Style Guide

Robert Grant is a Melbourne-based journalist whose style column is syndicated to Australia's metropolitan newspapers and major websites.

The following stories are available on this page.

- Wardrobe Essentials
- The Smoking Jacket
- Winter Wearables
- The Pocket Square
- Sartorial Sins
- Dressing for an Interview
- Your Wardrobe on the Web (reccomended reading)
- Sartorial Studies
- Looking for Wardrobe Guidance?
- Goodbye Casual Friday
- Places to Shop

Men tend to buy clothes in an ad hoc sort of way, a way which guarantees they will be left confused and frustrated when it comes to putting together a simple business outfit because items are often bought in isolation. But a little planning and knowledge of the basics can quickly eliminate the daily disorder which inhabits many closets. If you're about to enter the workforce and you need the essentials, the first thing to realize is that understated works best. There are easy guidelines covering your needs and while they may seem simplistic they are dependable and will let you side-step revolving fashion trends.

1. Suits: Your first choice should be either dark grey or navy. These will see you through a working day and into the evening and are by far the easiest colors to accessorize. Choose single breasted with medium width lapels in either two button or a three to two-and-a-half which is a three button front where the fastening falls naturally to the middle button. The current revival of the 1930s classic single-breasted peak lapel suit is an attractive alternative - but choose it once you have the basics in your closet. Pleats on pants look more formal and appropriate while cuffs look better if you're tall and cuffless pants help elongate a shorter frame. Buy 100 per cent pure wool and be careful about the "Super" numbers. Super 150 may feel silky but might present problems with wear and may not drape well.

2. Jackets: The classic navy blazer, single breasted in midweight cashmere or wool is a wardrobe workhorse. Brass buttons look common and outdated now but they can be replaced with mother of pearl or horn buttons for a subtle look which will differentiate it from a suit coat. The second jacket should be in a tan or brown wool but avoid large checks or patterns which will restrict its use.

3. Odd pants: Grey flannel is the key colour for business casual pants, both in summer (tropical worsted) and winter (wool flannel) weights. Mid-grey (or Oxford grey) looks better than charcoal for pairing with a sport jacket while light grey for summer is a versatile option. Dress down with finewale cords in winter and tan or bone lightweight wool pants in summer.

4. Shoes: The black lace-up cap toe (plain, no brogueing) is a business imperative. The next choice should be brown, perhaps in a half-brogue. Chocolate brown suede lace-ups are a more daring alternative. They will add interest to both grey and navy suits (navy and brown is a very popular Italian dress combination). Tobacco-coloured suede loafers will look good with the jacket and odd grey flannels as well as with jeans and cords.

5. Shirts: Solids should be your first choice, in both plain white and light blue and always 100 per cent cotton which breathes properly. Vary them by texture, such as twill, herringbone or Oxford. A medium spread collar is the easiest with a suit or sport coat, just don't mix ties and button down collars. Venture into blue and white stripes next, then perhaps pink which looks slightly edgier with grey and navy.

6. Ties: The cause for most consternation. Always choose 100 per cent silk. Start with solid colors in navy, burgundy, pale yellow and grey. Sounds boring but you'll be amazed at the number of combinations you can come up with - and it won't take much time putting together in the mornings. Silk grenadine (a plain fabric featuring small 'bumps') and twill (self stripes) are two staples. Move on then if you like to patterns and stripes, ensuring they are small and subdued and stay within the same colour palette.

7. Sweaters: A navy cashmere crew neck should be the primary choice, followed by one in mid-grey. Keep it simple, no cable knits or contrasting edgings around the collar or cuffs. The full zip or half zip-up has become a classic while the turtleneck (roll neck) is another useful alternative in navy, grey, black or camel.

8. Coats: The navy single-breasted cashmere or cashmere/wool top coat is the coat to have if you plan on owning just one. Check labels which proclaim wool/cashmere mix - try to ensure that's all there is - and avoid artificial fibres, which are rough, cheap and uncomfortable. Raincoats should be single breasted for a simpler look in classic tan. Many come with a zip out wool lining, taking them from autumn into winter.

The End of Casual Friday

It's created problems since it's inception and now that the casual Friday aberration has all but vanished from the workforce, men can breathe a sigh of relief.

The idea behind wearing smart casual wear on Fridays might have seemed bright at the time but the problem was it was embraced by men whose concept of smart and casual varied wildly.
That T-shirt you bought with Hawaii '98 emblazoned across the front and the three-quarter cargo pants designed for 15-year-olds didn't really cut it. What casual Friday did was pose more questions than answers.

