Final week we held an occasion for readers at Trunk in Zurich, signing books and the journal, in addition to bringing Wool Walkers so everybody may have an opportunity to attempt the brand new coat. 

It was a beautiful night, buzzy and enjoyable, and I by no means tire of assembly the spectrum of PS readers – younger guys exploring fits for the primary time, older ones who’ve had their fits made at Anderson & Sheppard for generations. 

A couple of buddies popped in too – Andrew Borda, a author for PS; Paul Fournier, a menswear good friend for a few years; Ingo Zorc at Bucherer, who we did the massive billboard shoot with two years in the past; and Pawel, the reader Manish bumped into in Thailand. 

It was plenty of enjoyable, though as per traditional the factor I discovered most fascinating was studying about Zurich – a metropolis I’ve solely ever been to as soon as earlier than, after which solely in a earlier life. 

The Trunk and Monocle shops are subsequent to one another within the stylish south-east a part of city, and that’s the place we stayed too. It was splendidly relaxed, and we went swimming within the lake each days (fortunately it was nonetheless 24 levels). 

Mats (Klingberg, Trunk founder) was telling us about how the store opened, again in 2018, and significantly discovered its toes throughout Covid. 

Throughout these odd years, individuals in Zurich have been allowed to satisfy up with as much as 5 others at a time, so everybody frolicked having dinner at one another’s homes. 

Monocle was in a position to stay open as a result of it was a newsagent, not only a store, and lots of people ended up hanging across the space, taking away coffees (and later negronis) and chatting on the road. 

I all the time neglect that (impressively) Monocle doesn’t do Instagram, and focuses all its efforts on gatherings like this – there was one on the identical evening as our occasions too, in partnership with a German division retailer. 

It’s a concentrate on smaller teams of individuals – much less of a attain – however maybe a richer connection to these individuals. It definitely appears to work for them and the gang on the occasion. 

Certainly one of our first inquiries to readers we met was what different menswear shops we should always go to on the town. The overall reply was that there isn’t a lot, and Trunk is definitely in a small group on the prime, however one which got here up repeatedly was VMC. 

We went to VMC the next day, and it actually was spectacular. You can inform instantly it was the type of place PS readers would love, as a result of the workers all had the look (an informal, workwear one) and knew the manufacturers inside out. 

In contrast to workwear shops in London, the model combine was actually large – each by way of value and elegance. There was plenty of Freewheelers, Actual McCoy’s and At Final, but additionally Goldwin fleeces, Smedley polos and a number of other craft manufacturers we’d by no means heard of. These included Rakki and Casa-Isaac, and I ended up getting a Rakki sweater. 

In an fascinating parallel with Monocle, VMC doesn’t promote on-line and by no means has. It’s nearly 40 years previous, and plenty of retailers I do know that took that stand towards e-commerce (usually Italian) folded because of this. VMC appears to have survived, maybe on account of its closeness to clients. 

Elsewhere in Zurich we popped into the Ludwig Reiter retailer, as there isn’t one in London any extra. A few of their chunky derbies are good choices for that model of shoe – the roundness is mitigated by a skinny welt, and so they use fairly a cushty, barely banana-shaped final. 

We additionally went to Dee-Cee, which was based by an ex-employee of VMC and has an identical vibe. That they had some extra style manufacturers among the many Japanese repros and conventional outfitters, corresponding to Kapital and Stone Island. 

There wasn’t a lot else – a few respectable department shops, Pelikamo and the Swedish model Rose & Born – and it was all the time a pleasure to return to Trunk and Monocle’s quiet nook of city. 

Trunk is celebrating its 15-year anniversary in the intervening time (London, not Zurich) and there are some fascinating collaborations coming within the subsequent few weeks. In retailer, I used to be after one other pair of Paraboot Barth footwear, however apparently they’re gone for the 12 months now. Oh nicely, I’ll wait. 

Thanks to everybody who got here out final Thursday, and I’m so proud PS is of a lot use to so many individuals. Thanks to Adrian, Gretchen, Mats and everybody at Trunk for internet hosting us as nicely. See you all subsequent time. 

I used to be carrying: Sartoria Salino jacket in Maison Hellard ‘Mildmay’ fabric, being coated in full quickly. With a cream knit on the shoulders (it was chilly within the night… shoulder season).