Men’s Fall & Winter Accessories 2017

In this article and video, I wanted to show and discuss some of my favorite accessories for the Fall & Winter Seasons. Also, please be sure to not miss out on my whole series dedicated to the best men’s Fall & Winter Essentials.

Watch Straps

Fall and winter is a great time of year to change out the straps of your watches for more appropriate colors for the season. As for materials, I don’t have a preference, but leather, perlon and suede are some of my favorites. The best colors for this time are always going to be:

Browns
Oranges
Burgundy
Taupe/Gray/Green

The pictured straps, as well as many others types and styles are available at my favorite site for reasonably-priced straps: CheapestNatoStraps.com

I talked to the owner, Sofie, and she was kind enough to offer you an additional 10% off your purchase if you use offer code: AshleyWeston

Suede Belts

Since you’ll be wearing heavier fabrics during this time of year, it’s time to bring out the suede belts to add a more visual texture to your outfits to compliment them. I prefer a dark brown or gray color this time of year and the below options have these choices available.

$128 – Brooks Brother Suede Belt – the best color for the time of year.
$80 – Torino Suede Belts (Various colors – I like espresso & navy)
$25 – H&M Suede Belt

Wool Ties & Pocket Squares

Wool ties and wool knit ties and pocket squares compliment the textures you’ll be wearing this season. For how to wear them, watch the video at the top. Just know that you’ll never go wrong with the rule: Whatever item has a pattern (tie or pocket square), make sure the other item isn’t patterned. So if you’re wearing a patterned tie, wear a plain pocket square with a similar colored tipping.

The colors I love this time of year are:

Browns
Oranges
Burgundy
Grays
Greens

I’ve talked at length about my favorite pocket squares and how to wear them, so see my wool ties & pocket squares video/article for details.

Wool Knit Caps

They’re great this time of year to keep your head warm and they can look good but remain functional when paired with some of your casual jackets or even heavier Winter jackets.

Gray, Blue and Black caps are my favorite colors because they go with everything, but you can certainly mix it up with other colors, if you prefer. There’s one caveat when wearing them, though.

$90 – A.P.C. Wool Knit Cap – Multiple Colors
$10 – H&M Rib-Knit Cap

Leather Gloves

Leather looks great this time of year and help elevate your appearance by adding a sophisticated touch, while keeping your hands warm. Black or brown are easiest to wear, so I say just get one or both of those colors.

$30 to $40 – H&M Leather Gloves
$100 to $600 – Various Quality Brands @ Mr. Porter

Scarves

Keeping your neck warm should be a priority, but why not have your scarf also look good? As far as colors and patterns are concerned, I honestly view them like men’s socks, where you can definitely go crazy with them, so if you think a plain color is boring, go with some patterns. Generally, you want to go with the same general color palette of the season – so blue, gray, black, brown, orange, burgundy and green all look great this time of year.

As for materials, I don’t think it matters much, it just depends on what you prefer. I love a good wool or cashmere scarf, but a cotton one is also good, depending on how thick and warm you want yours to be. But, there may be a reason to avoid certain materials or colors.

I’ve discussed how to tie men’s scarves at length so check that out, too.

$10 to $100 – H&M Scarves – they make some of my favorite budget friendly scarves.
$15 to $50 – Uniqlo Scarves – also great budget-friendly options.
$50 to $500 – Mr. Porter has a great selection of many high quality scarves.

Wool Ties & Pocket Squares

I’ve already talked pretty extensively about ties and pocket squares in my Men’s Essential Accessories series, so if you haven’t sen those articles/videos and don’t know the size of ties you should be wearing or the best ways to fold your pocket squares, check them out. The wool ties & pocket squares I’ll be discussing below are essential for the Fall and Winter seasons because they will compliment the items in your Fall/Winter Wardrobe nicely.

Material

For your ties and pocket squares during this season, you need to go all in with wool. There’s also technically cashmere, but there’s not a lot of them being made and I find them to be obscenely expensive when a wool tie looks just as good.

The reason you go all in on wool is because you want your accessories to compliment the fabric weights of the items you’ll be wearing during the various seasons, so if you were wearing silk or linen ties, which are for Spring and Summer, with your heavier wool suits or sport coats, it would look really off.

Colors

As I mentioned in the Series intro, this is the time of year to wear some nice, rich colors, like:

greens
shades of blues
burnt oranges
grays
burgundy
browns

Patterns

As far as patterns, it’s also the best time of year to wear plaids, paisleys and polka dots because they’re visually heavy and pair so well with your Fall and Winter wardrobe.

The one area that I see men really have an issue, though, is with matching these patterns and colors together with their outfits or other accessories.