Instead of giving men some sort of freedom from the uniformity of the usual office outfit, it presented a set of complex questions they had never faced before.
What was appropriate? A blazer, polo shirt, chinos and loafers? That would have passed muster in most offices but gradually standards broke down, encouraged by millionaire IT geeks who made the idea of wearing beach attire at work cool. Or so they thought.

Many workers, wrestling with the initiative, squirmed at their desks while their equally confused colleagues nervously compared frayed jeans, scuffed sneakers and faded rugby tops. The death of casual Friday returned men to a comforting sense of normality and made decision- making a simple task. Nothing was easier than selecting one of the two or three suits a man owned, the familiar white or blue shirt and an inoffensive tie. Like many movements, the return to "formal Friday" was an inevitable backlash against what had started as a cynical marketing exercise. According to Wikipedia, casual Friday had its origins in the 1950s as an attempt to raise worker morale but really gained momentum with the widespread production of cheap clothing outside the US. What followed was a push by manufacturers to foist this on business during work days. It was reinforced by the dotcom revolution of the 1990s but when the IT bubble burst and many large companies went to the wall - and some of their CEO's to jail - the need to look like you belonged to one of them disappeared.

Suit makers reclaimed the high ground as companies decided they needed employees to reflect a more formal and businesslike image and regain the respect of clients. The renaissance continues to swing further away from the casual camp with reinvigorated labels like Burberry and Gucci jostling for suit sales and more and more young designers entering what is now a booming suit market.

It has become an anachronism in this day of political correctness, but the Smoking jacket is about to make a comeback. But it won't be for smoking - unless of course you like to enjoy a cigar in one - rather it has been modified to suit the electronic age. It has been whisked out of book-lined studies and repositioned in front of the computer.

And the Smoking jacket has been renamed the Surfing jacket, now designed to be something worn while surfing the web. The Saville Row tailor Davies and Co is behind the revival and claims that it is in response to queries from the firm's customers. Davies and Co owner Alan Bennett says it is hoped the Surfing jacket will be popular among the young as well as those old enough to remember its original purpose.

"Many of them are trying to or have succeeded in giving up smoking, whether cigarette, pipe or cigar," Bennett told savilerow-style.com. "This new jacket will be just as suitable for a relaxed post-prandial brandy as the traditional smoking jacket - but lighter in cloth and construction."And for those who might like to combine an evening snifter with a gentle surf on the web, then this provides a relaxed but elegant option." The Surfing jacket will have pockets for an Ipod and a disc or two and is likely to be made in silk, cashmere or perhaps tartan in place of the traditional heavier velvet. But it will remain essentially the same casual, shawl-collared, toggle-tied jacket that men in past decades have used to smoke, slurp or seduce.

Bennett believes it could become a smart addition to the well-dressed man's wardrobe, echoing earlier times as the focus on men's clothing swings more to the revival of formal dress in a backlash to years of grunge and casual outfits.

He says the new jacket will be "not just for our younger customers either. Silver Surfers represent an important group with great purchasing power. "I think a smart jacket for a relaxed evening spent surfing the web with drink in hand should appeal to them." The owners of Henry Poole, the Row's oldest firm, launched the thigh-length smoking jacket for Edward VII in 1865 and is enthusiastic about its return, as is Dege and Skinner, a neighboring tailor, which sees its use as an elegant jacket for a host to don.

A custom-tailored version of the Surfing jacket from Saville Row is likely to run into several thousand dollars, especially in cashmere, but a quick search of eBay turned up more than 100 similar jackets for sale. Some are replicas of Playboy founder Hugh Hefner's familiar red coat but many are in plain or Oriental printed silks while others are the genuine vintage article.

The way to make winter more palatable for men is to ensure your wardrobe includes a few key items which will keep you looking stylish no matter what the weather throws at you.

Rugging up against the elements can by done with class, without resorting to polartec zip jackets, beanies and footy scarves. With climate control temperature in homes, cars and offices, the days of bullet-proof tweed suits and 20 ounce overcoats are long gone but there are ways of making your lightweight three-season suit do duty in winter's dark days as well.

Several internet stores sell an ideal winter item - super light silk undershirts, and even featherweight long johns if you need them. A Google search will bring up companies which export to Australia.

