Last Minute Stocking Stuffers

Here are two last minute gift ideas for a man in your life, including, of course, yourself.


First, a pair of Pantherella's maroon silk hose from Woods of Shropshire (£15.00 or about $30). Exactly what he needs to wear with his dinner jacket on New Year's Eve.


And then he'd better have sock suspenders from Albert Thurston (also £15.00 or about $30), so he won't have maroon silk puddled around his ankles after the first dance.

Happy holidays!

Reader Questions

From JB
"Can you tell me the proper way to wear sock suspenders? Where should I position the grip?"
Sock suspenders, like the pictured pair from England's Albert Thurston, are usually worn above the calf, with the attachment forward, on the inside of the leg bone.

From James
"Is it ok to wear cuff links with a sport coat? My friend says no way! A steak dinner is riding on this."


If you don't want to pay off your bet, you may want to get a second opinion. I think links are questionable with a blazer and too much for other odd jackets.

Reader Questions

From Jonathon
"I went looking for some non-iron dress shirts to take with me on business trips last weekend without any success Do high-quality shirts exist that don't need touching up to wear properly after several cramped hours in a suitcase?"

No-iron shirts are an abomination. Buy a folder from Eagle Creek and stack your folded shirts in it, then put the folder in your suitcase. They'll be fine.


Another From Jonathon
"I recently purchased several pairs of trousers with buttons sewn to the inside of the waist to accommodate braces. Could you recommend what to look for in a pair of quality braces?"

You need only know the name Albert Thurston. Thurston makes what are most likely the best braces in the world. Wear the barathea for summer (like the ones in the photo) and the boxcloth for winter.

In Praise of Albert Thurston

Men should not need to pull their trousers up several times a day.

That's the principal advantage of wearing braces with suit trousers. You put them on once and your trousers stay in place. They hang better too.

Albert Thurston braces like the blue ones pictured on the left are made from boxcloth with white hand stitched ends. The advantage of white is that you can wear them with brown or black shoes instead of maintaining a separate wardrobe for each color shoe.

The ends used to be made from a natural material called cat gut (and fortunately wasn't) which aged to a cream color, but they are now made from an unnatural material. It's too soon to tell whether they'll become equally mellow over the years .

Thurston's are sized, as you would expect. That's an advantage over the competition because on properly sized braces the brass adjustors sit where they are supposed to, near the waist.

You can also get lighter versions made from barathea for warm weather wear. These normally come with brown or black leather ends, but Thurston is happy to accommodate requests for white hand stitched versions.

Thurston has an online ordering facility and shipping is included in the price.