The Sapeurs - a short documentary video by Guinness

Are these the most stylish men in the World? The touching story of The Sapeurs of Brazzaville, Congo, a short documentary by Guinness. And click here see my post of a few days ago.

Older and middle aged men can be style icons and fashion models too

I recently received a beautifully-designed brochure for Ralph Lauren's Double RL range. Leafing through it got me thinking again about how fashion retailers are selling clothes to men. Usually younger men model the clothes - it seems that modern icons of style are generally seen as being well under 40 years of age. Here are RL's young models, selling decidedly classic clothes which, I suspect, many older men would be happy to buy -

It's refreshing to find successful purveyors of men's style who recognise that older men will buy and wear fashionable clothes. Have a look at these scans of Mr Porter's latest sales literature. Their style icons include a disctinctly older Pablo Picasso -

Also, they don't shy away from using slightly older models to wear their range of clothes; see the scans below, from their Spring Summer 2012 Collection brochure, and note that grey stubble. Given the economic power of men over 40, I wonder why more companies don't take the same approach as Mr Porter.