Silk is preferable to cotton in many ways - like cotton it breathes but is far lighter under a shirt and is more insulating. It is also virtually undetectable if bought with long sleeves in a crew-neck style so you won't see those unattractive tell-tale outlines through your business shirt that betrays the traditional singlet. Washed and laid out overnight, silk underclothes will be dry by the morning, so they are ideal for the traveler, apart from the weight saving advantages in luggage.

If you need extra layering you can follow the popular Italian style of wearing a short-sleeve sweater with your jacket and tie, just keep it light and in subtle solid colors like navy and grey. From underwear to outerwear, probably the best overcoat options is the raincoat, but get a sleeker single-breasted one in bone or tan with a zip-out plaid wool lining. Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca made the trench coat iconic but these days minimalism is paramount. A waterproof raincoat will keep you warm and dry, unlike a wool coat which can prove warm but won't wick away the water.
One tip - don't go for the ubiquitous British three-quarter length, suede-collared, olive jacket which will make you look like a farmer or the DCI in a BBC crime series. Nothing looks more inappropriate over a tailored suit.

A good sweater in wool or cashmere is vital. Crew necks or half-zip standup collar versions are a more stylish than V-necks which tend to look a little old-fashioned.
And don't dismiss the turtleneck or roll-neck - worn on its own with slacks, jeans or under a sport coat it provides some variety to your appearance. Consider when to wear it though - you may be tempted to pull one on when it's eight degrees in the morning, but after a few hours at your desk in a 22 Celsius office it might not seem such a great idea.

Cord pants in winter are also useful in colors like tan and olive and can be dressed down with a sweater or dressed up with a sport coat if you're brave, as long as you stick to a solid shirt and tie and avoid the clichéd professorial tattersall shirt and argyle sweater.

Chukka boots - ankle length lace-ups similar to desert boots in either suede or leather - are a great choice for winter. Wear them like Sean Connery did in Goldfinger, with a tweed jacket and cavalry twill slacks, but never, ever with a suit.

One last item - the scarf. It's simple but can make a huge style difference. In Europe scarves are mandatory in winter and the variety of ways in which they are tied adds extra interest. They are popularly worn with just a suit or sport coat as well as an overcoat. Cashmere will be the most comfortable and, if you search EBay, you'll almost certainly find several within your budget.

I there's anything so innocuous as to strike fear into the heart of the male dresser it is the pocket square. It remains in this modern era a daring choice - but it's one you'll find you will get increasingly comfortable with if you persist. The jacket's breast pocket is there for a reason and you don't have to stuff anything outrageous into it to create a neat and increasingly popular look. Americans are coming to grips with the pocket square after many years of neglect, led by some of the more refined newsreaders. Leading hosts such as NBC's Matt Lauer are rarely seen without at least a white square of linen in the breast pocket and the look is taking off among his colleagues.

Australians will be slow to warm to this but try it and you'll likely be surprised. There may be some initial comments about how slick you look but people will quickly accept it and move on. The internet is probably the best place to buy squares - especially a store called pocketsquared.com, which has an enormous variety in silk and linen.

Try to make the square relate to a color in the shirt or the tie you are wearing but under no circumstances have the tie and square match exactly. Sydney radio shock-jock Alan Jones matches his on a daily basis and it brings back unfortunate memories of those cheap tie and hankie sets you used to get as a Christmas present years ago. Former Prime Minister John Howard often wears a pocket square but also falls for the sartorial faux pas of matching it precisely to his tie. In the Golden Age of male attire, in the thirties and forties, no well-dressed man would be without a pocket square - Cary Grant, Gary Cooper and Fred Astaire were masters at matching.

And now the latest pictures of Brad Pitt at the Cannes film festival show him in a Tom Ford light grey suit, white open-neck shirt and white pocket square.Is it on the way back then? Possibly and hopefully because it does add a bit of dash to an outfit.
So should you wear one or not? By all means, but use caution.

The best and most inconspicuous is a small white linen or cotton square shaped in the TV Fold style, where is it folded to run parallel to the breast pocket with less than half an inch on show. If you are going to wear one make sure it is discreet and don't use bright colors or patterns - it's designed to compliment your suit, not detract from it.  

Sartorial sins can be spotted in all of the world's major cities - New York, London and Paris have as many inhabitants parading embarrassing ensembles as does Melbourne. But if you want to avoid melting into a mass market of mediocrity there are a few key looks to avoid at all costs.
Among them are: The short sleeve shirt with a tie. Can be popular in summer but looks anachronistic and tend to make you look like a postal worker or a parking officer.

