A black tie affair

On Black Friday, Mr. Spaniel and I avoided the mall and hit up the tux shop instead. We went back and forth about whether to go for the shadow stripes or solid black, and we had a heck of a time choosing between two or three buttons. Pure agony! Okay, so it wasn't that hard: Mr. Spaniel knew he wanted tuxedos for him and his groomsmen as opposed to suits, and he knew he wanted black. Menswear in general has a lot of catching up to do to ladies' fashions in terms of complexity and stress induction, because there really weren't that many options once those two choices were made. (I promise I will make up for the simplicity of his decisions by belaboring the sock selection as much as possible.)

For the groom: a black shadow stripe, two-button coat with Victorian Gold paisley vest and tie (we'll be substituting the rental tie for this one).

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For the groomsmen (and the bridesmen!): the same thing, but with a black vest and tie.


Not too shabby! Since the rental includes the coat and pants, shirt, shoes, vest, tie and cuff links, the only item we still need to track down are the socks. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find nine complementary pairs of green, patterned dress socks? It may be the most difficult wedding-related research task I have taken on! I'm giving myself an end-of-January deadline to find them before I kiss this idea good-bye and just ask the guys to all bring their own black socks. But I would hate to give up goofy pics like these!

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What was your tuxedo-shopping experience like?