The Neckerchief

So its been a while since the last post, and this is squarely down to the turmoil that we are facing in the UK. We're now living in a post Brexit society, where it is hard to see who's completely happy. But this post isnt about Brexit, political satire is not what we're here for, its about fashion in the UK today. And what we are facing is a low pound and fallen investment values. People are looking for ways to save cash, but still look trendy on those nights out, and here at TTC we are no different.

You may be excused to think that a finger on the pulse fashion blog would be rolling in it, with investments in the Cayman islands and  tax avoidance schemes being the guilty thread running through our cloth. However this is not the case, in fact we have been avoiding tax in a much simpler manner; by running at an incredible loss since conception, with the only assets being the few Ultimate Outfits we have painstakingly reviewed through to conception.

Today's post is for the cash strapped average gentleman, that still wishes to look as good as ever, but at a low price. What we here at TTC have decided, is that top end fashionable clothing is money hungry, but accessorising is a classy (and inexpensive) way to revamp some old threads. With the nights closing in, chilly walks into town cooling the extremities, something to keep the cold off would be welcomed. With a bit of research, the Neckerchief seems to be the most trendy choice.

The trendy pair back in action

One of the worst things about an autumnal outfit, is that it keeps you warm in the cold air between venues, but once in a club, where the climate is inevitably warm, the core temperature rises. This can cause an uncomfortable level of heating. In the wilderness, where Bear Grill fingers dead caribou and hugs bears for warmth, layers are apparently the way forward.

Looks like a toasty fellow

Layers allow one to remove them as they acclimatise to the heat, and the neckerchief is a classic example of how this neck warming attire can quickly become a sweat wicking wonder.

Pointing to the inappropriately clothed collective

Cosy DJ

Think about how toasty and serene all those DJs look around the wintery months and ask yourself how they do it, is it because of the droll ditty they are "dropping" or more to do with their trendy dress?  We don't really care for the answer, all we wanted was an excuse to buy ear muffs and pretend we were fiddling with the treble while enjoying a creamy pint.  If this presented us with the chance to discuss how the current tune fit in with the diapason normal then all the merrier. 

That's right, we're covering Cosy DJ, but sporting a pair of fluffy headphones. Now you may be asking yourself whether headphones (even without a fluffy element to them) are a trendy item, but you need to question whether you know any of the people shown here:

Of course you know them all, as they are the same person, and I don't mean they share matching DNA. What I mean is that they are all that person, walking around town with the headphones around their neck. I've seen these guys, but I have never seen them with the headphones on, so what the hell are they achieving? Could it be some form of music emitting neck protection, the last time I saw Wolf he wasn't wearing headphones, but instead a health and safety approved neck brace, a nipple revealing lycra one-piece and a menacing look in his eye.

How is his chest so bald, but hair so wavy?

Despite how ridiculous these people look, and the anger their unused headwear causes us here at TTC, we felt it an important trend to review.

As discussed last week, we have had to move on to Full Moon Bar due to the demise of Floyds and this week that move has paid off big time, look below!

The fact they had decided to jazz up the place to suit our latest trend warmed our hearts, having nice drinks and only a fairly disgusting toilet cemented it as our new hotspot.  Of course the hotspot is ironic as it is freezing in there, a long icy corridor with blasts of Siberian air, thankfully we were the only people not shivering and there was only two reasons why, our fluffy muffs and our steely resolve to report on trends.

As the other DJs blasted out tunes that we didn't really like we uncovered a secondary utility of our luxurious neck accessory, put them up over your ears and suddenly you are transported away to a tranquil but incredibly sweaty chill-out zone.  All that fluff was the perfect sound deadening and spirit lifting material.  The fact we looked like the DJ meant that punters didn't think anything of the prominent muffs and had no idea we were trying to remove ourselves from their clamorous world.

Similar to Patterned Knit, can be worn 2 ways

It wasn't all breezy living as a Cosy DJ, the great fear whenever we sport head/neckwear is the filthy thieves who can't wait to steal any item you hold dear and put on display.  See below for a textbook example.

