Sometimes in this business you get an idea you think will work for yourself, but others are just not willing to follow you down the garden path. It happens. I have been sporting kerchiefs in the snow for some years now and I have about five to ten customers that do the same. That barely allows us to keep it going but occasionally we have a female visitor in the Studio who loves the silks and understands how much work went into the silks and colours and she makes them her own. They are not designed for women of course, they are for men, but men willing to take risks and who are not afraid to set themselves apart.
The genesis for my foray came mostly from Prince Charles and a photo of him in a onesie in Zermatt circa 1983 wearing a kerchief. But my Australian icon must be Walter Reilly or Wally, the great bullshitting yarn spinner from Crocodile Dundee that has perfected that laconic story telling that Australians are so famous for, as though he might break out into The Man From Snowy River without so much as pausing for breath.
Our snow season is now over, a short one, marred by a virus that I am still not quite understanding the ramifications of. It would have to be the most interesting year I have ever had in business.
For those of you who are out there looking for something to wear casually without a shirt, who are not afraid to be a Walter "Wally" Reilly, consider a kerchief and learning how to spin a great yarn (Australian vernacular for a story) - because you are living through one as you read this. And maybe we are going to need a whole bunch of Homers to tell this one when it's finally over, so you might as well look the part.
