Recently I have seen an uptick both in prep style/ivy league style/trad style (not exactly the same) blogs, as well as discussion of just want prep is. Is it merely fashion, is it a lifestyle? Can it be purchased, must you be born into it? Is brand more important than cut or design? Does it only rightfully belong to those who attend preparatory academies, private schools, or boarding schools? Does it belong to those who go to Ivy League schools only? Do you have to be white, anglo-saxon, protestant? Must you be rich (and yet never talk about it and faux pretend you're not)?
Let's get this straight before we proceed any further: "prep" and its siblings are very much Americana. It's not a watered down version of British fashions, but rather stems from America's love affair with sports and sports based fashion. This sportiness and ruggedness leaked into higher fashion. It's more American than apple pie; we
did steal that from the British.
It's very important to keep in mind that this style family is uniquely American, because the application of it relies on the core values of what America has, at least in part, with some bumps along the way, always stood for: rugged individualism and not just the allowance, but the encouragement of upwards mobility. You should already start to see where I'm going to fall on some of these issues.
Is prep just a fashion statement, or is it a lifestyle? Both, but one cannot be removed from the other. I say you can't buy prep, and what I mean is, just purchasing the items you see above (all from my closet) and wearing them does not make you prep. All these items are key pieces in the prep closet, but the acquisition of them is not the focus. Already having them is. Those who are preps, usually (fashion commentators aside), don't often see the transition between the clothes that have been purchased for them and those they purchase for themselves. Yes, yes, options come in and out of trend, and certain colors or brands may be hot from this year to the next, but new items are purchased largely to replace similar items that have finally fallen apart or become too small.
One of the most important aspects of a prep wardrobe the longevity of the pieces it contains. This is shown through natural wear and tear (though not too much tear) over the course of years (purchasing "pre-distressed" clothing is not only silly, it stands out a mile away). So important is this idea, that Yale students (the only tradition I am very familiar with), used to rub their oxford button down shirt collars with sandpaper to make them appear to have years worth of rubbing against the neck, or standing in their showers with a brand new pair of weejuns (a type of shoe, google it) to make it look like they'd been worn continuously for years and to make the leather mold better, faster. Again, the idea is to replace what you had, and not make it obvious that you had! It's also a big deal to have pieces that belonged to a family member when they were younger. The sea green polo shirt in the above picture? Older than I am. It was my step-father's before it moved on to me. And it might have been purchased a few weeks or months ago, for all that anyone can tell.
So no, you can't purchase prep. However, you also don't have to be born into it. Although there are individuals who have a vested interest (no pun intended, vests are very big, if done right) in making you believe that prepdom is a birthright and nothing else, this is total pishposh. Many of these same individuals may only be second or third generation prep themselves, conveniently forgetting that their grandparents or greatgrandparents started with nothing but maybe a few great ideas and a very strong work ethic. Nothing annoys me more than meeting a fellow prep who looks down on others because of family position only to find out that their parents were the first ones to go to college in the family, and that the fellow prep is living high off the sacrifice and struggle of their parents who did all the hefty living. I can trace my family lines back to a 1400s noble family in the British Isles, so freakin what? This is America (well, for the purposes of this post, I'm not in Japan). Everyone has an equal opportunity to join high society. You don't think your family got made fun of three generations ago when they were the new kids on the block? They were, even if it was only in private. Be nice to the up and comers. Your grandpappy will thank you.
I've already said quality and longevity are the important aspects for a prep wardrobe. Obviously a piece is not very likely to be quality or long-lasting if it is obvious that the cut and design will be temporary. There are definitely go to brands for each item pictured above. Brooks Brothers and J. Press for suits, Polo Ralph Lauren and Lacoste for polo shirts, LL Bean for knits and jackets, Sperry, Bass, and Colehaan for shoes... New labels like J. CREW and Uniqlo are getting ahead, and avant-garde brands like Band of Outsiders also get attention... But WHY are these brands the "it" brands? Because,
these are the brands that consistently deliver quality and longetivity while also providing looks that are timeless. If you buy these items today, say a Brooks oxford, a J. Press blazer, or a polo from Ralph Lauren, and take care to keep wear to the minimum required for the proper look, they won't last you months or a few years,
they will last you decades.
The term prep comes from "preparatory" but we have long passed the period where this is an absolute reflection of affluence. Sometimes it's just the will of the kid. I attended private school for most of my schooling, but opted (begged, really) to attend the local public high school, when I could have continued on the private track. In truth, due to the sheer lack of diversity among my city's residents, this really didn't matter very much. The level of wealth and privilege at my high school was palatable, and the denizens observed the same rituals I would have found in a private or boarding school. But at least I had the freedom to dress as I wanted (and I ran away from prep so hard, it amuses me now). To give you an idea of how diverse my high school was? My mother's high school had the same number of black students as mine did: two. And she went to school during integration in the sixties. This has all changed in the last decade as the city has become a major commercial hub for the suburban area it lies in, but it was true at the time.