Please no

Being suddenly subjected to a rambunctious Live Lounge shook us to our very souls and did the criminals no favours, they were just bad eggs.  We did eventually recover our treasured items and in fact weren't bothered again so compared to other specialist winter items, such as the bobble hat, they fared well.

Away from all that drama we came to realise the beauty of the Cosy DJ.  Out on the street you can look like a music enthusiast who is protected from a neck chill or some form of trauma, while in the night clubs of Cardiff you can pretend to be the big dog while actually blocking out that ghastly stuff and focus on just jumping around and sipping bacon flavoured vodka shots.  What a trend!

 

Patterned Knit

Following on with the Winter/Spring theme, our second trend to be tested in front of the Cardiff collective was Patterned Knit, which FashionBeans calls Graphic Knitwear just so it can be as individual as the top-knot sporting hipster; yet I can't help but feel individuality is essentially opposite to what FashionBeans is touting.

In the deep dark Winter, it was easy to find a warming selection of patterned clothing which expresses that knowing Spring titillation, however the Cardiff retailers were providing mostly printed patterns on Tees and Deep V's. Now don't get us here at TTC wrong, we love a Deep V, and giving it a spicy pattern that accentuates the deepness of the V is a lovely testament to the garment, however the remit of the hunt was patterned knit, and the 'knit' part of this is as important as the pattern.

As ever, Peacocks was the place to go for the penny conscious fashionista...

Wowzer

Monochrome, although while lined not especially patterned

Eventually (TTC is very time consuming, and we do put in the time at this stage to ensure perfect results for the end user) we found the perfect knit and bought every example the store had, to ensure exclusivity (it costs a lot of money as well), the fundamental guideline for patternware is not to share them with people outside your group.

As a TTTwist we even tried alternate ways of draping the knit over our respective torsos

Now since our last post there's been something of a blow for the elite of Cardiff nightlife - Floyds has shut its doors for the final time, we think due to a very poor interior design decision to move and elevate the DJ booth, making the whole environment less intimate and sweaty.  It also always suffered a slight reputation issue from not having basin taps in the men's toilet, instead sporting a bucket and ladle.

Replacing Floyds' gaping hole in our evening schedule was nigh on impossible but a combination of Moon and Full Moon clubs gave it a darned good go.

The Alternatives

These places didn't do our favoured Jagerbomb deal but what they did have was mediocre bands trying to make a go of it rather than accepting they needed to get an actual job instead of relying on selling £12 gig t-shirts to 10 people as a way of feeding oneself - it would be funny if it wasn't so tragically depressing to see their crushed hearts when nobody wanted their poorly printed CDs.

These places also don't offer Floyds' exquisite lighting, famed for producing the best trend photos (please see our Instagram offerings).  Instead of photographic chutzpah, Moon Club gives us an honest representation of our delightfully playful yet geometrically brilliant patterns.

What these places did deliver on was the delightfully chatty punters who were more than excited to provide their thoughts on the patterned knit, which ended up being mixed. One such fellow, who had obviously decided that aerodynamicism was not a top priority whereas sub-dermal food storage was, enjoyed the trend. After complimenting though, he did say that he thought we may have been twins. Before this we were taking his compliments as praise from a wise, well fed man, however this quickly changed, as believing that two people are blood related due to similar clothing and optimal muscular definition is a sign of a fool.

We did encounter one incident that highlighted the risks of being a full time blogger/engineer, when a Regular Joe gets too familiar.  Looking carefully at the imagine below you'll see a mystery hand performing a deep tissue massage on one of our shoulders, looking even more carefully you'll appreciate that it can be neither my hand nor James'!

Mmm loosening

As it happens an overly excitable reader of ours had decided to become shamefully drunk and needed a steadying handrail. Thankfully for him, in the dark cesspit of Live Lounge, geometric patterns pointed the way to safety and a chance to propose all sorts of blogging ideas, something that we are never open to hearing about. The danger of arrow type patterns and favourable lighting conditions became very clear, so we quickly fled to the toilet where in a rather characterless fashion they have ladle-free taps.

