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Booklist
Most public library collections should include a current book on men's clothing style, and this one is an excellent candidate. Smith, an experienced men's fashion writer, submits his comprehensive guide as not simply a gathering of illustrations with minimal accompanying text but much more.
He opens with a discussion of male sartorial history and then shares his thoughts on men's traditional fear of being fashionable; his advocacy of style is underscored by his very serious sentiment that "privilege of the natural over the artificial is philosophically unjustified... for there is nothing inherently morally impure about the artificial."
His intended audience is the man at the beginning stages of assembling a wardrobe. The analysis Smith so spiritedly and professionally dispenses, concerning the kinds of shoes, shirts, ties, jackets, and other necessary items that are available, as well as his pointers on how to wear these wardrobe ingredients well, leads his readers to an understanding that "fashion is what is out there for you to choose from; style is what you choose." Brad Hooper
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