Growing up as a young gentleman in training, I often heard my father and grandfather reminding me that they teaching me to become a gentleman. My grandfather gave me my first piece of clothing accessory: a gold tie clip, the kind that you pinch to open. When I put on my navy blue suit, white shirt, burgundy tie, and pocket square, I never felt completely dressed without my grandfathers tie clip.
In recent years men have started to wear tie bars in an attempt to look classy ever since Mad Men revived the modern suit look several years ago. Many times, these men fail because they simply don’t know how a tie bar is supposed to work.
For over three decades, I have shared many of the lessons I have learned about the unwritten rules for developing personal style with clients. The first lesson is that menswear is rooted in functionality, the tie bar (or tie clip) is no exception. A tie bar's simplest function is to hold a gentleman’s tie down, preventing it from going askew. It accomplishes this by having the top end of the clip over the tie and the bottom end on your shirt placket. The tie bar essentially links the tie to your shirt, ensuring that it does not flap around. Your coat may not help you if are wearing one, as a strong wind can blow your tie out of the V-shaped open area of the coat.
An example of using the tie bar incorrectly is when men put their tie bar on the tie only, with no attachment to the shirt. This will still allow the tie to fly around, only it’s got a small piece of metal fixed to it. This is a result of men buying accessories for the aesthetic, not for the purpose. Additionally, I see men wearing their tie bars to close to the top of their tie. Clipping the tie bar too high is just as ineffective as if it wasn’t fastened to the shirt at all. Having it high up just allows more of the tie to be able to flap around.
To wear a tie bar effectively, it should be worn it just above the middle of your shirt. The unwritten rule is that a tie bar should be worn below the third button (from the top) of your shirt. This placement ensures that a majority of the tie will be kept in place, with the remaining part of the tie protected if you are wearing a coat or blazer. Even if your are not wearing a coat or blazer, your tie won’t have as much area to fly around, if it is at a lower location.
Once you’ve got the basic rules down, it’s time to make your tie bar your own. There are a variety of different tie bars out there! For example there are tie bars that are more like paper clips that simply slip onto your shirt and tie, and ones that are like clamps, which actually have a small “alligator mouth” mechanism to attach your tie to your shirt. No matter the method, there are plenty of styles that can suit you. Many of my clients enjoy finding whimsical ones, such as pistol ones, or even ones that look like the reading glasses I wear!
However, it doesn’t have to stop there. Wearing your tie bar with some angle and attitude has been around for a long time. Style icon Fred Astaire always wore his tie bar slanted. Even though he’s using something practical, his slanted tie bar exudes an attitude of nonchalance, the definition of sprezzatura. Astaire's choice of tie bars also included a large safety pin, much like a kilt pin. He would pin it through the tie and shirt at an angle.
The noted clothing designer Alan Flusser, when designing the wardrobe for the movie Wall Street, used the nonchalance of wearing a tie bar at an angle to create part of the style for Gordon Gekko.
Remember that a tie bar is functional above anything else: it purpose is to keep your tie attached your shirt, and to ensures that it doesn’t flap around. Choosing to wear a tie bar is a style aesthetic of its own, and if one chooses such an aesthetic, then understanding the unwritten rules is important to create ones personal style. The unwritten rules are simple:
1. Fasten your tie clip to your shirts placket
2. Wear it near or slightly above the middle of your shirt
3. Don’t wear it with a vest
4. Wear yours with personal style
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