Hopefully we've had our last mid-jig massage

The evening did not actually end up with much more interesting praise (or for that matter condemnation). It seems as though the Patterned Knit is not much of a great trend, and even with FashionBeans giving it a funky name.  The hurt of a Floydsless world will last for some time, all we can hope is that Cardiff gets a new RnB themed tavern very soon, and that we aren't wearing patterned knit when it does.

Snuggly Goth

Well, here we are again with another (very late) installment of Trend The Consequences. it has been a while since the last post simply because finding new and interesting trends has been difficult. It seems that the 'mainstream' fashion sites are just regurgitating the same trends every year, with a randomly boring addition squeezed in the middle. In fact, it seems that Vogue are just playing the past TTC playlist back to us for 2016. Now I would agree with them that floral and scarfs are good fun, but we have done them. The only interesting addition is Lace:

Delightfully revealing

And then you have FashionBeans with their 'jackets on jackets' which is just a poor remake of the layered V that TTC discovered a couple seasons ago. But I digress from the point of this post, which is to introduce the latest season that TTC are covering, which is some form of Winter/Spring 2015/2016 hybrid that we are posting in the summer.

This first post is about a hybrid that we here at TTC needed to blend together. A meeting of the 'all black' look that is synonymous with the goth world, and the snugglyness of a soothing knitted scarf. We felt that the classic goth was not the image we wanted to portray, simply because their scary outlook is quite intimidating, so incorporated a comfortably huggable scarf to really remove the social separation from others, whilst maintaining an outsider edge.

I think you'll agree - quite snuggly

When in town, you could tell that people were reserved at first, our gothly appearance was making people feel intimidated, and I don't blame the public for this; two dangerously handsome fellows all in black with menacingly good dance moves, what is not there to be intimidated by:

So menacing

However, intimidation slowly turned to intrigue as people noticed the comfy looking scarf. The obvious question going through people's minds was, 'how could someone looking so snuggly be anything other than delightful?', even goth Elmo is still cute:

What an adorable pentagram 

It was when we got to Cardiff's notorious Live Lounge where the crowds really enjoyed the trend. Multiple adoring comments were sent our way throughout the evening, and even the bar staff, who could only really see the scarfy darkness from the bar surface upwards, were delighted every time we came up for a refreshing beverage.

As the evening progressed, our snuggly appearance became too inviting, and groups wanted to get in one the action and feel just how caressable we really were, but with a silent understanding that we all liked drop-D based guitar riffs (or ideally C).

Lovably Cuddlesome

Swap beard for scarf and he is snuggly too

So welcome back to Trend The Consequences for our latest late-hybrid-season report, as ever we have a smattering of posts coming over next few weeks, each greater than anything we've ever done before, but to conclude Snuggly Goth is a (heart)warming way of getting stylish over the bitter winter period while also dabbling with the hoody and growly music types you'd normally steer well clear of.

Summer-Autumn Ultimate Outfit 2015

So with our new season, we only managed to test out three trends that would perfectly sit within the two seemingly different seasons of Summer and Autumn. However this definitely has not limited the delightful choices we could sample for the Ultimate Outfit. In fact, each trend we tried showed signs of being perfect to accumulate into a show stopping UO, with the seductive length of the two tone tunic, the sun shading rim of the straw fedora, and the elusive elegance of a waistcoat.

The First Summer-Autumn Ultimate Outfit

As you can see above, the UO was teamed with a skinny jean. This was chosen as the slender nature of this jean would complement the close fitting of the waistcoat. 

Celebrity Style
As you can tell, this daring outfit wouldn't be far from norm (at least whatever norm exists) in Hollywood. This was confirmed when I went to relieve myself; once in the gents and squaring up to start procedures, the chap that was next to me looked over and said, 'Hey, you look just like Bruno Mars.' At the time I obviously assumed that it was down to the trendy clothing, however thinking back on the event I cannot be too sure what had caught his gaze during his observation. Albeit, the UO may (or may not) be the kind of outfit that would be chosen for a celebrity soiree.

