The New Jean: Band of Outsiders rolls out denim with slim cuts, shirting liners and self-referential buttons. Of course. [Valet]

Looks Like the Internet: Google’s new augmented reality shades come up for review. Nice tech, but they certainly don’t look like much. [The Atlantic Wire]

Striped Polos and Ennui: The latest batch of warm-weather gear from Riviera Club, including a seersucker blazer. Summer can’t get here fast enough. [Selectism]

Reading Hour: And in honor of what would have been his 50th birthday, here’s 29 essays and stories by David Foster Wallace. [Open Culture]

When he was 13 years old, John Fairfax ran away from home to live in the jungle, emerging periodically in town to exchange ocelot skins for knives—which he used to skin more ocelots, and so on. After having been dumped by a college girlfriend in Argentina at the age of 20, he attempted suicide—by letting a 400-pound jaguar attack him. A decade later, he drew upon navigational skills picked up as captain of a Panamanian pirate ship, braved numerous typhoons and shark attacks, and crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a rowboat stocked only with Spam, oatmeal and brandy. Then, after a brief stint as a mink farmer, he traversed the Pacific Ocean in identical fashion, only this time he brought along a female companion.

Yes, Mr. Fairfax’s eulogy in Saturday’s New York Times reads a whole lot like a Dos Equis commercial.

That is, if the Most Interesting Man in the World had anywhere near the sand of John Fairfax…»
 

At age 20, George Lois dropped out of school to join the ad world. Over the next 60 years, he was behind some of the world’s most iconic images and slogans, including Muhammad Ali’s 1968 Esquire cover, the campaign to free Ruben “Hurricane” Carter and “I Want My MTV.” More recently, he wrote a book called Damn Good Advice, and we were able to sit down with him for a few hours to unpack the wisdom of a life in the creative world. (Not coincidentally, our friends at UD Perks have tickets to a lunch with the man, if you’d like to see the show in person.)

The wisdom of George Lois, after the jump»
 

This handsome cotton jacket just came down the transom from Drake’s, offering a pretty good primer on what double-breasted style looks like in warmer months. Our favorite touch: the strong navy blue in the tie and pocket square, all the more important set against the wide swaths of khaki.

The bad news is, this one will only be available at the Clifford Street shop in London, so most of you will probably have to seek double-breasted solace elsewhere. We’d suggest Cucinelli for the well-heeled and a custom tailor for everyone else. (You may even want to show them this picture.) And remember, keep the shoulders in proportion.

This shot comes courtesy of Retronaut, as a visual record of what skate culture looked like before the era of Vans and oversized tees. Not too shabby.

The Dollars: Men’s accessories are up 14% since last year, thanks to the surge in wrist wear. [NYTimes]

Interrobang: Good to know Cormac McCarthy agrees with us about exclamation points. [The New York Observer]

Miles Smiles: A photographic ode to Miles Davis, who is a timeless badass. [A Headlong Dive]

Where Whiskey Comes From: Some lucky bloggers take a tour of the Jameson distillery, including their 36,000-barrel warehouse. [Cool Hunting]

This note recently arrived in the Kempt inbox, timed for a February getaway:

I am looking for a leather or canvas traveling roller bag. Enough to fit a decent wardrobe. My J&M is falling apart and I wanted something with style. Any suggestions?

It’s a simple question, but a tough one. We prefer to stay far away from roller bags—just as we prefer to travel by convertible, bullet train or hydrofoil—but life is not always as we’d like it to be. Sometimes you need to leave your weekender bag at home in favor of something that fits in an overhead compartment and doesn’t strain your shoulder.

Handsomeness usually comes in a distant third, but it doesn’t have to. At least, not if you’re buying the right bag…

Our favorite roller bags, for use in emergency»
 

Last week, Arizona State Senator Lori Klein proposed a law that would make it a fireable offense for K-12 public school teachers to repeatedly swear in the classroom. “These are young, impressionable minds,” she explained. “We want to fill them with the highest ideals, values and education that we can.” Yes, we agree. (Who doesn’t?) The issue we respectfully take with Senator Klein, though, is that a distinction must be made between teachers swearing in front of students and teachers swearing at students.

