A Tie Clip, also known as a Tie Bar or Tie Clasp, is essentially a stylistic clothing accessory which is used to clip a tie to the front of a shirt, with the primary purpose being to prevent the tie from swinging about. This has its obvious advantages for those who work in more manual roles, especially with machinery, where a swinging tie is a potential hazard.
However, aside from the health and safety benefits which a tie clip affords, there are other more stylistic benefits which tie clips bring to the table. First and foremost, a tie clip helps to keep a tie nice and straight. Therefore, when wearing a nice stylish suit, a tie clip often adds that extra finishing touch. The last thing you want is to make all that effort, only for a gust of wind to suddenly ruffle up your tie so it is all misaligned. This is one of the reasons you often see famous stars such as David Beckham and Leonardo DiCaprio wearing a tie clip.
However, again this reason is a practical reason behind wearing a tie clip, and tie clips offer much more than sheer practicality. If you look at the images of both David Beckham and Leonardo DiCaprio on the left, you can see how as well as practicality, the tie clips they are wearing almost add an extra dimension to their whole attire. A well worn tie clip helps to add character, charm and style to an ensemble, and ultimately completes the finish. Now we say well worn, simply because there are a few points you need to bear in mind when wearing a tie clip. Firstly, it’s important that a tie clip is fastened to both the tie itself and the shirt behind it – the last thing you want is to have a swinging tie with a tie clip fastened to it as this defeats the whole purpose of wearing a tie clip in the first place!! Secondly, you must ensure that the tie clip is fastened in a horizontal position. Wearing a slanted or wonky tie clip will only serve to undo all the stylistic juices you have aimed to achieve by dressing smart. So our recommendation would be to check in the mirror before leaving the house in the morning, and take a glance at the tie clip from time to time throughout the day and re-adjust if required.
There are a range of different styles of tie clips out there, but when it comes to picking a style for you, we would recommend bearing in mind two key points; colour and design. We wouldn’t ever recommend wearing a tie clip which is the same colour as the shirt which you are wearing simply because it wouldn’t stand out how you need it to. Wearing a tie clip is something you want to do proudly, but if it’s the same colour as your shirt, the chances are people may not even notice it! The design of a tie clip is also crucial when choosing the right one to wear. When it comes to the design, we would always advise against wearing stripe designed tie clips with a stripe designed shirt as this could cause a catastrophic clash! Okay perhaps a slight exaggeration but you know where we are coming from with this, we only have your best interests at heart! So our advice would be to stick to wearing a patterned design tie clip with a plain shirt, and vice versa, so wearing a plain design tie clip with a patterned design shirt such as stripes would also be fine.
Ultimately, the best way to plan for wearing the correct style tie clip for any given occasion would be to ensure you have more than just one tie clip in your collection; our recommendation would be to have a minimum of 3 different styles of tie clips, but ideally 5. By having a range of different styles of tie clips in your collection you can be safe in the knowledge that you should always be able to achieve the right look.
We hope you enjoyed reading our blog on tie clips. Why not browse our full range of tie clips today and find the right style for you.
Kind Regards
Alfred & Co.