NEW YORK

Morning from Manhattan!

Good morning, New York.

Today is Thursday 18th June, and it is the morning after the Easy on the Ivy Japan Edition zine launch at J. Press in Manhattan. A reality that still does not feel quite real. If I am honest, maybe it never will.

Picture courtesy of remyego

J. Press has always held a special place in my heart, which may well be the biggest understatement I have ever written on this blog.

To everyone who came down, said hello, bought a zine, shared a story, or simply introduced themselves, thank you. You made the evening incredibly special.

In truth, you probably should have been the ones writing this blog post. There was such a fascinating mix of people in the room and so many good conversations that I suspect your version would be far more interesting than mine.

Picture courtesy of remyego

There are plenty of photographs from the evening, although rather embarrassingly most of them are by other people. I got so swept away in the event itself that I forgot to take many pictures of my own. Foolish, perhaps, but give me a break. I was operating in a fairly constant state of impostor syndrome.

Picture courtesy of remyego

I first visited J. Press four or five years ago on my first trip to New York. At the time it felt like a pilgrimage. To walk back into the same store now and see my own face staring back from the cover of a publication I had helped create was, frankly, surreal.

What makes it even stranger is that the zine technically arrived in New York before I did. By the time I stepped through the doors of J. Press, it was already there waiting for me. Somehow that makes the whole thing feel even less believable.

I have been obsessed with New York for as long as I can remember. My sister was a huge Friends fan growing up, so Greenwich Village always seemed to exist somewhere in the background of my childhood. It was one of those places that felt familiar long before I had ever visited.

To this day, the Village remains one of my favourite parts of New York. I can happily spend hours wandering its streets, occasionally losing my bearings before stumbling across something interesting. That is part of the appeal. In a city as overwhelming as New York, the Village still feels human.

As always, I arrived with a list of places I wanted to visit that was significantly longer than the time available to visit them. One place I was determined to see, however, was Hamburger America.

Truthfully, before coming to New York I did not quite appreciate how much of a following it had. I mentioned it to a friend back home and their immediate response was, “Oh, George Motz’s place?”, which, for anyone familiar with First We Feast, is probably the closest thing the burger world has to a Sean Evans figure.

If you have not come across him before, George Motz is a burger historian and filmmaker who has spent years travelling across America documenting regional burger styles, writing books, and making documentaries.

Hamburger America is the culmination of that obsession. Rather than trying to create the biggest or most extravagant burger imaginable, it is a celebration of the classic American hamburger in all its regional forms. It feels less like a restaurant and more like a small museum where everything happens to be edible.

Needless to say, it did not disappoint.

Of course, if we are being honest, I did not just go to J. Press for the zine launch.

You did not really think I was going to fly all the way to New York and not pick anything up, did you?

I might have had a zine to promote, but I also had a wardrobe to think about.

I have got a wedding abroad next year, and it felt like the perfect excuse to finally invest in a proper lightweight summer suit. Something I have always wanted but, for one reason or another, never actually owned.

I have recently lost a bit of weight, somewhat unexpectedly, so I also wanted to take the opportunity to get properly measured and fitted again.

In the end I went for a navy cotton poplin suit in what J. Press refer to as their 1902 cut. It is less a modern fit in the contemporary sense and more a continuation of their classic American sack tailoring, the kind of silhouette they have been known for since the early days of the brand.

It is a naturally structured jacket with a soft shoulder, a more relaxed line through the body, and that slightly undarted shape that feels very characteristic of traditional Ivy League tailoring.

I chose navy partly because it felt versatile enough to work with almost everything I already own, which is usually my main consideration with anything like this.

They are making a few alterations for me, taking the trousers up slightly and adjusting the sleeves, before shipping it back to the United Kingdom in a couple of weeks. One of the things I really like about J. Press is that so much of the tailoring is still done in-house. There is something about that which feels reassuringly old school in the best possible way, like a proper men’s clothier rather than just a retail space.

While I was there I had a couple of other things in mind.

I have been really enjoying their button-down shirts recently, particularly the way they have started playing with colour and pattern in a way that still feels rooted in what they do best. I picked up a striped piece in yellow and blue, something I would not necessarily expect to find so easily in the United Kingdom.

Then there was a rugby shirt I had had my eye on. It is one of their made in USA pieces, and it is already one of my favourite categories in my wardrobe. This one had a bottle green base with orange striping through it, which sounds quite bold on paper but works surprisingly well in person. It is the sort of thing that immediately feels like it will get worn a lot.

And finally, a cap.

J. Press caps are something I end up wearing constantly, so it would have felt almost wrong not to leave with another one. This one had a small stitched detail using semaphore flags, which together spell out “J. Press 1902”. A slightly hidden piece of branding, but exactly the sort of detail that makes it feel special rather than obvious.

So there is just an insight into what I have been up to here in the hustle of New York. There is a lot more, obviously, but I would need another zine to do that.

Picture courtesy of remyego

I did actually get asked quite a lot at the event if I was going to write a New York edition of the zine. Quite honestly, I would have loved to, but I have not had the time to focus on photography and everything like that for this one. My partner, who normally does the photography and did all of the photography for my last zine, was not with me this time. This was a purely solo trip.

I would love to do one in New York though. There are so many places, both in and around J. Press, and so many people I met there, that to say they deserve a place in any New York edition of the zine feels like an understatement.

Picture courtesy of remyego

I hope you have enjoyed reading this. If I met you in New York, or to the people of New York more broadly, thank you for making it such an incredible time.

And a huge thank you to everyone at J. Press, Jack Carlson, Leah, Duncan, and the in store team, as well as everyone I met in the room that night. It was my honour.

Thank you.

Picture courtesy of remyego