Philly Style Blogger Profile: Mohammed Shariff

Name: Mohammed Shariff

Hometown: Princeton, New Jersey

Currently Based in: Philadelphia

Age: 28

Blog: Fame Appeal

Day Job: Fashion and Entertainment Attorney

What He's Listening to These Days: The Holy Quran (on CD)

How He Describes His Style: Classic with a twist

Style Influences: The Red Shoes, Good Fellas, Flaunt Magazine

Mohammed is working to make these glasses his signature piece. He's intending to wear them in any and all promotional materials for his blog, which in case you don't know it, chronicles fashion from a legal perspective, particularly in regards to intellectual property law. 

Mohammed pointed out lawyers to me as they passed by. "You can tell," he told me, "by the cheap black suits they wear no matter how hot it is." 

Suits, for most people, are a job requirement. They come off as soon as a person gets home. Mohammed, however, takes pride in his, embellishing it with a pocket square, adhering to the fastidious detailing of the well-dressed man. Most peoples' suits don't fit them, he explains, and you can tell when someone doesn't know how to wear one when they button the bottom button. Mohammed's suit, of course, is tailored, and he prefers German-made suits to most other varieties. "American suits tend to be boxy," he told me, "and Italian suits only fit skinny people." 

Frankly, I've posted a lot more suits on this blog in recent weeks than I intended. I had imagined a much larger percentage of leather jackets than sports coats. But then if you believe popular menswear blogs like A Continuous Lean, Sartorially Inclined, and Die Workwear!, we are in the midst of a new peacock revolution. Some people cite Mad Men as one of the main inspirations for this. Others insist it's a response to the continual cheapening of mass production. Menswear, we are told, is about valuing quality and craftsmanship. It is about care and attention, living and dressing consciously. It is, in other words, anti-Walmart, anti-fast fashion, and anti-massification, a literal embodiment of slow fashion. But just try convincing the old guard of Birkenstock-wearing leftists of the revolutionary potential of well-tailored suits! Can you resist the establishment by embodying its most representative garment?