My newly arrived, custom-made scarf by Ryder and Amies of Cambridge, England in University of Wisconsin colors: cardinal and white.
Every once in a while, we all see something we simply must have. Such was the case with with this scarf from Ryder and Amies in Great Britain. I happened on a post mentioning the company's ability to produce a wide array of wool 'school scarves' on Christian Chensvold's Ivy Style website last fall, and made a mental note to check it out, and possibly order a new scarf, in the new year.
Well, about two weeks ago, I finally bit the bullet, spent a little while fooling around on the Ryder and Amies website to find a suitable stripe configuration, and made an order, which arrived in the mail just yesterday. I'm very pleased with the purchase. A warm, eye-catching, six foot long wool scarf in the colors of my alma mater, the mighty University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Sure, it's not Oxford, Cambridge, or even among the so called Ivy League schools here in the United States, but UW-Madison is a large, world class school that I am extremely proud to have attended for five years. I completed a bachelor's and master's degrees there back in the 1990s, growing by leaps and bounds in a host of ways during my time there. Quite simply it was a fabulous time, and I was lucky enough to work with some amazing professors and fellow students while there.
Sadly the only scarves available from the UW-Madison bookstore are those goofy, cheap acrylic things with the school mascot Bucky Badger emblazoned on them. Like you might wear to a football game on a cold autumn day at Camp Randall Stadium. And if that's your thing, fine, but it's not exactly what I was after in winter scarves. So, when the possibility presented itself to create my own? Well, see for yourself.
-- Heinz-Ulrich
"Big-name" schools are fine for some of the people some of the time. Other schools are better for different intents, although not widely known by mainstream/middleclass folks. For example, if you want to study writing and get a degree from the school most respected by authors, you would want to go to the University of Iowa. If you want a degree in Beethoven studies at the school most respected by musicians in that area, then you would go to the school with the second-largest repository of Beethoven memorabilia in the world, San Jose State University (when I tell other musicians that I have a graduate degree from San Jose State University they immediately ask if it was in Beethoven studies). Even in two-year colleges there are some that are highly respected for different studies, such as De Anza College's jazz program, whose recordings have beat Yale quite a few times in Downbeat Magazine's highly-respected awards.
ReplyDeleteCongrats on your new, great, tasteful scarf, and I'm very glad to hear that you're (justifiably, of course) proud of it & your alma mater!
Great scarf! I'm a fan of the school boy scarf as well, and I need to acquire more.
ReplyDeleteAs an aside, could you list my tumblr site in your links list? Thanks.
http://theoldmanandthetweed.tumblr.com/
Happy to do so, as long as you return the favor!
ReplyDeleteBest Regards,
Heinz-Ulrich von B.
Can you tell me whether you went with the scarlet or the maroon color? I am trying to decide on colors myself, but know that it can be difficult to determine the actual color from a computer monitor.
ReplyDeleteThanks!
Thank you for your question, Keith! Yes, it is hard to discern the difference with their online 'scarf builder.' I opted for maroon, figuring that scarlet would be too bright for University of Wisconsin red, which always looked considerably darker in tone to me during my undergraduate and grad student years in Madison. I was very pleased when the scarf arrived. The maroon is definitely red but nowhere near as bright as scarlet. Hope this helps.
ReplyDeleteBest Regards,
Heinz-Ulrich von B.