En Route, In Style
Travel, in some way or another, is inevitable in every man’s life. What varies from guy to guy, though, is the experience. Some will stumble through the trip haphazardly, picking up wrinkles and maybe even the occasional tropical disease. Others, meanwhile, breeze from city to city, with great-looking photos to prove their traveling prowess. Half of traveling is all about looking the part; here’s how to do just that.
Maximum Fashion, Minimum Bulk
Hollywood often portrays the fashion-conscious character with trunks full of clothes, but the real fashion-conscious – and practical – man knows that reality is very different. The ideal case is, in fact, bringing as few pieces to make as many great outfits as possible.
Always account for the fact that you’ll do laundry at one point or another, and that you will end up wearing the same piece multiple times (each between washings, of course). Don’t fall into the trap of bringing luggage proportional to the time you’ll spend on the road; it’s the surest way to over-pack and burden yourself unnecessarily.
That being said, each piece has to count, especially on the versatility front. The styles you bring have to be easy to mix and match so that each one can be worn several times with a multitude of other style pieces. Fashion need never be separate from practicality.
More Style with Fewer Pieces
Your first step to traveling in style is to identify which mix-and-match pieces would be more strategic for you. If you’re going to backpack through Europe and dress codes are not a major concern, then layers of tees, casual shirts and cardigans are the best idea for the trip. If, on the other hand, you’re going out on business and intend to close deals, a couple of suits and a mass of neckties would be much more strategic.
The strategy starts at home. Before you pack, sort your clothes by style – cardigans, tees, jeans and so on – and then by color. Try to pack with as diverse a color palette as style and good taste will allow; this gives you (and your co-travelers, if any) the illusion that you’re wearing a vastly different outfit every day.
Business wardrobes give you a little more leeway since your outfit is a combination of the suit, the shirt and the necktie. Varying any one of those elements will automatically result in a whole new outfit. As long as you keep to the rules of, say, matching neckties to office shirts, then you should be safe for most of your trip.
One really great trick is to bring two or three pieces that are out of place: dressy shirts for the casual traveler, jeans and sneakers for the road warrior. Combining ‘low’ (casual) items with ‘high’ (dressy pieces) is one of the handiest tricks that you could learn. It very often makes for an interesting look that seems lifted directly from the fashion magazines.
The Travel-Friendly Wardrobe
Not all clothes travel well; some will turn out to be better companions than others, and it’s your job to pick out which ones will serve your purposes best. A garment’s travel-worthiness is a function not just of its style and design, but of the properties of the fabric as well.
Volume – and, hence, bulk – is the last thing you want in any garment you’re bringing. That’s why anything with padding or puff is never a good idea in your luggage. Stick with sleek tech fabrics for cold climes, or with stylishly
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Your Mens-Ties.com Team