A good rule of thumb is:

If your tie is a bolder pattern, like a paisley or plaid, then you want your pocket square to be more subtle or as close to a solid color as possible. It doesn’t have to be a solid, but when in doubt, go for a solid one. This ensures you don’t have too many patterns clashing. (See the video above and outfit images below for examples)

And the inverse is true for a patterned pocket square – go for a solid or very subtle patterned tie.

This helps balance these items out so you don’t look like a goofball.

Best ways to wear Wool Ties and Pocket Squares

TopMan Selected Homme Brown Wool Rich Suit Jacket
The Tie Bar Chambray Shirt
The Tie Bar Wentworth Plaid
The Tie Bar Kingsley Attune Pocket Square
The Tie Bar Metallic Navy Tie Bar
Diesel Buster 0607A Jeans
Allen Edmonds Poplar Dress Belt
Johnston & Murphy Nolen Double Monkstrap Shoes
John Varvatos Prince Sunglasses
H&M Wool-Blend Blazer Slim Fit
Burberry Slim Fit Cotton Poplin Shirt
The Tie Bar Score Check Tie
The Tie Bar Olive Green Tie Bar
The Tie Bar Southeast Plaid Pocket Square
Diesel Buster 0607A Jeans
Allen Edmonds Poplar Dress Belt
Allen Edmonds Strand Cap-Toe Oxfords with Dainite Rubber Sole
IWC Portugieser Automatic Dress Watch
Tom Ford Snowdon Sunglasses

The Best Wool Ties

J. Crew American Wool Tie in Chalk Stripe

J. Crew English Wool Silk Oxford Olive Tie

J. Crew English Wool Silk Oxford Burgundy

Notes About My Recommendations

The ties from Tom Ford, Alexander Olch, and Thom Sweeney are pricey, but you’re paying for a high quality, luxurious accessory that’s timeless. If you’re going to shell out this amount of money for a tie, then you want to make sure it’s easy to wear and it’ll never go out of style.

For fun patterned ties that are also easy on the wallet, I’m a huge fan of The Tie Bar (and no, they’re not paying me to say this). For great textured wool ties in solid colors, I love J.Crew. They also made a charcoal chalk stripe tie that is really easy to wear with your existing wardrobe.

$250 – Tom Ford Dot Wool Tie
$180 – Drake’s 8cm Houndstooth Wool and Silk-Blend Tie
$160 – Alexander Olch ‘The Spot’ Knit Necktie
$60 – J. Crew American Wool Tie in Charcoal
$20 – The Tie Bar Webster Medallions Tie
$20 – The Tie Bar Score Check Tie
$20 – The Tie Bar Woolf Houndstooth Tie
$20 – The Tie Bar Wentworth Plaid Tie

The Best Pocket Squares

Brunello Cucinelli Circled Dot Wool and Silk Boucle Pocket Square

Alexander Olch 'The Birdseye' Wool Pocket Round

Alexander Olch 'The Windowpane' Wool Pocket Round

J. Crew English Wool Silk Pocket Square in Stripe

The Tie Bar Kingsley Attune Pocket Square

The Tie Bar Wentworth Houndstooth Pocket Square

The Tie Bar Southeast Plaid Pocket Square

Notes About My Recommendations

Brunello Cucinelli makes probably the best – in terms of color, pattern, and quality – pocket squares out there, in my opinion. The Hugo Boss and Alexander Olch pocket square and rounds are all the perfect shade of grey so they’ll pop really nicely from your darker suits or sportcoats.

The striped J.Crew pocket square will go with pretty much every Fall suit/sportcoat you have. For some great patterened options at an incredible price point, I love the double sided ones by The Tie Bar.

$95 – Armani Collezioni Chevron Patter Pocket Square
$95 – Marwood Slub Pocket Square
$60 – Boss Wool Patterned Pocket Square
$60 – Alexander Olch ‘The Birdseye’ Wool Pocket Round
$60 – Alexander Olch ‘The Windowpane’ Wool Pocket Round
$30 – J. Crew English Wool-Silk Pocket Square in Stripe
$10 – The Tie Bar Kingsley Attune Pocket Square
$10 – The Tie Bar Quest Tooth Pocket Square
$10 – The Tie Bar Wentworth Houndstooth Pocket Square
$10 – The Tie Bar Southeast Plaid Pocket Square

The Best Men’s Ties

Just like all the other essential accessory pieces, you want your ties to work perfectly with all the items in your essential wardrobe. If you own a suit or blazer, then you absolutely need ties! Unfortunately, I see a lot of guys also completely crapping the bed with their ties.

