A Sheep in Sheep's Clothing

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If you’re like 95% of dudes, you either don’t know or don’t give a fuck about style. You go to work and you dress the same as everyone else. As long as your shirt is ironed and your shoes are clean, you’re good to go.

You wear the standard weekend casual wear - a pair of ugly trainers, some Dad jeans a t-shirt and plaid shirt or a hoody. Same as everyone else.

For a night out, you’ll switch the trainers for a pair of shoes and switch the t-shirt for a shirt. Same as everyone else.

And if it’s a big night out, you’ll pull out your ‘going out’ shirt. The one you bought 6 years ago and still wear because someone once told you that it looked good on you.

You wear a fleece in winter because it’s ‘cozy’. You wear cargo shorts in summer because they have handy pockets. And you wear wrap around silver tinted sunglasses in summer because.... well, I have no idea why the fuck you wear them.

You never put any effort in, you don’t do any research and you never go outside your comfort zone. And if you’re an especially lazy cunt, you let your wife buy your clothes for you.

That’s OK if you’re happy being a badly dressed sheep. That’s fine if you’re content being an average looking Joe. That’s great if you’re happy putting in zero fucking effort. But if you want to look like a man who has his shit together and looks like he actually gives a fuck, then you need to develop your own style.

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What da Fuck is Style?

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It’s not about matching your belt with your shoes.

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“Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn.”

– Orson Welles

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A High Value Man has frame and lives his life according to his own values and his own standards. An integral part of these standards is his style. Style is important to him. Looking good is important to him. Smelling good is important to him. Being groomed is important to him. And not looking like his wife bought his clothes for him in Wallmart is really fucking important to him.

Why?

Because his style is a visual representation of who he is.

It is the outward projection of his frame - a visual expression of his own identity.

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"Remind yourself. Nobody built like you, you design yourself."

- Jay Z

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I'm too hot - hot damn - Called a police and a fireman

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Your style is for you to decide and when you define it, when you own it, it becomes part of who you are. You do it for yourself. But make no mistake - looking good makes your life a shit load easier – easier to get a job, easier to advance in your career, easier to win over clients, easier to develop relationships and yeah.. easier to get your dick wet.

It’s a value add on on every level.

People will always make a judgement on you based your appearance. By dressing well, you are conveying a message and projecting your frame without speaking a word. Style is an instant language. You’d be a fool not to learn it.

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"It is both delusional and stupid to think that clothes don't really matter and we should all wear whatever we want. Most people don't take clothing seriously enough, but whether we should or not, clothes do talk to us and we make decisions based on people's appearances."

-- G. Bruce

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Developing Your Style

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“Know first who you are, and then adorn yourself accordingly.”

– Epictetus

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Developing your own style has parallels to developing your body through lifting and proper nutrition – it doesn’t happen overnight. If you’ve spent the first few decades of your adult life turning yourself into a waddling blob of fat, you’re not going to look like a Greek God after 2 weeks. It takes time and effort.

The same applies to developing your style. You’ll get noobie gains. The first time you start dressing well, people will notice, you’ll get compliments, you’ll feel great. But don’t make the mistake of thinking that you’ve nailed it. You haven’t. You just bought the first half decent outfit you’ve worn in your adult life.

And yes, I did say ‘outfit’. Suck it up, Princess.

That’s the learning curve. Just like lifting, the longer you spend at it, the harder you work at it, the better you get at it... until one day, you’ll walk by the mirror and think – ‘fuck that dude looks good’.

I can’t tell you what to wear no more than I can tell you how to live your life or develop your own frame. No one can. You need to decide this for yourself. If your style is the visual representation of your frame, then it’s your frame that will decide your style.

But there are some easy ways in which you can begin the process;

Fit is King

It doesn’t matter what you are wearing or what the occasion is – be it a business suit, a casual weekend fit or even your sweaty gym gear – fit is absolute king. It reigns supreme over everything else. Too baggy, too tight, too short, too long - if it doesn’t fit, it will look like shit.

You see it all the time – fat dudes wearing baggy clothes in a pathetic attempt to hide the belly, muscular guys wearing far too tight clothing to show their gains, skinny twats wearing skinny jeans to show how fragile their legs are, or just your middle-of-the-road average Joe wearing stuff that’s cut badly, made from cheap materials, doesn’t sit right and does nothing to enhance their visual appearance.

None of this shit works.

So learn how to nail the fit and you’re halfway there already. No exaggeration – that’s half the work done.

Stick to the Classics

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"I live for myself and I answer to nobody."

– Steve McQueen

You don’t need to reinvent the wheel when developing your style. It’s already been invented – all you need to do is find the pieces that you like and put them together in a cohesive way that looks good on you. The easiest way to do this is to stick to the classics.