If a second-grade teacher, say, channeled Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in Full Metal Jacket by telling his students that they “had best unfuck themselves” or he would “fuck them up,” we’d assume he’d be dismissed.

Especially if he did so repeatedly…»
 

Most of the vintage Rolex trade specializes in ’60s-era divers, but there’s plenty of good wrist candy to be found in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s, too—and some prime examples are coming up for auction at Bonhams next week.

This ’50s-era Oyster is a prime example—the wrist-wear equivalent of a gray flannel suit—but there’s plenty more, like this ’40s manual-wind or a 9-karat gold Oyster from 1936. They don’t quite have the James Bond vibe you’d get from a GMT, but we wouldn’t be surprised if we saw one of these on M.

Part one of PBS’s great documentary on Bill Clinton aired last night, just hours after a Gallup poll showed Rick Santorum leading Mitt Romney by 36% to 26% among national Republicans. All eyes are now on Michigan as 2012’s sweater-vested version of the Comeback Kid may be poised to send Mitt Romney the way of Paul Tsongas. (Unless, of course, a version of Jennifer Flowers emerges as well.)

Here’s what else you may have missed over the “holiday”…»
 

Almost Blue: A very close look at some lust-worthy dip-dyed jeans from Tender Co. [OEN]

One More Round: The wisdom of a Portland bartender. A highlight: “A Negroni was the kind of cocktail that changed my view on what cocktails are.” [Esquire]

The Horse Race: A detailed look at a Polish sledge race, timed for the dead of winter. We just found our new favorite sport. [Reuters]

Your Hate-Read of the Week: And finally, the worst thing you’ll read about Linsanity. [Deadspin]

Ladies and gentlemen, the topcoat of 2012.

We know it’s a little weird recommending a winter coat just as February’s tailing off—even weirder since you won’t be able to pick it up until August—but this one’s worth it.

It comes from Ian Velardi, who just unveiled his fall lookbook—but if you can’t peruse the whole thing, we’ll save you some time: it contains one of the most handsome topcoats you’ll see all year. It’s a frontal assault against the cloud of gray overcoats that usually pops up in late fall, and the neutral pattern means it’ll fit with just about anything you decide to wear underneath.

Note: we do recommend wearing something underneath.

Jon Hamm is Esquire’s cover story this month, but the profile itself is a little… unusual.

That’s a delicate way of saying “off-the-rails crazy.” Just to prove he can, Tom Chiarella peppers the profile with outrageous lies on the level of a Chuck Norris joke. So in the first thousand words, we learn that Hamm sleeps in a self-designed hoverbed, keeps four eagles in his own likeness and cannot read. Apparently, he also has a new movie coming out.

If you haven’t read it, it’s here, but we’ve got something else for you first. In the name of investigative Hamm journalism, we dug up a few lost pages from an early draft of the piece. (A midnight burglary of the Hearst Tower may have been involved.) Check it out after the jump…

The lost pages of Esquire’s Jon Hamm profile, acquired through suspicious means»
 

This shot comes from a William Eggleston auction coming up next month, boasting three dozen photos. Between the cowboy hat and the muscle car, we wouldn’t be surprised if this one ended up on a few inspiration boards.

The It Woman: Kim Gordon interviews Chloë Sevigny about thrifting, transsexuals and generally being cool. [Interview]

Enduring Style: Cary Randolph Fuller tracks down Gary Cooper’s daughter for one of the better vintage style pieces you’ll read this year. [RL Magazine]

I Am the Pirate King: The Kim Dotcom profile you’ve been waiting for. A highlight: he owned a life-size statue of the Predator (from Predator). [Bloomberg Businessweek]

Rough Business: A 95-year-old socialite has died at a Fashion Week show. [The Atlantic]

When it comes to men wearing scarves indoors, there isn’t necessarily a hard-and-fast rule one way or the other. The ascot, a haughty great-uncle of the scarf, has been a mainstay for centuries, and a handful of notably well-dressed men have successfully pulled off the look of late.