A lot of men are wearing ties that are:

too wide or skinny, which completely throws off their proportions
tied with the wrong knots
not matching their outfits
really odd textured or patterned ties
the wrong material or fabric weights for the outfit

A big mistake most men make, whether they’re just starting out or have a little better handle on their personal style, is thinking they need to go overboard and have their accessories be these big statement pieces. That’s when men get into trouble.

Some men think it’s “boring” to stick to the basics, but they’re basics because they work for everybody and look timeless and sharp. And with the right accessories to round out your outfit, you’ll look well-dressed throughout your entire life. If you never own another type of tie in your life, my suggestions will cover you for every situation you’ll ever need.

How to Match Ties To An Outfit

The most common question I get about ties is how do you match them to and outfit. And it’s pretty simple:

The safest thing you can do, which looks great 100% of the time, is to have a similar color in your tie (not exact, just a similar shade) to any other color you’re wearing in your outfit – outside of your dress shirt.

So if you’re wearing a gray suit, white dress shirt and black dress shoes, wear a tie that has black or charcoal/gray in it. If you’re wearing a navy suit with brown dress shoes and charcoal socks, wear a blue or charcoal tie. If you’re wearing a gray blazer with dark wash jeans and brown boots, wear a tie that has some blue or charcoal in it. Brown leather jacket and boots, wear a tie with some brown in it.

That’s it.

Anything outside of that is next level stuff and can go wrong quickly if you’re not sure what you’re doing. You can go your entire life only following this rule and you’ll never go wrong – I promise.

What materials should your ties be?

You really only need ties in two materials to cover you for the whole year.

Silk Ties
Silk ties work year-round with every kind of outfit where a tie can be worn – dress, business and casual.
Knitted/Woven Ties
For the Spring and Summer months only – Check out Summer Essentials Ebook for details about those specific ties, but since they’re not for year-round wear, I won’t cover them in this article.

Any other types of materials, like pure wool or linen, have pretty small use cases and definitely won’t be as versatile as the above options and you should wait to get them until you’re much further on your style journey.

What color ties should you own?

Like all the items I recommend in the essential wardrobe series, you want to stick to black, charcoal, and navy, with one exception – which you can throw in there, if you like, and that’s silver or light gray.

These colors will go with 99% of the outfits you’ll wear. Just like with tie materials, any other colors will have specific use cases and are outside the scope of this series.

Once you’ve gotten those basic colors, then and only then can you start expanding to lighter shades or darker or brighter colors like burgundy, brown and other pastel or jewel tones. Again, that’s once you get more comfortable and really understand how to add them to an outfit.

But if choosing tie colors is still tough for you, then those default colors go with pretty much everything and you’ll never have to worry about not looking sharp and put together.

What patterns of ties should I own?

First, stick with plain, solid colored ties in the colors I discussed in the previous section. Then, you can move onto some striped ties with no more than 3 colors in them (ensuring at least the major color in the tie is one the colors I discussed above) and you can also throw in some smaller polka dotted ties in there, too. Also in the same colors I discussed previously.

What Size Tie Shoud You Own?

Follow these rules for your tie widths based on your height and body type so your proportions will always be balanced. Trust me, I deal with clients of all shapes and sizes all day long and these tie widths will work for you.

These sizes are to be used irregardless of the lapel width of your jacket.

Tie lengths really don’t come into play because most places you’ll go don’t make tall or short versions anyways and they’re not entirely necessary unless you’re ridiculously tall (over 6’5″) or short (under 4’10”).

To take your tie width measurements, just use the widest part of the tie near the bottom.

Under 5ft 8in and very thin

You need to get a 2″ width tie. If you’re not sure if you’re very thin, then you probably have an average build. Under no circumstance should you ever wear this width of tie unless you’re very thin and under 5’8” because it will look silly on you. I’d say that at least half the men I see wearing skinny ties shouldn’t be. Don’t fall into that group!

Under 5ft 8in & average/broad Build

Wear a tie that is 2.5″ wide.

5’8” to 6’3″ tall

thin to average Build

Wear a 2.5″ wide tie.

Large/Broad Build

You need a 3″ wide tie.

6’4″ tall and above (no matter your build)

You need a 3″ wide tie no matter what. This will help balance your proportions.

The Best Men’s Ties

I’ve been a customer and user of TheTieBar.com for years now, and they continually prove to me that they are, by far, the best place to get quality, affordable ties. I have never taken a dime from them to promote their products because they deserve all the praise and business in the world. Unless a designer has specifically made a tie for a client, I use them every time.

Black Ties (solid, striped, polka dotted)