Steve McQueen was a master at this. He’s often lauded as one of the greatest ever style icons and features repeatedly year after year in article after article in men’s style magazines and blogs. And his style still looks good today. Not bad for a dude who’s been dead for 40 years.

If you look at how he dressed, there’s nothing complicated about it – he just stuck to classic items like polo shirts, bomber and Harrington jackets, slim fit jeans, well fitting t-shirts and perfectly fitted suits.

There’s nothing try-hard about his style, nothing fancy and nothing ‘fashion’, yet he looks cool, elegant and stylish – all the while combining classic items with perfect fit. He looks equally good in a suit, in motorcycle gear or even dressed head to toe in denim. That man knew how to dress. If you’re looking for a style icon to follow, you can’t go far wrong with McQueen.

Keep it Simple

It’s not complicated, so don’t over complicate it.

Classic items will help you keep it simple but there are other areas where you need to stick to the basics:

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Colour.

Your colour friends are – neutrals and earthy colours – black, white, navy, grey, khaki, olive, beige and brown.

That’s it. Stick to a basic pallete. Not only is it easy, it’s masculine, refined and makes it really simple to mix and match.

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Less is more

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“All it takes are a few simple outfits. And there’s one secret – the simpler the better.”

– Cary Grant

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The 80/20 rule applies here. If you look in your wardrobe, I guarantee that you wear 20% of your clothes 80% of the time. That is why you don’t need a massive amount of clothes. You need a small amount of clothes that you will get a lot of wear out of.

You don’t need lots of choices; you just need the right choices.

So learn to choose carefully – or time after time, you’ll be left standing in front of a wardrobe full of clothes, frustrated that you have nothing to wear. Like a bitch.

Steal from Your Icons

“One pretends to do something, or copy someone or some teacher, until it can be done confidently and easily in what becomes one’s own style”.

– Cary Grant

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If you look at any famous creative people – musicians, artists, designers, film makers – none of them are original. They have all stolen from other artists, then learned how to tweak what they liked, combined it with other bits and ‘made it their own’. A great artist is basically a magpie.

Developing your own style is no different. So find your style icons and rip them off. Yep.. just copy them. Then tweak it & develop it until it becomes your own. It’s that simple.

One of the easiest places to start is the annual Best Dressed Man of the Year Awards – the likes of GQ & Fashionbeans run these every year. Here you’ll find the likes of Vincent Cassel, Ryan Gosling, David Beckham, Idris Elba, Simon Porte Jacquemus, Daniel Craig, David Gandhy, Shawn Mendes,Jeff Goldblum, Donald Glover, etc. All men with great personal style, all worthy of emulating and stealing tips from in your journey as you develop your own style.

Show Me the Money

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“It is totally impossible to be well-dressed in cheap shoes.”

– Hardy Amies

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Why spend 100 bucks on a polo shirt when you can get 8 for that price? Well, the answer is easy – for 100 bucks, you get quality in terms of design, materials and fit that will last. For 12 bucks, you get a poorly fitting polo made from low grade materials that looks like it cost 12 bucks and - after a few washes - is worthless. One well selected costly item has much more value than ten cheap ones. Not only in how it looks but in how much bang per buck it gives you.

The difference is even greater when you’re buying outerwear and footwear. These are two areas where you simply cannot skimp on. Cheap shoes kill any outfit stone dead. Cheap jackets are just as bad. There’s a reason why you pay more for leather, wool and cotton - it’s practically impossible to look good in man made synthetic materials like polyester, pleather and acrylic.

If you can’t afford high quality clothes, there are numerous places and ways to get discounted quality clothing and footwear.

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Shop online

A retailers job is to sell you shit you don’t need – good retailers do this by maximising lighting and mirrors to make you look as good as possible when you’re in the changing room. Ever tried on something in a shop, thought it looked good and when you got home realised that it looked better on in the shop? That’s why.

You’re also a lot more likely to impulse buy. 3 shirts for 20 bucks on the sale rack? What a bargain. That’s 20 bucks for three shitty shirts that’ll end up gathering dust in your wardrobe before you fuck them into the thrash. Yeah, real bargain.

So shop online –use retailers that offer free deliveries and returns, then try on that shit in the comfort of your own home. This also allows you to try stuff on with things you already own. There’s no point in buying something that just doesn’t fit into your wardrobe – you’ll never wear it.

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Never Go Full Retail

All designers and high street shops are over-priced. Their pricing structures allow for their clothing to be sold at discount prices during sales periods and still make a profit, so don’t pay full whack – wait for the sales, use discount codes, install the Honey add-on to your browser, sign up to newsletters for discounts, use cash back sites.

Other places such as Yoox offer designer clothes at discount prices. You’d be a fool to go full retail.

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“Looking good isn’t self-importance; it’s self-respect.”

– Charles Hix