Here’s the thing, though…»

Thumbing through snapshots of Fashion Week, you might get the idea that it was nothing but good ideas and great clothing, just aching to leap off the runway—but it’s not so.

For every mouthwatering-but-wearable suit, there are two more that you’d never dream of putting on your shoulders, that made it to the runway only out of artistic bombast and the enduring provocateur spirit.

It’s not a bad thing (it certainly makes things more interesting for writers), but we thought we’d take a moment to look past the gushing prose and see how five of the most outlandish outfits look in the harsh light of commerce. We’ve even picked out the rare situation when you could wear them, if you’re feeling brave and wealthy…

We dissect five of Fashion Week’s finest looks»
 

Flooding the zone with fedoras, courtesy of Archival Clothing. This is how your granddad did it.

Michael Bastian knows menswear. Between his years at Bergdorf and Ralph Lauren and his current post overseeing two of the best-loved lines in menswear, he feels the ebbs and flows of style better than nearly anyone—which makes him the perfect guide for the whirlwind of Fashion Week. We caught up with him a few hours before his Gant show yesterday to talk about his favorite icons, going gray and the genius of American style.

A few words with Michael Bastian»
 

The Greatest Party Ever: Would you like to see an hour-long video of the release party for Paul’s Boutique? Of course you would. [WBE]

Never Too Many Books: Shots from the New York apartment of author Michael Cunningham. He has a bookshelf in his bathroom, people. [Work in Progress]

Boots and Socks: A walk in the woods with the Midwestyle chaps, and a very handsome pair of socks. [The Midwestyle]

The Tux Returns: The latest batch of Phineas Cole gear looks pretty good as well. [Men of Habit]

It’s easy to forget what a slick bastard Alec Baldwin was in his prime.

It’s not that he’s fallen off; just the opposite. He’s aged so gracefully, it’s hard to remember he wasn’t always the jolly playboy uncle he is now. But over the years, he’s passed through a wide range of styles, from “young hunk” to “slicked-back corporate raider” to “mountain man,” and he’s never seemed like anyone other than himself.

So we thought we’d take a minute to celebrate the evolution of Mr. Baldwin, in five easy pieces…

The style of Alec Baldwin in five pictures»
 

If there’s one thing to be learned from Ambrose Everett Burnside, it’s that you can be dubbed “the most incompetent general of the Civil War” and still be feted in style blogs 150 years later. In the Battle of the Crater in 1864, Burnside succeeded in digging an explosive mine under a fort in the Confederate entrenchment, but failed to brief his own soldiers on the existence of said mine—into which they crammed, by the hundreds, figuring the massive crater to be an ideal bunker. Confederates surrounded the mine and, well, you’ve seen how this one turned out.

But we’re here not to revisit Burnside’s humiliating miscues on the field of battle, but rather to honor the glorious muttonchops on the general’s face—so glorious, in fact, that the term “sideburn” was dubbed in his (fittingly inverted) honor.

To that end, we offer five of the finest muttonchop specimens of all time…»
 

The world is a strange and confusing place.

Male nail polish, for instance, is apparently now a thing—and we can say without reservation that it is the greatest threat facing our nation at this time. Somehow, the more we learn about it, the more terrifying it becomes…

The horror that is “male polish,” explained»
 

Spotted at the Brooks Brothers preview, this is what a tie dimple should look like. Deep, proud and ever so slightly asymmetrical.

Louder Than a Ton: Tommy Ton takes on New York Fashion Week, with predictably sharp results. [GQ]

Kilim Rising: Perhaps it’s time for you to buy a pair of slippers that look like a carpet. [Die, Workwear]

V Is for Victory: Some push-pull on the value of Valentine’s Day. We still blame the roses. [The Atlantic Wire]

Keep It Simple: In the background of Fashion Week, Dana Lee continues to kill it. [The OEN]