As a child searching around my father's things, as I often did on lonesome afternoons, this was the jackpot. Exactly what I was looking for. Surefire evidence that my father was indeed the man I thought he was. This coat, a relic of a lifestyle well beyond the walls of our home and general suburbia which prescribed him a uniform of nothing more than a white Hanes undershirt and his work pants, was proof that my father was a "man." A man about town. The kind of man who might swoop in and out of a room only to leave the bold presence of power with the added fragrance of something from a blue Ralph Lauren bottle and a taste of an expensive cigar. The type of absent father that might only show up just before I fell asleep to pat me on the head and kiss me goodnight. Yes, that one camel coat said all of that.
It's weight, as heavy as the puppy golden retriever I'd been given as a Christmas gift, spoke such languid power and style. The color—reminiscent of the whiskey he would drink after a long day's work—couldn't have been more GQ. And the fabric, soft as the new carpet my mother had lined the living room parlour with. I was too young and from a generation too detached to know of the gents now synonymous with that same masculine luxury. I had yet to discovered Clint Eastwood, so cool in his cowboy hat, Paul Newman in a simple suit without a tie, Robert Redford in one of his iconic bomber jackets, George Clooney in his camel-hair overcoat, John Kennedy casual in his wayfarers, and on, and on . . .
I'm sure it was these iconic men who inspired my father, albeit subconsciously, to reach for that coat and take if off the hanger in a small suit shop in Georgetown. The same men whose, although he'd never admit it, swagger he admired and conjured. And it is these same men who have inspired us once more this season where, after a long period of dark outerwear, the camel coat has been resurrected again as the go-to for winter apparel. There it is in the darkest of beige at Gucci, the palest of gold at Tommy Hilfiger, collegiate at Dries Van Noten, perfectly at Burberry, and in a marvelous, myriad variety at Prada. Each are impeccably tailored and beautifully cut with a nostalgic feel, making wearing them all the more appealing. You might just feel like George Clooney, the man all women lust over regardless of how old he is, or Paul Newman, arguably the coolest man to walk the earth. But they bring me back to my father's closet on those lonesome afternoons. Welcome home camel coat; oh how I've missed you.
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