Photo: Von Span
I prefer to wear linked cuffs in town. I think links are better looking as well as faster to don than a couple of buttons on my shirt cuffs. But there's a trick to it.
I was wearing a double sided pair the other day, which is to say a model like the link in the photo that had decoration for both sides of the cuff, and a colleague asked how I got by without a valet to help me dress.
Now it is fairly obvious that both sides of a man's cuff are visible and ought to be dressed. Two identical or similar decorations are required, joined by a short bar or length of chain. There's no need for single sided links with mechanical gizmos or for a second party to be involved in putting them in for (and here's the trick) a man's shirt cuffs should be sized to slide over his hand with the link already in place.
And that's all there is to it.
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18 comments:
I can remember the first time I was putting on these cuff-links. It took me forever, all the while thinking about how I'd have to suffer this every time I put on a double-cuffed shirt in the morning.
Fortunately, by the second time I had to go through with this, I had already figured out the "trick" Will is referring to.
Will, are you sure that the cuffs should be so big?
I agree that those one-sided links look rather silly, and only two sided links are worthy of wear.
My trick is to out one side of the links into one part of the cuff before I put on the shirt. Then closing everything I put the link on "asole" at a time to close the cuff. It takes time, patience and clam. In fact, I often lose patience when it doesn't work, but I look at it as way to face the day.
If I have the patience for these cufflinks, I can be patient with anyone today.
i have a nut and bolt set of cufflinks. they are silver plated, with the cross on the bolt. i picked them up in london from a japanese shop that is no longer with us. when i am at work i have the bolt on the outside and when at play i put the nut on the outside, with the unfinished end of the bolt showing.
So that is the trick to it! I have always admired the larger cuffs, especially on the English made shirts, figuring they were made that way to allow a watch to fit under them. But this revelation hits it straight on. I am due for a new batch of shirts and I will be certain to explain to my tailor that I want the correct cuff sizing to allow for my hand to slide through with the link already on. No more clumsy displays while I try to get my links through my shirt!
Piffle. It does not require much dexterity to enable one to put on a pair of cufflinks without requiring a valet or great exapnses of cuff hanging off one's wrist.
It's true.
And I've spent forever wrestling with my cuffs.
Ah well, we live and learn!
The cuffs on Ralph Lauren's top of the line "custom fit" shirts fit snugly. There is no way I can put the cufflinks in beforehand, though I have slender hands. I'm not convinced Ralph Lauren's shirts would look better with oversized cuffs.
Cuffs that do not permit you to slide your hands through them when closed are under-sized.
For those who absolutely insist on the tighter-fitting cuffs, the snap-links are an excellent choice. For those unfamiliar with them, these are double-sided cuff links that are joined with a snap. After donning the shirt, one needs only to snap the links.
I've never really seen the attraction of the T-Bar cufflink, always prefering a chain-link or a solid pinked piece, as in your photograph.
And the things that, to us, seem second nature (or common sense) like making sure the hand slips through the cuffs when the links are in place are, I suppose, understandable to any novice.
Indeed, if one cares to peruse my own blog, just before Christmas I was stopped in the local Marks & Spender by two teenage girls, out buying a present for some beau, with the words: "Excuse me. Do cufflinks come in different sizes?".
End of story!
I have been putting them in all of these years and had no idea I wasn't the only one. Thanks Will!
Forgive me gentlemen. In this era near economic collapse, bad television, terrorism, environmental decay, and square toed shoes. This forum inspires me to add my two cents to a more dramatic unfolding tragedy...
Shirt cuffs flopping around like some fish on your wrist? I think that is what is killing French cuffs. They have to fit. Skin should not be showing, but they shouldn't slide over your Vacheron-Constantin!
I've seen British bankers here in meetings with Italian bankers. While the Italians do not usually wear links, their sleeve length fits better than most british. Blasphemy, I know, but the Brits oversized sleeves (and no taper to their jacket sleeves) and their french-cuffs ten sizes to big, look rather silly.
Later that day, I met an older British gentleman (one of the banks hereditary founders). He just looked the part. Subtle, but fiercely well dressed. His cuffs looked perfect, as did everything else. Despite the perfection, and my infuriating envy, I realized the genius of British wear. He looked incredibly relaxed and completely natural as if he were wearing shorts and flip flops on a beach in Santa Cruz. No Italian could really pull it off like that-not even Agnelli!
I controlled my envy enough to notice that his cufflinks were double sided. He winked at me when I looked up from them. "Made them myself from buttons from my ancestors’ odd jackets..."
Unfortunately my dear Mr. Frensham, I do not believe there is a standard size of cufflinks. I actually measured them and they are all over the map.
Since these are important matters in our difficult times, I would say you stick to your guns about the size of your French cuffs. I do, however, suggest you see Cary Grant in "Charade" when he changes his shirt in front of Audrey Hepburn. If you can learn to put your links on like him in front of a lovely woman, then you are on your own!
Page 135 of Flusser's "Dressing the Man" states, in relevant part:
"Shirt cuff and hand should move as one. If the hanbd can slide through the cuff opening without first unfasterning it, the cuff's circumference is too large."
The preceding sentences on the page discuss regular and french cuffs, so I think the stated "rule" above apply to both.
Salvatore, French cuffs are always larger in circumference than button cuffs. In this case, I disagree with Mr. Flusser.
Reinforcing that opinion, I can slide my hand through the cuffs of my bespoke shirts from Sulka, Turnbull & Asser and Charvet.
I have to think that cuff size is a matter of personal taste. I imagine there are readers of even this blog who have no taste for cuffs which require links. My own taste is to use french cuffed shirts linked together such that they overlap, as with a button cuff. If I were attending a black tie event, perhaps I would link them so as to point outwards, but frankly I find that manner a bit ostentatious. Some love to have a huge watch hanging out in front of their cuff no matter the position of their arm, some prefer to be more discrete. Only cuffs sized to taste can accommodate one's own style. If even the authorities disagree with one another, it seems worthwhile to me to follow one's own style and comfort.
I tend to agree with the thought that you should not be able to slide your hand through the cuff of a shirt when closed.
After all, there is a functional element to all this. The ability to open the cuff at all is so that the wearer can get his hand through. If he could get his hand through without unfastening, why not just have the cuff sewn shut so that it doesn't open at all?
One quick vote for Mr Flusser and the ability not to slide your hand through. Tightness to the wrist enables you to have sleeves that are long enough not to move when you extend your arm, yet also never extend below the base of the thumb.
Personal choice and large watches excepted, this is the rule I have always been taught.
Much more elegant to put on, also, as has been pointed out.
Thanks
Perhaps some men have hands that are larger than mine. Perhaps they don't wear links that use a chain to join the ends. All I can say is that Charvet and Turnbull make me shirts with cuffs of a standard size that rest comfortably on the base of my hand and I can insert my hand with the links in place. It's tight, but it works.
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