I got told yesterday by a kid in third period why I had “the same coat as my dad.” I was not wearing my dad’s coat. Was not wearing his coat jacket coat. I was wearing a field jacket I bought three weeks ago because I liked the way it looked with a sweater underneath. The boy was thirteen, heartless, and also just about hit the nail on the head for why I suddenly hate that jacket so much. It was, in fact, the exact boxy, extra large shape that every dad jacket adopted in 1994 and that shows up in your grandparents’ photo albums twenty years later unexpectedly flattering everyone in them.
I wore it a couple more times for maximum adolescent bullying potential and then banished it to the back of my closet, where it stays for the pendulum to swing back and forth between being donated and me giving it another chance.
I mention all this because when people ask me what is actually currently fashionable when it comes to menswear jackets, they’re usually thinking of some variation of a trend report and what they need instead is someone telling them what’s currently landing on actual bodies and hitting actual streets and doing its actual job in actual weather, not what was deemed handsome on a mostly empty runway in Milan three months ago by people who live in cities where forty five degrees and raining is not a thing.
The stuff people are wearing as opposed to what marketers want them to
The chore coat has quietly ascended to replace the plain hoodie as the jacket of choice for anyone under 40 who wants to look like they made an effort but not too much of an effort. Not the stiff sherpa ones that look like they can stand up by themselves.
The ones with a little bit of body to them but still soft, in colors that aren’t black or navy, something close to faded army green or rust that has clearly been through some shit. I have three. This is not a coincidence, I promise. I bought one to wear on parent teacher conference days so I could blend in with all the other chaotic magnet school parent teachers conferences. Then I ruined that one with paint on the cuff when one of my students accidentally dipped his wrist into the washable paint bowl while making ridiculous fantastical animals and I got the second one because it was the exact same one but BRAND NEW! Paint ruined again! And then after my colleague wore hers to staff meeting and looked–and I’m not one to just hand out compliments–ten pounds thinner and forty years cooler than anyone else in the room, I bought a third because the jacket and not what we were supposed to be talking about.
The other trend happening vs. what all the internet menswear cosplay sites will tell you is happening is that puffers are officially all of us choosing them instead of them just being something you put on before you grabbed your skis out of the garage. And I don’t mean the glossy semi-transparent ones that look like they’d snap if you blew too hard on them. I mean the kind that are matte and have some quilted texture to them but aren’t inflatable, form fitting in a weather coat rather than ski jacket kind of way, and in colors Mother Nature would recognize as neutrals. I avoided this forever because the bulk of reference for puffers in my mind was the gigantic dedicated ski jacket my mother made me wear while waiting for the bus in seventh grade that wouldn’t even let me put my arms down at my sides. It haunted me for years until a coworker wore a black, fitted puffer with a collared shirt to school one day under her winter coat and I realized they actually exist and bought one that weekend. Three years later I have three. Don’t judge me.
Death on the style trends that will never come backronically being worn right now? Big frickin’ blazers worn as “everyday” coats. No one cares about pretending to look like they’re wearing somewhere anymore. Trenches, windbreakers, actually useful bags, clothes people actually feel good wearing while being active. Pockets that can fit your phone without exploding. Coats with collars that do something to protect your neck from wind. Fabric that doesn’t scream “Please let it not rain!” the second you feel a drop.
Your commute on your worst day is the only true fashion freelance writer knows
Here’s where I gettery, and we’re not even friends so you know it, because someone literally told me this last week, an eighth grader asked me if I “only talk about coats like you’re preparing for war.” Maybe I do! Winter where I live isn’t a season it’s a bodily violation inflicted upon you by the atmosphere and if it has survived one particularly horrendous commute where the weather apps lied to me and my coat failed me badly I trust it.
Last week it was supposed to rain, light in the morning but switching over to flurries in the afternoon, according to the weather. It did not flurry.
It rained sideways and hard enough that it got into my coat through every opening it could find and I was standing there in wool blend jacket that looked fabulous and served absolutely no functional purpose whatsoever besides looking fabulous once it soaked through and retained all that water like a sponge. Suddenly my jog to my car felt like a weight lifting workout and that sweater I was wearing underneath suddenly felt like a bad idea. That coat, once worn anywhere that wasn’t “nice restaurant, city that doesn’t actually snow,” is never going to see the light of day again.
The stuff that stays wins though. The washable down skateboarding jacket my kid begged me to buy him that can handle being ridden hard because thin enough to bike in, warm enough to not freeze on said bike. The chore coat that caught coffee splashed in its face by a student tearing across campus when my dean grabbed my shoulder and said, “Watch those kids, man,” and had coffee spit on by another student who thought stubbornly running while holding a textbook looked like a good idea. No seam burst, no stain didn’t come out in the wash. You think I care that it doesn’t photograph well? Guess who got to talk about coats with a receptive audience today.
Gareth teaches in Leeds and dresses for four proper seasons, including the sideways rain. He writes about practical clothes, weatherproofing that actually works, and coats he’s put through a full Yorkshire winter.
