Getting it Right: The Duffel Coat

Buying the wrong thing on the way to the ideal one.

Don’t worry, this is not a post about how “Holdoverscore” is taking over TikTok

I’m a big fan of “buy once, buy best”—in theory. But the messier reality is that getting to that “best” sometimes requires buying the same thing several times.

Lately, the duffel coat has been on my mind, in no small part thanks to its prominent placing on Paul Giamatti in The Holdovers (which really is good as everyone insists). Now, I’ve had a duffel before—in fact a few—but each were ultimately discarded for reasons I’ll go into below.

My first was picked up from a Uniqlo in Manhattan—the city’s first, and at that time, still very exciting—at the start of winter break my sophomore year of college. An admirer of Paddington Bear (before it was cool), I’d long wanted a duffel of my own, and the camel-colored Uniqlo iteration checked all the right boxes for a gentle price.

Of course, I was innocent then, and wouldn’t even have questioned whether its majority-poly fabric composition would lead it to excess pilling and a generally less attractive look over time. And I wasn’t at all bothered that its toggles were made out of plastic instead of horn—until I was.

So, sometime after losing my #menswear innocence and growing jaded with this once beloved piece of outerwear, I donated what I now considered my “starter duffel”, in anticipation of obtaining the “real thing.”

The next duffel arrived during a stretch of my mid-20’s when I was living alone and furiously hunting after vintage Ralph Lauren on eBay (two conditions that tend to exist simultaneously). One day, I came across a navy Ralph Lauren duffel in my size for just $12—and in a click, it was mine.

It was a magnificent piece, made from a heavy melton wool that fell below the knee, and was completed by checked tartan lining in the hood, wooden toggles and roped frogging. Not only were its details vintage, but so was its fit—a size “medium” in ‘90s Ralph (I presumed its date) was absolutely enormous, swamping my 6’ 1” frame. The body was so wide, that when I fastened the toggles enormous gaps existed between the coat’s flaps, letting cold air and wind inside. More unfortunately, its sleeves fell an inch or two above my own wrists, leaving the exposed flesh of my lower forearms out to freeze.

In sum, this superbly styled coat fit me atrociously, but my 25-year-old self decided not to worry about it for $12. However, I gradually wore it less and less until one of the rope fasteners tore, and realizing I didn’t care enough to have it fixed, allowed it to go to the wayside (ie, trash).

Many years have since passed. I’ve continued to admire the duffel while remaining duffel-less myself, in large part due to my difficulties finding a version that might fit my absurd, 27” sleeve. But this season, a new Canadian brand named Wynona put out its “Enzo Coat,” a sand-colored duffel that hit all the requirements on my own sheet—100% wool fabric, a knee-grazing length, genuine horn toggles—and importantly for my own reasons, it boasted an oversized fit that extended to its sleeves. Baited by a 20% Black Friday sale, I took the plunge.

After much delay, it arrived in my building’s lobby at the start of January. Is it perfect?Not totally. As a dedicated long wallet wearer I wish it had more than a single interior pocket, and my allergy to any sort of branding took issue with the (admittedly very subtle) inscribing of “Wynona” on the toggles.

But, this is small-fry stuff. The fit is spot-on, the fabric is beautiful, and its styling is about as close as you can get were you to task me with building a duffel from scratch. In other words, I’m feeling comfortable enough after a week of wear to call it “the real thing”, and put the whole saga to a happy end.

Cut, Make & Trim

• Earlier in the season, I wrote up a little roundup of duffel coats over at Robb Report. In addition to Wynona’s, there are a couple from that list that I still catch myself daydreaming of—in particular, the excellent collaboration between De Bonne Facture and Gloverall.

• I also wrote about Wynona more generally for Robb Report, back in May.

• And if you aren’t entirely sick of big coats by now, a story on Balmacaans by myself was published today at RR.

• Over last weekend I finally watched Killers of the Flower Moon. It’s masterful—but at 3 and a half hours, hard not to split across two nights, particularly if you have a kid. Iv’e been on a little Western kick since, also owing to the wonderful new edition of Bruce Boyer’s Gary Cooper: Enduring Style. Halfway through it, I realized I had never actually seen a Gary Cooper film, and corrected that post-haste by streaming High Noon and Veracruz. Each are the sort of excellent escapism Hollywood doesn’t do anymore, and at under 90 minutes each, a refreshing reminder of how compact movies can (and used) to be.