Style

From the fashion cupboard

Sailors have had a big influence on the clothes men wear, most directly in the form of the pea coat and the blazer. Because it’s almost invariably cold on the water nautical clothing is useful in winter, even if the nearest you’re going to get to the sea this winter is a fish supper. Here we have two sweaters, both beautifully made, which were originally designed for sailors. The stripy crew neck is by SNS Herning, which was founded in Jutland, Denmark, in 1931, and while the styles have changed very slightly since the way the heavy sweaters are knitted hasn’t.

London’s North Sea Clothing makes the polo neck and it’s a copy of the sweaters issued to British naval divers in the first and second world wars. The most obvious way to wear it is underneath a well-worn Belstaff Trialmaster, or a Barbour International, but we keep wondering how it would look under a substantial double-breasted blazer, or a pea coat.

SNS Herning, £160, www.sns-herning.com

North Sea Clothing, £115, www.garbstore.com