Falconer, O’Connor, and Tom Ford
Returningson
Posts: 560MI6 Agent
So this all started with this picture….
A screen used Spectre suit with a rare shot of the inner factory label and its designation as “fit F”. Now I was intimately familiar with all the Base fits that TF previously offered (A, B, D etc) but was a little hazy on Fit F and was initially very perplexed as all my O’Connor skyfall suits had come in Fit Y (which I thought was the definitive O Connor Fit). After talking with Paolo it seemed that Fit F was “no longer available” and that all the Spectre suits would come in fit Y.
So I kinda just let it go for a while until I was doing research and came up with an early report by Mantis stating that Bond would wear the Falconer suit in Skyfall. After doing some digging I found that Falconer suit was designated as Basic Base F or Fit F. Now I was intrigued because I was getting somewhere…
I know that Falconer was the 1960s era style suit Ford designed for the character of George Falconer played by Colin Firth in A Single Man . A suit with slim lapels, straight (as opposed to slanted) shoulder seams—something I thought TF NEVER did but I was wrong, and belt loops instead of waist adjusters. One of the most significant changes was the 3 button cuffs. I had ALWAYS wondered why the opening Skyfall PTS suit had three button cuffs when the rest of his suits had the standard 5 button cuff like most other TF suits have. This now seems to explain it.
This diagram was shown to be what Bond wears in Skyfall and like many of our esteemed members pointed out, it lacked the 3-2 button front yet retained the Falconer’s narrow lapel and signature 3 button cuffs.
The origin of the Falconer suit design comes from collaboration between TF himself and the film’s costume designer Arianne Phillips. She comments here that “Tom has a factory in Italy that makes men's clothing. I . . . found all these '60s vintage suit types for Colin Firth's character, George. We looked at the different shapes and different details -- a collar from one and buttons from another -- and we fashioned together what we thought would be appropriate silhouettes, which were then taken to the factory in Italy.”
While not breaking news in any way, I just find this fascinating. It seems that Bond was in all likelihood going to wear a Falconer but subtle changes (like waist adjusters, 3-2 roll etc) caused a new suit to be created, the O’ Connor. It also means that Bond's current "shrunken" look is based on designs from the 1960s and are amalgamations between different suit designs.
I personally have never tried the Falconer and was wondering if any other members had a chance to play with this suit. Would be interesting to know if its just the same as the O connor fit or fundamentally different in some way.
A screen used Spectre suit with a rare shot of the inner factory label and its designation as “fit F”. Now I was intimately familiar with all the Base fits that TF previously offered (A, B, D etc) but was a little hazy on Fit F and was initially very perplexed as all my O’Connor skyfall suits had come in Fit Y (which I thought was the definitive O Connor Fit). After talking with Paolo it seemed that Fit F was “no longer available” and that all the Spectre suits would come in fit Y.
So I kinda just let it go for a while until I was doing research and came up with an early report by Mantis stating that Bond would wear the Falconer suit in Skyfall. After doing some digging I found that Falconer suit was designated as Basic Base F or Fit F. Now I was intrigued because I was getting somewhere…
I know that Falconer was the 1960s era style suit Ford designed for the character of George Falconer played by Colin Firth in A Single Man . A suit with slim lapels, straight (as opposed to slanted) shoulder seams—something I thought TF NEVER did but I was wrong, and belt loops instead of waist adjusters. One of the most significant changes was the 3 button cuffs. I had ALWAYS wondered why the opening Skyfall PTS suit had three button cuffs when the rest of his suits had the standard 5 button cuff like most other TF suits have. This now seems to explain it.
This diagram was shown to be what Bond wears in Skyfall and like many of our esteemed members pointed out, it lacked the 3-2 button front yet retained the Falconer’s narrow lapel and signature 3 button cuffs.
The origin of the Falconer suit design comes from collaboration between TF himself and the film’s costume designer Arianne Phillips. She comments here that “Tom has a factory in Italy that makes men's clothing. I . . . found all these '60s vintage suit types for Colin Firth's character, George. We looked at the different shapes and different details -- a collar from one and buttons from another -- and we fashioned together what we thought would be appropriate silhouettes, which were then taken to the factory in Italy.”
While not breaking news in any way, I just find this fascinating. It seems that Bond was in all likelihood going to wear a Falconer but subtle changes (like waist adjusters, 3-2 roll etc) caused a new suit to be created, the O’ Connor. It also means that Bond's current "shrunken" look is based on designs from the 1960s and are amalgamations between different suit designs.
I personally have never tried the Falconer and was wondering if any other members had a chance to play with this suit. Would be interesting to know if its just the same as the O connor fit or fundamentally different in some way.
Comments
I have this suit so will compare labels later {[]
Just to be clear im not saying DC wore a falconer. He def wore an O connor suit. I just think its interesting that the falconer design seems to be what the O connor is based on.
Ive never seen a Base B Windsor (but thats not to say they dont exist)
Interesting and yes totally confusing. Maybe i will sneak into the zegna factory and see whats really going on over there