When the legendary Hollywood actor-turned director Robert Redford handed away Tuesday, he left behind not solely a physique of impactful and culturally important movies, but additionally a mode legacy that has largely change into the blueprint for American menswear.
Instantly recognizable by his floppy windswept hair and penchant for relaxed, but refined seems to be, Redford turned an emblem of basic, understated magnificence all through the Sixties and ‘70s, when he became the go-to leading man in American cinema, starring in films such as “All the President’s Men” and “The Way We Were.”
Among Redford’s memorable outfits is the elegant pastel swimsuit worn within the 1974 romance-drama “The Great Gatsby” and the herringbone tweed sports activities coat, layered atop a blue chambray shirt, striped wool tie and lightweight blue denims, that he sported within the 1975 thriller “Three Days of the Condor” — a preppy, layered type that wouldn’t really feel out of place right this moment amid the current resurgence in Ivy League dressing.
Indeed, Redford, who turned the embodiment of timelessness and class, paved the way in which for a lot of American menswear archetypes, from prep to western.
And his embrace of basic wardrobe types, comparable to button-down shirts, aviator sun shades and denim pants — at instances worn with an identical shirt, making him an early adopter of the “double denim” look lengthy earlier than it turned a development — seeped past the large display screen and into his sartorial selections.
Despite his seemingly easy nature, Redford was explicit about his garments. For “Three Days of the Condor,” the actor made particular requests for his denims, requesting a “Hollywood hem” for his flared Levi’s that concerned cropping the 36in inseam and reattaching the unique cuff, the movie’s costume designer, Joseph Aulisi, advised the Financial Times’ luxury supplement HTSI, which on Monday revealed a tribute to Redford’s type.
Yet regardless of widespread efforts to mimic the icon’s picture, it was not often efficiently replicated, the French designer and founder of tailoring model Husbands Paris, Nicolas Gabard, who produced the grey tweed blazer worn by Redford within the “Three Days of the Condor,” advised HTSI. “All menswear guys, at one point, have tried to copy this jacket. Even Ralph Lauren,” he mentioned. “And no one has succeeded.”
Influential fashion designers and lovers alike have usually drawn inspiration from the late actor. Michael Kors, for instance, checked out Redford’s portrayal of a swaggering skier within the 1969 movie “Downhill Racer” when designing his 2016 males’s assortment, which referenced “apres-ski” type. Ralph Lauren (who designed the costumes for the male solid of “The Great Gatsby”) has additionally spoken of his admiration for Hollywood’s golden age and the type of its main actors, comparable to Redford.
“Robert Redford was America’s movie star — from ‘Gatsby’ to the ‘Sundance Kid’, but it was his personal commitment to preserving his craft and the natural world he loved that will be his enduring legacy. We will miss his joy and optimistic view of living,” Ralph Lauren advised NCS over electronic mail.
Still, a tanned, graying brown-haired Redford mentioned, aged 82, that he was “surprised” to have been thought of a intercourse image. “When I was a kid no one ever told me I was good looking; I never heard that,” he advised British newspaper The Telegraph in 2018.
“My hair was red and unmanageable and I had cowlicks going all over the place. I had freckles and my teeth were too big. So I didn’t have people coming up to me saying, ‘Boy, you’re a really good-looking guy.’ That came much later and when it did come I wasn’t prepared for it,” he added.
While Redford’s seems to be and charisma had been advantageous to his profession in some ways, they didn’t all the time work in his favor: The actor famously misplaced out on a starring function within the 1967 comedy-romance movie “The Graduate” as a result of he had by no means been rejected by a girl. (Speaking to Vanity Fair in 2008, the movie’s director Mike Nichols mentioned Redford might “never play a loser” for that motive.)
And little doubt he was proper. 58 years on, Redford’s enchantment endures — and can possible proceed lengthy after his passing.