Basically can't tell who's who

The General Public
It is typical on our nights out that we may see a person wearing the trend we have sported recently, possibly due to our favourable review of that item influencing the perception of style. However this UO night out we saw both the fedora and waistcoat being sported, clearly the two tone tunic is still too fresh for the Cardiff masses. 

The waist coat making an appearance with other members of the public

Classic fedora wearer

It happened that the guy wearing the fedora was a lot more accommodating of the embarrassing reality of wearing the same clothing as another person (A potential disaster for a teenage girl going to the prom). Possibly the happy-go-lucky feeling that a fedora gives a man is only enhanced in its company.

However this was a lot less so with the waistcoat wearer. Decidedly disinterested in the busking band, wearing a trendy waistcoat but ruining the look with a gel band round his wrist that one would find in on a teenage punk band and short sleeved shirt (that is far from a trendy short suit), he was not keen to have his look likened to our more trendy style.

Happy Feelings
The night was full of happy people in Live Lounge giving James and I high fives, thumbs up and even once a cheeky fist bump and sincere comments such as, 'nice hat' and 'crazy top' (clearly that chap was unclear of what a tunic is.

A Tunic - it's obvious really

This happy vibe people seemed to be thriving on was clearly emanating from our trendy garments. It felt as though the UO being held in Autumn, but obviously having a summertime aura due to our choice of season mash-up, was providing people with the happy thoughts of summer.

And really, as the nights start to draw in and the realisation that 6 months of darkness is upon us hits home, can TTC give the common man anything more than that vital feeling of sanguine hope that the sun's warming glow hasn't left us yet?

In spite of much ridicule and people telling us we were shattering fashion's restrictive predefined seasons, it would appear the purpose of the Summer Autumn combination is to help folk on the street get through the  pointlessness of Autumn with some optimism and a brash rejection of fashion's archaic rules.

Please join us in a few months when we fully embrace everything we have rejected this season for TTC Winter 15/16.

we have our reasons (££££££££££)

Floyds Man

Following the unprecedented success of our first true foray into the cut-throat world of bespoke fashion, we thought it best we give it another go, this time trying to evoke warm feelings in the more sophisticated reader while not abandoning our nightlife roots. What we got was actually the day to day look of the Floyd's barman, a man we hold in very high esteem, both a snappy dresser when those around him look revolting and someone who can pour a Jagerbomb like no other (sadly the Floyd's Red Bull substitute is very poor).

This is not him but other than the human body inside the clothes there's little difference

Curating the look

We knew a tie was required to achieve a dapper look, but with a summer club environment a full suit would have been an erroneous choice. It was clear the sweater vest of suits was required; the waistcoat. Wearing nothing but ties and waistcoats, although daringly chic, would provoke an adoration from female fans that would be purely a sexual based emotional response to our bodies and not the covering garments, therefore the choice to add in a sharp white shirt, trousers and varying levels of bicep bulge (see below) was taken.

Regrettably when we went to Floyd's and hit the bar sporting big grins and a certain swagger, we were left underwhelmed when the barman served us our jagerbombs without so much as a batted eyelid, the very least a man would expect. We walked away feeling like phonies, but that was the last time we felt less than 110% such was the adoration afforded towards the outfit as we progressed through the sweltering Cardiff streets.

Buttoned up or not?

Thinking back to our idol, the barman, we realised he is a waistcoat buttoner with no rival, always tightly fastened so as not to knock over a pricey bottle of spiced rum with an out of control waistcoat flap. Torn, we tried both out near some cars, to great effect:

Loose and flappy vs. tight and controlled

 Agreeing that, actually, buttoned up was dumb we never spoke of it again.

The black and white combo provides a striking UV juxtaposition

Difference to a business suit

As readers of this blog, it's not stretching it to picture us as perfectly successful businessmen, but how would dressing in what could be grossly mistaken as business attire fair in bustling Livelounge? This fear was compounded during the walk to Livelounge, when a deeply uneducated neanderthal asked, "why are you wearing suits?", despite the distinct lack of suit jacket. We walked away from this, because obviously the UK's educational system had failed him, how could we have helped now?

