In January 1996, the new sworn mayor of San Francisco noticed something wrong in the town hall. One of his assistants wore a linen suit in the winter. The mayor, shocked, sent him home to change immediately.
The Moral of the Story: Stay on the fashion calendar. And style is important for Willie Brown.
Mr. Brown, who served as mayor of San Francisco from 1996 to 2004, is one of the sharpest dressed political figures in California.
The handkerchief peeves from his bag with Baldini suit in exactly the right corner and is exactly the right color. And he once raced on a municipal railway tribe on Market Street to refute an article that pedestrians were faster than the train service all while he was wearing a suit, wing tips and a broad Panama hat.
At the age of 91, Mr. Brown open his cupboard. Are green Gucci high-top sneakers? Yours for $ 105.50. Are ivory kiton kiton cashmere crew-neck sweater? $ 36. About 50 items that Mr. Brown used to be wore shoes, track suits, T-shirts, sweaters, coat of jackets sold at an online auction sponsored by goodwill, the non-profit retailer.
Once a year Mr. Brown from a few old items come in his closet and donate anonymously to goodwill Thrift stores. Goodwill San Francisco Bay decided to make the Willie Brown collection on Ebay and to auction his clothing and shoes on the highest bidders.
“If I don’t wear it for a year, it automatically goes to Goodwill,” Mr. Brown said in an interview.
Mr. Brown is one of the few politicians, retired or otherwise, whose cabinet would be considered stylish enough to rob. He noticed in the world of politics, where rolled sleeves, open collars, kakis and blue blazers are the highlight of the fashion for men. He saw stylistic verve and politics as hand in hand to inspire the trust of the public. And he hated Casual on Friday in the town hall.
“Most of us considered it a point of pride that you prepare for work,” said PJ Johnston, the former press secretary of Mr. Brown. “You look out. You have to teach a sense of trust and decency in the audience that you serve, and part of it is dressed appropriately.”
Johnston seems to have learned a lot from his former boss, in terms of fashion. He is the assistant who was sent home in 1996 for the linen-in-winter accident.
Mr. Brown, who has set up part of his clothes for auction in recent years, said that good fashion comes on two things: the fabric and the fit. He was 17 when his mother sent him out of his birthplace of Mineola, Texas, to live with an uncle in San Francisco, who dressed, he remembered, as “people of Harlem in films.”
Mr. Brown added: “And he took me down on the first or second day, and I got my first blue serge suit with a white shirt and a yellow tie. And believe me, I went to church next Sunday, and everyone wanted to know where that came from.”
Mr. Brown is a pronounced democrat. Last year he threatened to sue Donald J. Trump for defamation and defamation, after Mr Trump wrongly claimed that he had almost died in a helicopter with Mr. Brown and that Mr. Brown said they were on that ride for that ride on Kamala Harris, with whom Mr. Brown had once dated. Both claims were incorrect, Mr. Brown said.
Only a few items for picking up in this year’s auction everywhere near politics. One is a navy blue T-shirt for $ 14.99, with a logo with the text: “Willie Brown for President 2024.” It had zero bids from Sunday morning.
Other clothes that Mr. Brown in the past seemed to be more interested. On Sunday the Green Gucci High Tops had 12 bids. The Kiton Crew-Neck sweater had 10 bids. The most expensive item, a reversible jacket from Burberry, for $ 167.50, had 18 bids.
The items in the online auction were freshly picked from Mr. Brown. In the collection, many of the more expensive and extravagant suits and clothing from Mr. Brown. For example, there are none of his trademark Fedoras for grabbing. The former mayor seems to have strictly compiled what is qualified as a giveaway action and what qualified as a non-giveaway.
He had already donated a black striped suit for the auction when he turned on the television and already looked the Reverend Sharpton sharp with a similar. “As if he had already bought my suit from Goodwill,” said Mr. Brown.
He realized that he wanted his suit back – and asked goodwill to give it back, after he told the retailer that it wasn’t his.
The suit is now back in his closet.