- Sports stars: They may look impressive in Speedos but that's usually about the limit for athletes. When dressed up they tend to look uncomfortable and often wear ill-fitting suits - probably because the average suit is made for an average build, not an athletic or muscled physique. You can tell just how irritable they look because there is often one-inch gap between their tie and top shirt button - as if they know they have to wear one but really can't bear the thought of tying it correctly.

- The black suit: Common in New York and Melbourne and as drab a look as is available. Best left to funeral directors. Black looks good on women but on men it is an uninteresting base color, much harder to co-ordinate with than navy or dark grey, which are better options for matching shirts, ties and shoes.

- Dry clean the entire suit: Those who try to save money by continually having their suit pants dry cleaned while ignoring the jacked end up with two different shades - normally the pants fade eventually. Not a nice look.

- Sneakers and suit: It still persists and is about as awful as it comes for both men and women. At least try to wear decent shoes in public and, if you must, change into something more comfortable in the office where you can't be seen.

- The business suit and open-necked shirt. Never comes off and looks even worse if the suit is a formal pinstripe. You can get away with it in summer with, for example, a tan suit, and blue and white stripe open-neck shirt and tobacco suede loafers.

- Cufflinks and no tie. Why team something formal with something informal? Again it is incongruous and looks decidedly odd.

- Shine shoes: Often neglected but one of the first things women notice about men is the state of their shoes, so keep them in top condition.

- The double-breasted suit. It never went out of style even if it comes in and goes out of fashion. All that is asked is that it is kept buttoned at all times.

If you've got l-o-v-e and h-a-t-e tattooed on your knuckles there's not a lot you can do, but there are crucial points to remember when dressing for a job interview.

Assuming you are being interviewed for a white-collar position and a suit and tie will be a requirement, remember that the impression you make on your prospective employer in the first 30 seconds can be vital.

There is a maxim that you should dress for the job you want, not the job you've got - but this could lead you into a fatal trap in the interview process. Out-dressing the interviewer by turning up in a $5000 Brioni suit, $1000 benchmade brogues and a $15,000 Baume and Mercier watch poking out from beneath those French cuffs cinched by diamond cufflinks is probably not a clever idea. But under-dressing can be more offensive and there is a lot to consider about your personal appearance, which goes beyond your clothes, if you are serious. Some people recommend phoning the company's human resources office to get an idea of what most people in the organization wear in the position you are applying for. A little research can't hurt. But basically the idea is to dress conservatively, look decently groomed and don't wear anything that can distract from the process of discussing your appropriateness for the job.

A dark coloured suit is the safest bet. Get one in navy or mid to dark gray but avoid loud pinstripes or checks. Don't wear a pocket square, save that until after you have the job.

- Your shirt should be either plain white or pale blue and worn with either a solid coloured tie or one with subtle patterns or stripes. Some believe the American Republican Party standard red tie is the wrong color for an interview - it's thought to be confronting, in the same way that red cars are considered police magnets.

- The tie should be silk and tied neatly. Make certain you don't walk in with a knot the size of a butcher's first and a collar that's curling at the points. Don't wear fashion-forward suits with ultra slim pants and avoid the current trend to tight-fitting high two-button jackets paired with low-rise pants which leave a six-inch gap of shirt showing between the buttoning point and your belt.

- Belts should always match your shoes in color and black is probably the default choice. Keep the style simple - plain lace-up captoes or brogues and ensure they're well-polished. Leave the pointy-toed or square-toed fake lizard skin slip-ons at home.
And make sure your socks (which should match the pants contrary to popular opinion) cover your calves. Nothing looks more unattractive than a flash of white flesh between dark pants and dark socks.

If you don't own a suit or the company has a slightly more relaxed dress code, wear a navy two-button jacket (without brass buttons), plain grey slacks and shirt and a simple tie.

Apart from clothes there are other aspects which should be considered:

- Make sure your hair is cut and neat and you are freshly shaven.
- Clean hands and fingernails are essential
- Avoid any overpowering cologne or aftershave
- Jewellery on a man should be restricted - a watch and a wedding ring are sufficient
- Think about your briefcase or portfolio - its condition and style is part of the image you want to project.
- The shirt collar and tie frame your face and are items the interviewer can't help but focus on so if you don't know how to tie a four-in-hand or half windsor knot search the internet for simple instructions.
- If you are carrying a mobile phone, make sure it's turned off.

Official figures have confirmed for the first time that consumers have finally become comfortable with buying clothes on the internet.

A recent trade group report showed that internet clothing sales this year overtook those of computer equipment in the US for the first time since the start of online retailing a decade ago. Last year, revenue from skirts, suits and shoes reached $US18.3 billion, surpassing that of PCs, printers and word-processing programs, which totaled $US17.2 billion.

Online retailers said liberal return policies and better navigation tools, such as the ability to zoom in on and rotate the images of items have bridged the gap between online and offline shopping for clothes. Disenchanted with the lack of choice, poorly-made garments and over-the-top prices at bricks and mortar city stores, men as well as women have turned to the net.So where do you go if you want variety, quality and the right price for everything from socks to a suit delivered to your front door? One of the most comprehensive online stores is Lands End (landsend.com), a US retailer which has been in the mail order for more than 40 years.It features a full wardrobe for men and women, although men should probably not venture beyond the business casual - their suits and jackets are basic. For $A25 you can buy solid hard-wearing oxford cotton shirts, around $A140 will get you a 100 percent cashmere sweater in various styles and a range of colors while highly-rated Pima cotton polo shirts are excellent value at $A25.

Even track suits are a good buy - unlike the cheap stuff on offer in Australian shops these are pure cotton, will not pill and will last many years. Suits and sportcoast offer astonishing value on the internet. Exclusive products can be found at shopthefinest.com where a beautifully-made Borelli suit from Naples will set you back around $A1200 - the equivalent in an Australian store will be more than $A4000. Other exclusive Italian makes, Corneliani and Isaia, can be bought at sierratradingpost.com for a quarter of the price they are in Melbourne or Sydney.

But you don't have to go near that figure for value. Perhaps the best bang for your buck in suits is the Baroni (go to EBay and search Baroni), sold by a company called the Wizard of Aahs. Baroni suits are made in the traditional way, with full canvassing and pick stitching and produced from silky Super 150s Australian wool. They can be had for about $A300, almost certainly an unbeatable deal. One of the best things about Baroni is the variety in styles, colors and sizing. You can find every size from a 36 short up and fabrics in solids pin and chalk stripes and subtle plaids. There are single breasted two and three-buttons and the increasingly popular two-button single breasted peak lapel. if you can't see your size or the colour you want email the store - their communication is first class - because only a certain number of suits are scanned onto email - many more are available on request.
If you're worried about fit, don't be. All the key measurements for each size are listed, such as length of the coat and sleeves, width across the back and pant waist. All you need to do is measure your best fitting jacket and compare it to the online suit.

Shoes also have become a big online seller.

One of the better stores is pediwear.co.uk, which sells traditional Northampton-made English classic lace-ups, loafers and boots. Again, if you are concerned about size, go to a high-end shoe store and try on the brand you want to note the size. For example a Loake lace-up brogue shoe which retails for more than $400 in Australia can be purchased from Pediwear for $190, including shipping (remember no VAT applies) and be at your doorstep within a week.

Books on men's style in Australia are about as rare as a pair of spats but if you're intent on a wardrobe overhaul or just want to know what to wear and how to wear it, comprehensive guides are easily available. They range from expansive - and expensive - coffee table tomes to brief and very basic paperbacks which can be had for a few dollars. Amazon is probably the best resource for new books but if you want to save money check out the huge stock available on the central second hand book register abebooks.com. There is a mountain of books advising men on how to dress properly by people with dubious credentials - on the other hand there are several standout volumes which will not lead you astray.

Chief among these is the lavishly illustrated and beautifully presented authority by New York writer and designer Alan Flusser called Dressing the Man: Mastering the Art of Permanent Fashion. A 320-page hardback priced reasonably at $US32 on Amazon, this book has everything you need to know and a lot you could well do without. It is packed with colour photographs of standout dressers like the Duke of Windsor, Cary Grant and Fred Astaire and even reproduces a number of the famous illustrations from Apparel Arts, which developed into Esquire men's magazine, highlighting the epitome of style from the golden age of the 1930s.

Flusser covers everything from suits to socks but also includes advice on physical proportions and appropriate choices for various body shapes and what shades best suit your colouring. But be warned - this is a book about permanent style; how to dress to look good no matter what is in or out of fashion. The Guccis, Versaces and Pradas beloved by the nouveau riche of this world are notably absent. This is more than a basic guide, but it is close to being a definitive one and is written in a witty style which keeps the text lively and entertaining.