Fearing we would be singled out as public enemy number one - CityBankers/England Rugby Team – and wedgied, we kept a low profile, not doing anything that would give a false impression of massive wealth, such as buying bacon flavoured vodka or having overly polished shoes. To great relief we found ourselves embraced in the bosom of acceptance and laddish antics thus demonstrating rolled up sleeves and a waistcoat only highlight your fondness of both a good time and organic bulgur wheat.

Final Thoughts

The only particularly cutting comment of the night was when we were rudely compared to a waiter, other than that the look was warmly welcomed.

A note, there are in fact two Floyd's barmen who dress and look the same, we can confidently say they are twins and not just one man in different ties as we have seen them pouring jager side by side.

The sweet breastage of a TTC blogger

Straw Fedora

It's been said that the straw fedora is the most versatile hat in a modern gents walk in hat rack and this year it is available everywhere in a range a colours that will blow your mind. From the cheap and very pleasant offerings in Peacocks to the lavish charcoal wool offering from Harvey Nicks, there's no reason not to get one.

Pimp Mutha F*ckin' Daddy
When we met in the Gatekeeper, we got our drinks and were heading to find a table to sit. This is where we were stopped by a gentleman who asked us about our hats. Gladly we talked of the straw fedora and its benefits, to which he seemed perfectly agreeable with. At the end of the conversation he asked my name, and when I started to speak he immediately stopped me and said, 'No, now it's "Pimp Mutha F*ckn' Daddy"' as he held his hand up for a handshake. With the shock of my unbeknownst recent name change, I felt more comfortable with the idea of a hearty handshake; but oh how wrong I was. This is where a complicated series of hand shifts and tantric holds started and I came out feeling as though I had just performed some form of rigorous hand yoga. It was unclear whether this chap thought I was part of some secret society in which this was the secret handshake, but whatever had gone through his head at the time, the fedora had clearly been an influence on his thought process.

Shocked I still have the ability to hold a glass after my hand workout

Style and More
The fedora offers classic grace and charm, but not only that, it provides one more key benefit.
Being naturally pasty lumps of muscular goodness, that would only induce mild jealousy at an albino fashion show, we are often victim to the harsh reality of sunburn when caught short of emergency sun block. The beauty of a straw fedora is that it instantly provides us with the protection we need to be able to leave the house between the peak sun hours of 10:00 - 17:00, with only factor 50 sun cream on the tips of our noses.  This is a liberty we were unaware of prior to Summer Autumn 2015, previously resigned to spending the cruel British spring, summer and autumn hidden away, hoping for rain.

What is shocking here is that this guy clearly does not have the traps for wearing a vest in public

Night-time Robbery
As ever with the nights we test trendy hats, this was one trend that was easily stolen. Whilst walking to our final venue (the classic Live Lounge), my hat was removed from my head in one simple swift motion. Providentially, I spotted the rogue a while before crossing his path, so had the knowledge of his planned attack ahead of time. Instead of stopping him taking it, I felt that providing the deviant opportunity to get robbery out of his system early in the evening may save a fellow hat bearer the trauma at a later hour.

Shamefully hatless

This theme continued through the night, with more crafty thievery than could even be conceived by Abu in Disney's Aladdin.


Chomp Chomp

Luckily this didn't deter us, we carried on with our night regardless.

Why do they feel the need to take our hats?

Through the rest of the night, the hats received good feedback, some genuine: "I love 'um" as well as "Love your hats, I really do".

Instead of stealing, this is compassionate sharing

However some was potentially less so when we received what seemed to be a classically legitimate complement: "You've got a nice hat Bro" but then later the same guy, "You're rocking that hat Bro" which basically cheapened everything he had previously said.


Elegance

The real highlight, we enjoyed a whole night out without succumbing to nasal sunburn.