Winter tie: which tie to wear with flannel or tweed?

Choosing a winter tie for a flannel suit or a tweed jacket takes more than switching to wool. According to The Rake, the rule fits in one line: the tie follows the texture of the suit. On these thick, matte cloths, a matte, textured silk therefore works better than a satin that shines.

Three silks meet this requirement: madder, grenadine with its small knots, and muted woven silk. A very lustrous silk, on the other hand, quickly looks out of place to us on a milled cloth, like a leftover from summer.

Madder and grenadine, the two silks of the winter tie

Ancient madder silk owes its traditional tones, dusky pink and paisley motifs, to dyeing with madder root (Rubia tinctorum). Synthetic dyes now reproduce this look. In Parisian Gentleman, Hugo Jacomet described in November 2009 a matte, rather dark finish that softens the patterns. Enthusiasts readily wear it with tweed or with a flannel in fall colors.

Its limit lies in its discretion. Seen from a distance, a dark madder can look plain. Its matte texture also places it among the casual ties, alongside wool, according to Permanent Style. It therefore suits an office with relaxed codes better than a very formal meeting.

Grenadine, for its part, is woven noticeably thicker than an ordinary woven silk. From a distance it looks matte, but up close a fine network of small knots appears. Its variants range from the dense garza piccola to the more open garza grossa. Permanent Style considers it the most versatile, since it goes with every suit except the most formal. A black grenadine, however, remains too sharp for a brown Donegal tweed suit, as the author of the same site found with his own outfit in January 2017.

Woven silk, printed silk or wool: the other options

A woven silk has more relief than a printed silk, so it generally looks less formal. It therefore finds its place with a flannel suit worn in town. For printed silk, Permanent Style recommends a muted color and a small geometric pattern. Satin stands apart, since its sheen makes it the dressiest silk.

Wool remains the most common answer. In winter, The Rake notes, the tie can follow the suit right down to its material: brushed wool flannel, thick cashmere. The square-ended knit tie, for its part, goes with casual jackets. But any wool looks less formal than any silk, because of its matte texture. It suits Saturday’s tweed, much less Monday’s flannel.

Read the cloth before choosing your winter tie

The first criterion remains formality, and texture is what sets it. Permanent Style ranks ties this way, from the most formal to the least: satin, printed silk, woven silk, grenadine, knit, wool, linen, madder. The more rustic your cloth looks, the further down this scale you can go.

Next, tell flannel apart from tweed. Flannel, a suiting cloth, keeps a crisper look, while tweed lends itself better to the casual jacket. Milling breaks the fibers of flannel and gives it its soft, fuzzy surface. In its December 2017 guide, Permanent Style recommends a 13 oz flannel, and 11 oz at the very least.

Finally come color and sheen. According to The Rake, strong colors are best worn in highly textured materials, while shiny silks call for discreet tones. A winter tie therefore gains from playing on depth rather than reflection. As for patterns, those of the tie, the shirt and the suit get along when their scales clearly differ.

Three mistakes that give away a summer tie

The first mistake is about sheen. Satin, the shiniest silk, seems to us to clash with the fuzzy surface of a flannel as much as with the fibers of a tweed. No written rule forbids it, but the formality scale is enough to understand the mismatch.

The second is putting too sharp a tie on a country cloth. The black grenadine on a brown Donegal tweed shows it well. A softer navy grenadine would, in our view, have held the pairing better.

The third concerns patterns of the same scale. A small tie pattern on a small-check tweed blurs the picture, because the eye no longer knows where to rest. Choose a plain tie instead, or a pattern clearly larger or smaller than the checks.

You often read that a tie that is too narrow clashes with wide lapels, or that a thick silk calls for a fuller knot. The serious sources we consulted do not back up these rules. The only solid indication: according to The Rake, double knots add volume and go with more open collars. To brush up on them, see our four essential knots.

Our pairings by jacket and occasion

• Gray flannel, in town: a grenadine, or a muted printed silk, plain or with small geometric patterns.
• Flannel in fall tones: a madder with a paisley or a small motif, like the seven fold rust tie with small yellow medallions.
• Tweed jacket: a madder, a wool or a knit tie, with repeated stripes or a pattern of a different scale from the checks. The blue tie with a red and yellow geometric print, in madder silk, plays exactly in this register.

If you buy only one winter tie, make it a plain navy grenadine. Permanent Style considers it the most versatile, with almost every shirt and every jacket. To compare materials, from grenadine to madder, browse our silk ties.

One last reflex in front of the mirror: step back about six feet. If the tie catches the light more than the jacket does, change silks and keep this one for spring.

Photo credits: Peazapata / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.