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The Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome, tucked into the forests of New York’s Dutchess County, isn’t just a museum: It’s a rip in the space-time continuum. Every weekend from mid-May through the end of October, the skies above it fill with Great Lakes biplanes, Fokker triplanes and other aircraft from the early days of aviation — an elaborate summer-long air show that the Aerodrome has hosted for 48 years.
In this tribute to flight’s formative years, the daredevil pilot’s traditional garb of high boots and coarse wool has been upgraded with the finest leather and lush cashmere. The essential spirit of those threads, like the fabulous setting itself, never goes out of style.
Text: Nick Kolakowski
Photographs: Matthew Furman
Fashion Director: Jennifer Lee
As anyone who’s spent time behind the stick of the Bleriot XI will
tell you, flying was a very different experience back when William Howard Taft was in the White House. The front wheels, set far forward on the frame, help increase the heaviness of the plane’s tail — a key feature in the years before brakes, when aircraft used tail skids to stop. Such a pedigreed craft, of course, demands the proper dress: pinstripes, cashmere topcoat and a pair of sturdy leather boots — just in case you ever need to apply supplemental stopping power, à la Fred Flintstone, by dragging your feet.
Taxten leather newsboy cap, $82, by Bailey of Hollywood. Button-down dress shirt, $150, charcoal-black trouser pants with white-chalk stripes (part of two-piece suit), $1,450 (full suit), cashmere topcoat in navy blue with pinstripes, $2,395, and grey diagonal-striped tie, $105, all by Hickey Freeman. Stark grey zip-up sweater, $165, by Napapijri. Star XXXL Chronograph watch in 18 carat white-gold case with black alligator strap, $13,210, by Montblanc.
The ghost of Manfred von Richthofen, a.k.a. the Red Baron, looms prominently over the Aerodrome. One of the planes he used — the Albatross D.Va — is represented by this 1917 model. As Snoopy could tell you, the Albatross was anything but. Fast and maneuverable, it helped the Baron shoot down 80 Allied planes over the trenches of France. Hoisting oneself up to wing level of such a plane while wearing a ruggedly elegant utility jacket and in-style-again grey Fedora lends new meaning to the phrase dressed to kill.
Grey fedora, $176, by Paul Stuart. Blue windowpane button-down dress shirt, $150, by Hickey Freeman. Black thin-knit Pima sweater with shawl collar, $125, and black utility jacket with quilted zip collar, $595, by Polo Ralph Lauren (available at Bloomingdale’s Men’s Store).
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