James Brown Potter (not pictured above) was a resident of the wealthy neighbourhood of Tuxedo Park, just outside of New York City.
While on a visit to London in early 1886, Potter and his wife met the Prince of Wales at a court ball. Among other topics, Potter and the Prince gas-bagged about British fashion trends, and particularly the differences in men’s formal wear in their respective countries. The Prince invited Potter to visit his own Saville Row tailor (Henry Poole & Co) where Potter soon found himself kitted out in the latest in British evening wear: a short black jacket and black tie. Said to have been designed by the Prince himself, and inspired by British military uniforms of the day, the suit was vastly different from the ‘white tie and tails’ that was so popular in the United States.
On his return home,
Potter modelled the new fashion for his friends at the Tuxedo Club, an elite
hunting and fishing retreat founded by the elegantly moustachioed Pierre Lorillard IV, whose family were
wealthy tobacco magnates in the area.
Presumably everyone was most impressed by Potter's fancy duds from across the Pond, because at the Autumn Ball at the Tuxedo Club later that year, young Griswald Lorillard wore a modified version of Potter’s design, which he paired with a bow tie and a crisp, white shirt. When one guest asked why Lorillard’s coat did not have tails on it, another nonchalantly replied, “oh he’s from Tuxedo”. Word spread around the party and the suit and the Club became linked forever.
Presumably everyone was most impressed by Potter's fancy duds from across the Pond, because at the Autumn Ball at the Tuxedo Club later that year, young Griswald Lorillard wore a modified version of Potter’s design, which he paired with a bow tie and a crisp, white shirt. When one guest asked why Lorillard’s coat did not have tails on it, another nonchalantly replied, “oh he’s from Tuxedo”. Word spread around the party and the suit and the Club became linked forever.
