Introducing The New American Sportswear
In April of this year, the J.Crew men’s store in Dumbo, Brooklyn, marked down its slim-fit stretch chinos, printed camp shirts, and patterned swim trunks to 65 percent off before permanently closing its doors. “Don’t worry—we’re not going anywhere,” a sign in the window read, suggesting that shoppers visit Jcrew.com. It seemed like the latest chapter in a familiar story: Physical stores are dead, e-commerce is king, and J.Crew, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in mid 2020, had lost its hold on men’s wallets. The customer who was once seduced by the wildly popular Ludlow Suit, which prompted him to ditch generously cut tailoring for something cropped and fitted, had apparently moved on to direct-to-consumer brands like Untuckit and Bonobos—labels that see men’s wardrobes as a series of puzzles. “It’s problem-solving,” Todd Snyder, a J.Crew alum who started his own line in 2011, tells me. “ ‘I found pants that fit me.’ Or ‘I found a shirt that fits me.’ ‘I don’t have to subscribe to the designer way of things.’ ” Read more at GQ.