So what about Ivy League? Nope, not anymore. Entire family histories have been written with university and college legacies loyally followed. You are as likely to find someone who summers in Nantucket at the University of Texas or Baylor as you are at Yale or Harvard or Princeton (they may even know each other; you never know who you'll end up with property next to. My grandmother's beach house was next door to Al Capone's!). In my experience this is possibly even more true of prominent black families, with legacy ties to Morehouse, Spellman, or Huston-Tillotson, historically black colleges and universities with storied and dignified pasts. As families grow larger and spread across the nation, you see less reliance on the Northeast and less reliance on Ivy League schools, although it is never a surprise when a family haunt like Martha's Vineyard is still a generational retreat, or that some percentage of a family's offspring will end up at an Ivy League school. Affluence follows capital, and capital can be found in all corners of America. And where you find affluence, you find prep.
The race, ethnicity, and religion claim to prep is by far the easiest myth to debunk. While the WASPs (White Anglo-Saxon Protestants) may have made up the majority of the social class that gave birth to prep, they never held that class entirely alone. From the very beginning of the country, there were prominent Jews and Catholics. That not only gets rid of religion, it gets rid of ethnicity. In our modern times a number of individuals can be looked to as examples. Lisa Birnbach, that princess of prep herself, author of the Official Preppy Handbook, is Jewish. Also those prep icons for generations, the Kennedys, were neither Anglo-Saxon nor Protestant, they were (like me) Irish Catholic. Race is also fairly easy to debunk merely by looking at the history of Martha's Vineyard:
Many of the country's most affluent black families have enjoyed a century-old tradition of summering on the island. Concentrated primarily in and around the town of Oak Bluffs, and the East Chop area, these families have historically represented the black elite from Boston; Washington, D.C.; and New York City. Today, affluent black families from around the country have taken to the Vineyard, and the community is known as a popular summer destination for judges, physicians, business executives, surgeons, attorneys, writers, politicians, and professors. The historic presence of black residents on the island resulted in the nickname of one of Oak Bluff's most popular beaches. Dubbed "The Inkwell," this small beach is central to Oak Bluffs and within short walking distance to many of the homes of the more notable black families. The Inkwell (1994), directed by Matty Rich, dealt with this close-knit Vineyard community.Source:
Wikipedia entry on Martha's Vineyard.What about money? Doesn't it always come down to money? Yes and no. I think it is much more reasonable to say that it is affluence that matters for prep, and not a specific amount of money. Let's examine the definition of affluence vs. the definition of wealth.
Main Entry: af·flu·ence
Pronunciation: \ˈa-(ˌ)flü-ən(t)s also a-ˈflü- or ə-\
Function: noun
Date: 14th century
1 a : an abundant flow or supply : profusion b : abundance of property : wealth
2 : a flowing to or toward a point : influx
Main Entry: wealth
Pronunciation: \ˈwelth also ˈweltth\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English welthe, from wele weal
Date: 13th century
1 obsolete : weal, welfare
2 : abundance of valuable material possessions or resources
3 : abundant supply : profusion
4 a : all property that has a money value or an exchangeable value b : all material objects that have economic utility; especially : the stock of useful goods having economic value in existence at any one time
These may seem to be the same, but the difference is the word flow. Affluence (the steady flow of money or property) may exist where wealth (the abundance of money or property already) does not. Affluence seeks out the wealth of others, but is a prerequisite for wealth to exist. Let's go back to the example of how many of these prep families earned their wealth:
Grandfather moves to America from INSERT COUNTRY HERE, and maybe he has some savings, some clothes, but not much. Let's even say he has a skill... He's a shoe-cobbler. He finds a job and works at it. He wants to make shoes, but he needs more money. Ten years later, he has enough money to open a small custom shoe shop. It's still the turn of the century, so this is pretty viable. Within another ten years his store has grown, he's married, has your father, and is showing a tiny, but livable profit. His shoes are known for quality and longevity, and they attract the notice of the city's elites. While your grandfather doesn't keep much of the profits, his newfound AFFLUENCE allows him to control and direct the growth of the business. Twenty years later, grandfather now owns a successful chain of stores and he's considered a regional power. He now has WEALTH because his profits are coming in way faster than his overhead is going out. By the time you're born, Grandpappy is running a Shoe Empire, your father went to Harvard, and you are, at birth, both AFFLUENT and WEALTHY without doing a damn thing.
At some point, after Grandfather achieved affluence, but before he achieved wealth, he had to "fake it before he made it." It was probably difficult at first, financially, but he had to be seen at the right parties, court the right clients, eat at the right restaurants, and wear the right clothes (but always, always, his OWN shoes!), and make sure your father understood he was going to go to Harvard, and there would be no discussion about it. This is what I call "owning" prep. I wouldn't really call it faking it, because that implies there is something artificial or non-genuine about the effort, which I don't think there is.
You don't need to be Bill Gates, or even the Kennedys, to "own" prep. As long as you have an inbound flow of success and prosperity or are doing your best to move towards it for the good of yourself and the good of your progeny, then you can have the right attitude to be prep. You might be the first in your family to go to college, you might be the one who has go out there and work some shitty jobs to get the capital investment to build your widget empire. But that's cool, because one of these days you'll be looked upon as the founder of a dynasty. The one who made it possible for your descendants to walk the halls of both Brown and Washington.
I think your future family can spot you one on the polo shirt, as long as you make sure to "own" everything that polo shirt represents. If you can do that, you're prep.
