25th
Questionable Fashion: The Full Cleveland
These days I read the Wall Street Journal to get the print version of the “news” I can’t bring myself to watch on Faux Gnus (I can’t sit through more than a few seconds before pulling a Really!?! with Seth and Amy), but today the WSJ taught me a phrase for a questionable fashion pairing that is back in fashion. Not only that, I learnt this from the Golf Journal column (registration required).
The “full Cleveland” applies to anyone wearing white shoes with a white belt, while a “half Cleveland” is just the belt or shoes. Which begs the question, what do you call white shoes, white pants and white belt? Over-the-top Cleveland? You’re-blinding-me Cleveland? Grandpa? But I digress.
The Golf Journal’s John Paul Newport explains:
For a baby boomer like myself, this is a disturbing development. When I took up the game in the 1980s, I did so with the understanding I would never be expected to wear white belts, plaid pants, canary-yellow sweaters, polyester Sansabelt slacks or any other flammable items of clothing. My assumption was that the 1980 movie “Caddyshack” had successfully parodied such attire into permanent oblivion. The cool guy in the film, played by Chevy Chase, wore classy Ben Hogan-esque outfits, while the buffoons, played by Rodney Dangerfield and Ted Knight, wore the white patent-leather belts and loud pants. By the late 1980s, even Johnny Miller had mostly abandoned the white-belt look.
But like the irrepressible gopher in Caddyshack, the full Cleveland just won’t die. The under-35s are putting the full Cleveland back into fashion rotation, and not just on the golf course:
Michael Kors Spring 2009 Collection (via About.com)
And not just on the runway:
Miami, February 2007 (via Streetpeepers)
Ladies, this trend is for you, too! I first encountered white high-heeled shoes in Scotland in 1977 and it left an indelible memory of what not to do. Something about the whiteness of the shoes and the whiteness of the goose-pimply, blue-veiny skin put me off. I couldn’t look at uncooked chicken quite the same way again after that. But if you are young enough - I think the cut-off here is 25 - and sensible enough to indicate with the rest of your outfit that you are being: 1) wacky! 2) retro! 3) ironic! then go for it. The Vine has some tips for you.
How to Wear White Shoes (via The Vine)
For the rest of us, I recommend not taking the advice of Marty Hackel, the fashion director for Golf Digest magazines, “Fashion comes full circle. This is absolutely the reason you should never throw out anything”. Um, no. Unless your white belt and shoes from the 70s are in immaculate, never-worn condition and you have saved them to give to your teenage son or grandson, the full Cleveland should meet the round file.
