the street at six in the morning are wearing them. The people sweeping the road with one of those little electric brushes on wheels machines are wearing them. Even the guy who checks my ticket at the station has one on, although his, oddly, is under his railway cap.
What am I talking about? The ubiquitous beanie, of course. What I didn’t know, until I began to research the subject is that beanie is the name for two different types of hat and once again, it’s a case of two nations divided by a common language.
One kind, the beanie cap is made of felt, and was popular amongst schoolboys - it was either brimless with a visor or, more commonly, no visor at all. This became a cap made of panels of several colours which was madly popular with American college fraternities because they could incorporate their school colours into it. And that, in its turn, became the geek cap, which is essentially the same panelled, coloured, beanie, with the addition of (wait for it!) a propeller. No, nobody knows why, but if you ever attend a linux conference, believe me, you will see enough propellers to run a wind farm.
Recently, and partly through the efforts of stars like Eminem, the other form of beanie has been more popular. It’s usually made of fleece, or special synthetic material that wicks moisture away, which earns it one of its other names - the fleece hat. Woven or knitted versions are popular in winter sports. The design is incredibly simple but the hats don’t only protect the head and ears from the cold and wet, they are increasingly worn as a fashion item, often heavily branded or with logos or slogans. This is also called a Bronx cap in the UK, but not in the USA - weird but true.
The name beanie is used mainly in New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom. In the United States, this kind of headgear is variously known as a knit hat, stocking cap or skull cap. In India it is usually called a monkey cap.
These knitted versions are also called bobble hats if they are topped with a pompon, which is common, and the bobble hat, as worn by Cartman in South Park, has become a fashion item of choice in the USA snowboarding world.
Who would have ever believed that the thing your gran used to knit for you, that made everybody laugh their heads off when you waited for the school bus, could become a Nike best-seller? Life is strange.
Beanie photograph by Dianaoftripoli, used under a creative commons attribution licence.
November 15th, 2007