A similarly useful book is Bernhard Roetzel's Gentleman: A Timeless Fashion (Amazon $US35.80). Roetzel is a German but one who is a committed Anglophile so the emphasis is on many things traditionally British, although the Italian benchmarks are given a fair degree of attention. Again, at 357 pages and a hardcover, it provides a comprehensive guide. Apart from clothing, topics such as personal grooming, packing for a trip and even the correct way to iron a shirt are included. It also points to the history and development of men's clothing over the decades. Roetzel's book devotes a lot more space to shoes than Flusser's and also gives you the various takes on outfits - how the American, the Italian and the Englishman might approach smart casual, for example. Michael Anton (writing under the nom de plume Nicholas Antongiavanni), a New York-based writer who works for News Corporation chief Rupert Murdoch, has recently released his book The Suit: A Machiavellian Approach to Men's Style (Amazon $12.89). Don't be put off by the daunting title - that simply refers to the humorous way in which the book is written, inspired by Machiavelli's classic The Prince.

The Suit offers advice for men who want to know how to look their best with a view to succeeding in business and to that end provides a wealth of knowledge on suit styles and body shapes, pattern mixing, the appropriateness of stripes and checks and so on. Powerful American public figures in politics and the media provide Antongiavanni with a gleeful opportunity to dismantle their personal style, or lack of, in an attempt to show, in general, what to avoid.

Finally, Cary Grant: A Celebration of Style by Richard Torregrossa (Amazon $US23.10) is worth a look, if only to find out some of the secrets of perhaps the 20th century's best-dressed man. In this you'll learn some of his tricks, such as the way he had his tailors build up the shoulders of his suits to compensate for his unusually large head.

Grant had a simple understated elegance and usually stuck to solid colors, but his wardrobe was awesome. At his Beverley Hills home he had a specially-built contraption in which doors sprung open when he stepped on buttons built in under the carpet to reveal racks of suits and sportcoats in the style of a dry cleaners shop. One friend tells of driving with Grant one day when he diverted to an enormous warehouse storage vault to pick up a coat he needed. When they went in the friend was confronted with, in his words, probably 300 suits, 200 sportcoats and about 50 overcoats. Grant told him to take anything he fancied.

Unfortunately he was the wrong size. 

LOOKING for wardrobe guidance? Confused by the fashion glossies? Intimidated by clothes stores? Don't panic.

There's a huge, largely untapped resource where you can prowl freely and anonymously. The internet has left no area of life untouched, and that includes fashion for men. Before the online explosion of free information, men in need of fashion advice were basically restricted to two options – men's fashion magazines and men's stores. Fashion magazines are just that – all about trends in clothing that seem to change each time you blink. And it's no accident. Designers are hardly going to make money if styles remain constant. Not surprisingly, you'll find little in the way of permanently appropriate dress sense here. And the brands featured are usually in direct proportion to the number of advertising pages a company has paid for. All you'll glean from the pages of fashion magazines is the apparent need to toss out your clothes every six months.

Men's stores are similar. There is either an annoyingly cloying salesperson shadowing your every step or not a soul in sight. Salespeople often have little or no knowledge of how clothes are constructed, how they should be worn and matched and possess scant knowledge of sartorial history. When the sleeve on the suit you try on reaches your knuckles and you're told, "that's the way they're wearing them now", you know you're in the wrong place.

The internet, though, is a different story. Two major international men's web forums – styleforum.net and askandyaboutclothes.com – can provide the answer to more questions than you ever imagined existed.

Styleforum, a classic men's style site founded by a young American known simply as J, began in 2002 as an offshoot of a men's magazine website. There are now more than 10,000 members on the site – and Australians are the fourth most frequent visitors behind Americans, Canadians and Britons. You'll also come across members from a range of countries including Syria, Ethiopia, Surinam and Brunei. "Our demographics concentrate around the college age to young professionals and again around the mid-30s to 40s plus," J says. "But we have members as young as 14 and as old as at least 72." Questions raised range from what men should wear to their wedding, what to wear to go out clubbing to how to dress the departed.

Askandy is similar and it also began in 2002.

Stories in The New York Times and Playboy increased its profile to the point where last year the hits reached more than 300,000 a day. This is a good place to go if you want to ask questions of the experts – even if many are obsessives. Tailors and shirtmakers are also regularly online to give tips. So if 95 per cent of posters tell you a black suit looks bad, take notice. These are just a starting point and similar forums deal with casual wear, fitness and classic clothes for sale. But beware, these sites can be addictive. And once you start giving those lovingly displayed shots of $4000-plus shoes and suits a second look it may prove hazardous to your hip pocket.