# Charvet Place Vendôme

Charvet is a French high-end bespoke and ready-to-wear shirtmaker from Paris, France. Its flagship store, is located at 28 Place Vendôme in Paris. It is known for its inspiring display of colours, "where the rainbow finds ideas" (Jean Cocteau, La danse de Sophocle, Mercure de France, 1912, p. 133). "Charvet is the greatest artist in creation!" wrote the American painter James McNeill Whistler (Edgar Munhall: Whistler and Montesquiou: The Butterfly and the Bat (1995), p. 145, Frick Collection).

## Quotes

    In chronological order.
* When I saw my new gown all full of rolls of tissue-paper, packed by poor dear Bee, I went to my trunk and pulled out my smart Charvet tie. I handed it to her in silence. "Take it," I said. "I hate to give it up, but you deserve it." Bee accepted it gratefully.
** Lilian Bell, Abroad with the Jimmies (1902), p. 89
* He stopped at a shady spot, and Nguvu, his gunbearer, pulled out a round mirror three inches in circumference and a Charvet cravat, which his master tied very carefully over a flannel shirt which had been fresh in the early morning.
** Eleanor Stuart, Bibi Steinfeld's hunting (1909), McClure 32:480
* The pale tones of shirt and cravat and out-peeping pochette bespoke the genius of the well-known M. Charvet of the rue de la Paix.
** Justus Miles Forman, Bianca's daughter (1910), p. 135
* She calls me a chic type because I wear a Charvet tie.
** Claude Carlos Washburn, Gerald Northrop: a novel (1914), p. 285
* Marçais is a charming man and so distinguished! Charvet makes exclusive ties for him.
** Pierre Benoît, Koenigsmark (1918), p. 28
* … tightening from time to time the knot of my magnificent Charvet tie and taking care not to soil my polished boots...
** Marcel Proust, Remembrance of Things Past (1922), p. 566
* ... as becoming as a Charvet cravat ...
** Scofield Thayer The Dial (1923), 75:9
* Telegrams to Poole, Charvet, Briggs, Thomas and Lock, to tell them to send my summer wardrobe on here.
** Valery Larbaud, A. O. Barnabooth, His Diary (1924), p. 14
* Andre started to unhook the pot, burned his fingers, and, after wrapping a Charvet silk handkerchief around its greasy handle, carried it off gingerly ...
** Eleanor Medill Patterson, Glass houses (1926), p. 214
* He had on a straw hat with a club ribbon (what club I haven't the foggiest idea), a bright blue Charvet cravat and linen spats, and he was swinging a thick Malacca cane.
** Kent Curtis, The tired captains (1928), p. 53
* Shady young men in Charvet shirts sit round the bar repairing with powder-puff and lipstick the ravages of grenadine and crème de cacao.
** Evelyn Waugh, Decline and Fall (1928), p. 33
* He had brought his presents for them down to breakfast — the Dunhill pipe and the Charvet dressing-gown for Harry ...
** Sinclair Lewis, Dodsworth (1929) p. 183
* He was a very good-looking young man indeed, shaped to be annoyed. His voice was intimate as the rustle of sheets, and he kissed easily. There was no tallying the gifts of Charvet handkerchiefs, art moderne ash-trays, monogrammed dressing-gowns, gold key-chains, and cigarette-cases of thin wood, inlaid with views of Parisian comfort-stations, that were sent him by ladies too quickly confident, and were paid for by the money of unwitting husbands, which is acceptably any place in the world. Every woman who visited his small, square apartment promptly flamed with the desire to assume charge of its redecoration. During his tenancy, three separate ladies had achieved this ambition. Each had left behind her, for her brief monument, much too much glazed chintz.
** Dorothy Parker, Dusk before fireworks (1934), p. 151
* … the Charvet tie was dashing — black china silk with orange and emerald-green splotches.
** Margaret Ayer Barnes, Edna, His Wife: An American Idyll (1935), p. 375
* Bernie occupied the great leather chair by the fire, a modish semi-invalid in his Charvet dressing gown of maroon faille brought from Paris by Lotta.
** Edna Ferber, Come and get it (1935)
* He googled at a bill from Cye for two dozen voile shirts: $312. There was another from Charvet; thirty cravats: $225.
** Jonathan Latimer, The dead don't care (1938), p. 125
* The good ties, Charvet and Saks Fifth Avenue. If he had taken all these away I would have suffocated in an emptiness.
** Myron Brinig, The family way (1942), p. 306
* He was wearing a purple dressing-gown that was obviously a creation of Charvet, and a purple expression that was obviously the creation of acid.
** Beverley Nichols, Men do not weep (1942), p. 181
* His necktie was practically what Charvet calls a scarf. I thought maybe he was intelligent.
** Allan Seager, Equinox (1943), p. 46
* Charvet was showing summer ties. I bought a couple from an elegant and hollow-chested salesman. I didn't want to talk to him about the war, because he looked sad enough already, but he began to talk about it himself. "We are an indolent people, monsieur", he said pleasantly.
