The new edition celebrates summer on the Riviera, via Worthing, Mont Ventoux and Tiger Bay, Cardiff Chap Autumn 20 is the second edition of this gentleman’s gazette published during lockdown and, if anything, the limitations have pushed the editorial team to produce a no less sensational edition than under normal circumstances. Heading the contents is … Keep Reading
Hot on the heels of Flaneur comes a new gentlemanly scent that is more appropriate for night mischief Last year The Chap released its first fragrance for men, Flaneur, which was designed to be worn during daytime strolls about town in flannels and straw boater. Now comes a brand-new scent to be worn by gentlemen … Keep Reading
Gustav Temple finds that, forced to eschew the pleasures of a European city break, Oxford delivers just as edifying an experience Taking one’s annual summer holiday during a global pandemic produces one or two changes to one’s usual habits. Images of the azure skies, Gothic cathedrals and café terraces of Europe and beyond are somewhat … Keep Reading
As an introductory offer for new subscribers, we are offering a FREE copy of Best of The Chap when you take out an annual subscription. For just £24, you will receive four editions of The Chap Magazine, plus a free copy of our 300-page hardback book celebrating 20 years of publication. Simply visit our Subscriptions … Keep Reading
For those wishing to make the recommended switch to traditional shaving methods, the Raffish Shaving Set provides everything you need. A sturdy black-handled badger-hair shaving brush accompanies a black-handled safety razor, with a free set of five blades, plus a tin of The Chap's very own Raffish Shaving Soap, a subtle rendering of the … Keep Reading
A hard shaving soap bearing the same scent as Raffish Eau de Cologne, whose blend of of dark spices and elegant florals combine to produce a decadent scent that will make you feel louche as soon as you wear it. On a base of sandalwood, vetiver, amber and patchouli is added a fragrant sprinkling … Keep Reading
Chap Autumn 20 features an interview with actor Martin Freeman, sharing his strong views on clothes, music, mods and badly dressed actors. We also meet Scott Simpson, a young fashion designer influenced by vintage, Palm Beach and Riviera styles, ivory tickler Tom Carradine and Alexander Larman, author of a new book on the abdication of … Keep Reading
Raffish is the new men’s fragrance from The Chap, taking a much more masculine stance than Flaneur. Raffish is for the man-about-town off to make some night mischief in his top hat, monocle and cane. Raffish is a heady blend of dark spices and elegant florals, which combine to produce a decadent scent that … Keep Reading
Kentucky is regarded as the first of the Southern states, sitting south of the Ohio River on the eastern side of the United States. It is a green and pleasant land, literally. There are miles of gently rolling hills, clean air and plentiful amounts of fine pure mineral water. All these elements play a large … Keep Reading
One of the fourteen countries that straddle the Equator, Ecuador took its name from that imaginary line and offers an engaging place for the traveller to explore with much historical interest, museums and art galleries but, more significantly, it’s the best place in the world to buy a Panama hat. I took a trip out … Keep Reading
Why am I writing about Disneyland in The Chap, you ask? Because, for the past four years, Disneyland in Anaheim California been the epicentre (not Epcot Center – that one’s in Florida,) of Dapper Day, and Rose Callahan and I had been invited by the event’s organizer to give a presentation about our book I … Keep Reading
Part Two of Chris Sullivan’s history of male grooming The first rudimentary form of shaving cream was documented in Sumer, Mesopotamia (now Southern Iraq), around 3000 BC, which combined wood alkali and animal fat. Further shaving creams remained essentially unchanged from the Romans to the Renaissance, and it wasn’t until the 18th century that men started using a badger hairbrush to apply the soap. Shaving cream as we now know it first cropped up in the 1840s in England, Vroom and Fowler’s Walnut Oil Military Shaving Soap being one of the first widely available foaming tablets on the market. Since…
Chris Sullivan looks back at the history of male grooming to ensure that post-lockdown man is ready to spruce himself up After months of lockdown, whereby a chap has been bereft of haircut, a barber’s wet shave and, for some, a manicure, many of Britain’s menfolk now resemble Robbie Coltrane as Rubeus Hagrid in Harry Potter or Giant Haystacks, rather than Terry Thomas. As such, a touch – or rather a large slab – of personal grooming is in order for the well dressed Man-Who-Can-Now-Be-About-Town, while a little investigation is certainly also in order, to remind us all of the…
This short videogramme by Sophie Gargett gives a tantalising glimpse of what’s in store for readers of Chap Summer 20, published in May 2020. Heading the cast is Honor Blackman, the subject of a profile by editor Gustav Temple, which focuses on the star’s roles as Cathy Gale in The Avengers and Pussy Galore in Goldfinger. Members of our European collection of eccentric dandies, artists, filmmakers and actors are Fritz Lang, Anna Karina, Tamara de Lempicka and Federico Fellini. We also tracked down the most splendidly attired chaps from countries across the Continent, from Luxembourg to Hungary, with features from…
Gustav Temple and Olly Smith on the transformation of gin from slum-dweller’s slosh to sophisticate’s tipple “Liquid Madness sold at tenpence the quarter.” Thus did Thomas Carlyle, admittedly not the world’s greatest party animal, describe gin in 1839. Back then, gin was still waiting for its launch into the High Life, and was the tipple of choice for the lower orders of London for at least a century. Gin palaces, glamorous as they sound, were disgusting dives in seedy quarters of the capital where the bottom end of society would spend the evening quaffing crude early forms of Old Tom…