Ivy Style reports that Brooks Brothers will no longer be stocking their traditional fit shirts on store shelves. Instead, shops will only carry the company’s regular fits, slim fits, and extra-slim fits, while traditional fits must be ordered online or placed as a special order through a sales associate. A Brooks Brothers representative writes:
There is simply less demand for the traditional-fit model, whereas sales for the other three fits continue to grow each year. We recognize that that the traditional-fit shirt is important to some customers, therefore we continue to make it available in all the same fabrics.
A bit sad as far as Brooks’ history goes. As far as I can tell, the company’s traditional fit is more or less the same as the 1950s Brooks Brothers shirt I have stored in my closet. At the same time, it’s a cut that’s almost only valuable as a novelty. Even for the readers of Ivy Style, whose tastes run more traditional than most, it seems everyone has migrated to Brooks’ regular fit, if not slim.
Personally, I like my oxford-cloth button-downs a little full – sort of like what you see above. A little more room in the chest and waist in order to give the shirt a distinctively relaxed, easy-going, all-American look. Even those, however, are probably closer to Brooks Brothers’ slim fit (at least on my frame), than their regular, let alone traditional. So, perhaps nothing’s lost.
