Everyone for cricket

By SUSIE RUSHTON

Of all the fashion designers who trade in the "classic" looks, Ralph Lauren is the master. Not for him the constant flux of seasonal trends. He simply keeps on doing "his" style - the American lifestyle, writ large - and, in a rhythm, the mood of the times invariably come around to his way of thinking.

"I don't want to be in fashion - I want to be a fashion," Lauren once told Vogue .

One of Lauren's most enduring muses is the preppy, an archetype born in the early 80s whose dress reflects a rose-tinted view of old England from the Wasp-y vantage point of the Hamptons, Connecticut and the Ivy League. Lauren, should we forget, is the designer who outfitted Robert Redford as Jay Gatsby in 1973's The Great Gatsby. And if the carefully parted hair, collegiate scarves, contrast-trim blazers and myriad references to Gatsby/Brideshead Revisited/Chariots of Fire seen on other menswear catwalks (Paul Smith, Burberry Prorsum and, for next spring, Louis Vuitton) are anything to go by, then a Ralph Lauren moment is upon us once again.

Lauren describes preppy style as having "timeless sophistication", a term of approbation that is perhaps only to be expected from a designer who decorates each of his mahogany-panelled flagship stores with antique cricket bats and Persian rugs. The preppy muse feels at home in such an environment. After all, the look borrows its codes - such as the pique cotton polo shirt, or leather deck-shoes - from picturesque sports that evoke clement weather, gentlemen's agreements and, of course, extreme wealth.

Not all sports are equal. Why else would a younger Lauren - who was born in the Bronx in 1939 named Ralph Lifshitz, and who later wrote "millionaire" under the heading "aims", next to his photograph in a school yearbook - have settled upon the name "Polo" for his brand 37 years ago?

As part of a classic sporting outfit associated with a privileged life, the cricket sweater, then, is a garment well within the Lauren milieu. The colours will make the blood boil at the MCC - but this is typical of Lauren's approach.

He appropriates an emblem of the Establishment, such as a pale cream cricket sweater, and makes it far dandier than the original.

Lauren never did play by the rules. His modus operandi is to disprove the belief that you can't improve on a classic.

In more than 20 separate clothing collections, Lauren does just that. He caters to the teenager who wants to buy a $95 polo shirt as readily as he does the tycoon who sinks a few thousand into a suit from the Purple Label line (this season inspired by hunt-season balls).

Lauren pioneered "total lifestyle" retail, launching accessories, linen, furniture and kids clothes early on in his career. American fashion historian Valerie Steele once said that, thanks to his distinctive advertising, you could identify a golden retriever as a Ralph Lauren kind of dog.

While Europeans have long bought into the leisurely world of Polo, they have not embraced Lauren's more expensive and luxurious pinstriped suits and Eton-collar shirts so wholeheartedly.

For dressy occasions, Italian and French brands are still perceived to have more cachet, a situation Lauren is determined to change.

- INDEPENDENT