Last updated at 13:04, Thursday, 16 February 2012

Time was, you used to be called a cissy and a mummy’s boy if you were caught wearing a vest.

It didn’t matter how cold the weather was, you didn’t wear a vest under your shirt or T-shirt.

And a string vest was even worse (what is the point of a string vest?) they were only for grandfathers or Rab C Nesbitt, certainly not for any style-conscious young man about town.

But all that has now changed.

Now the vest is back in fashion and is, in fact a key fashion accessory for every bloke – thanks to Brad Pitt using them to show off his buff biceps in films like Fight Club and David Beckham including them in his new underwear range for high street chain H&M.

Debenhams says Woking is the vest capital of the UK, sales in the town’s store have boomed 2,900 per cent, year on year.

Of course, vests were a second nature second skin to gentlemen and Joe Bloggs alike until the 1930s.

Until 1934 to be precise, when movie heart-throb Clark Gable (the Brad Pitt of the 30s) was seen without one in the hit film It Happened One Night.

The scene had a devastating effect on the underwear business as men suddenly dared to bare.

But now it seems that Becks and Brad have made it all allright again to wear a vest.

According to Debenhams, the places where vests are most popular with men are all down south, which just makes me think that they’re all just softies...

First published at 11:24, Thursday, 16 February 2012
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk