Since m1k3y just declared flâneur to be the word of the week and thinking on that very subject helped inspire me to quit Facebook, I thought I’d share another old essay that, once upon a time, helped define some of the sensibility of this blog. Allow me to introduce, The Data Dandy. The data dandy collects …
Category Archive: dandarchism
Dec 02
Dandy Bushido
The Buddhist meditates on his breath and is thought deep. The dandy meditates on his cufflinks and is thought shallow. From the Samurai Monk, Yamamoto Jocho: Among the maxims on Lord Naoshige’s wall there was this one: “Matters of great concern should be treated lightly.” Master lttei commented, “Matters of small concern should be treated seriously.” From the …
Jun 12
Bespoke Green Check and Velvet
Beyond the cloth and fit, I love bespoke for the participation it allows and relationships it creates. Not only with people but with objects. I have about three roles with most objects: Consumer, user and garbage creator. I buy a microwave, hit buttons until it breaks, then toss it out. I don’t understand how it …
Mar 30
A Short News Report on Chappism
A fairly decent short news report on Chappism, which has spread to France. While I don’t consider myself a chap and chaps don’t consider me a chap, I do feel a certain affinity with this group and view them as friendlies. We share many common points. (Both in insurrectionist methodology and style.) I suspect that …
Feb 12
The Revolting Dandy
Yesterday, when Mubarak finally resigned, I was at my tailor. Dandyism and revolution have long made strange bedfellows. Eons before the British mocked the American revolutionaries with their song of Yankee Doodle Dandy some of our better dressed people have done much to overthrow the powers that be in politics and culture. If a camera phone is …
Jan 24
Sprezzatura
As I child, I’d watch Blue Jays games with Dad. The bat cracked, the ball sent on a line into a gap for a sure double. We’d hold our breath. Devon White loped towards it. Then, somehow, he’s there. Waiting. Never seemed to speed up. Always seemed to jog. But his glove always found the …
Jan 20
Dandy Antihumanism
“The redemption of objects is impossible except by virtue of becoming an object. As the work of art must destroy and alienate itself to become an absolute commodity, so the dandy-artist must become a living corpse, constantly tending toward another, a creature essentially nonhuman and antihuman.” –Giorgio Agamben
Jan 14
Anarchist Button on the Waistcoat
Now that I’ve sent off my first round of edits, I can once again direct my interest to matters of some import. Like the buttons on a vest. Convention says that one should always leave the bottom button undone. I hold to that convention. But I don’t like it very much. The tradition originated in …
Oct 28