** A. J. Liebling, The road back to Paris (1944), p. 68
* We walked through the Place Vendôme and he asked if I would mind going in to Charvet's for a moment; he had ordered some things and wanted to know if they were ready. It appeared that he was having some vests made, and some drawers, and he was having his initials embroidered on them. The vests had not come in yet, but the drawers were there and the shop assistant asked Elliott if he would like to see them. 'I would', he said, and when the man had gone to fetch them added to me: 'I have them made to order on a pattern of my own'. They were brought, and to me, except that they were of silk, looked exactly like the drawers I had frequently bought for myself at Macy's; but what caught my eye was that above the intertwined E. T. of the initials was a count's crown. I did not say a word. 'Very nice, very nice' said Elliott. 'Well, when the undershirts are ready you'll send them along'. We left the shop and Elliott, as he walked away, turned to me with a smile. 'Did you notice the crown? To tell you the truth, I'd forgotten about it when I asked you to come in to Charvet's'.
** W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor's Edge (1944), p. 138
* [H]is feet limp in their polished handmade shoes, with a Charvet tie under his double chins and a Paris- monogrammed handkerchief peeping from one sleeve ...
** Frances Crane, The Indigo Necklace (1945), p. 172
* His immediate impression had been that here was a ward heeler in a Charvet tie.
** John O'Hara, Pipe Night (1945), p. 92
* Sebastian entered — dove-grey flannel, white crepe-de-Chine shirt, a Charvet tie, my tie as it happened, a pattern of postage stamps.
** Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited (1945), p. 31
* He has— or had— 3000 Charvet neckties … which is more than Charvet has now.
** Damon Runyon, Short takes (1946), p. 208
* [T]he private detective, with his mocking smile and cold wit, his chivalry, his magic appeal to women, his Charvet ties...
** Martha Gellhorn, Point of no return (1948), p. 32
* "He wasn't literary; he himself made jokes about the writers of "nine-dollar words," he worked the homespun line in public as religiously as he wore Charvet shirts.
** Ward Greene, Star reporters and 34 of their stories King Features Syndicate (1948), p. 151
* Hortense shook her head. She had noticed that this extraordinarily relaxed man had fine, well-kept hands and that his tie, however the worse for mauling, had upon it the unmistakable Charvet stamp. She couldn't imagine a man in a Charvet tie rifling her luggage.
** Dorothy Cameron Disney, "The hangman's tree" Ladies' Home Journal (1949), p. 40
* [A] man lying on one of the couches with his coat off and his shirt open over a Charvet scarf you could have found in the dark by listening to it purr.
** Raymond Chandler, The Little Sister (1949) p. 112
* [H]is clothes might have cost a lot even if they were badly cut, and his tie, though rather loud, she recognized as a Charvet.
** W. Somerset Maugham, Theatre: a novel (1951), p. 103
* I've brought you a tie from Charvet, Daddy." "Is it loud?" "Very." "Good." They were all so pleased with one another that they burst out laughing.
** W. Somerset Maugham, Christmas holiday (1953), p. 303
* I note that my New Yorker's clothes have become duller, and that his haberdashers' has dimmed from Charvet to washable nylon.
** Ben Hecht, A child of the century (1954), p. 368
* Old Nick had taken out a cambric handkerchief, one of a set of twelve he had bought a year ago, if you call it buying, at the establishment of M. Charvet in Paris.
** P. G. Wodehouse, French Leave, (1956), p. 182
* Augustus sat hunched on the sofa, strangely shrunken; even the Charvet dressing gown had an air of ruin.
** Josephine Pinckney, Splendid in Ashes (1958), p. 127
* Around his neck directly, a Charvet cravat. (A theory of the Doctor's. Ties are made of fine silk, shirts at best of inferior silk, ergo wear the best next to the skin.) This, as most of the Doctor's theories, he held in private.
** Robert Paul Smith, Where he went: three novels (1958), p. 70
* At half past ten, Don Otavio issues from the house, splendid like the moon, all in white silk, his silvery hair brushed upwards, a Charvet tie over his holy shirt, bearing nothing.
** Sybille Bedford, A Visit to Don Otavio: A Traveller's Tale from Mexico (1960), p. 158
* All he learned — from the clothes — was that the Count was a much-traveled man— shirts from Charvet...
** Ian Fleming, Thunderball (1961), p. 26
* 1 put down his night glasses, took a Charvet handkerchief out of the breast pocket of his white sharkskin jacket and dabbed gently at his forehead and temples.
** Ian Fleming, Thunderball (1961), p. 93
* [T]he idea of calling the society the Purple Cows emanated from Mr. Straight. Monsieur Casenave sent to Paris for purple Charvet dressing gowns with orange collars and cuffs that the male members wore over their suits at meetings ...
** Brooke Astor, Patchwork Child (1962), p. 61
* The batiste ties from Charvet in Paris … bespoke a certain kind of decadent taste
** Nicholas Monsarrat, Smith and Jones (1963), p. 13
* "I don't know Charvet. I know Jean Goudal." Maurice Sachs switched on more lamps. Charvet is the greatest shirtmaker in Paris, my dear...
** Violette Leduc, The Bastard (1964), p. 268
* I sold some more things, a dressing gown and two pairs of Charvet pajamas, and got ready to leave.
** Maurice Sachs, The Hunt (1965), p. 127
* His Majesty would drink the glass in three or four installments and then eat the strawberries with his fingers, daintily touching up his mustaches with a huge Charvet handkerchief.
** Lucius Beebe, The Lucius Beebe Reader (1967), p. 210
* The simple thing is to consider the French as an erratic and brilliant people, dressed either in blue blouses and berets or trick suits and Charvet ties, who have all the gifts except that of running their country.
** James Cameron, What a Way to Run the Tribe: Selected Articles, 1948-67 (1968), p. 104
* A mouth wash, half a dexedrine, a morsel of anchovy toast and a Charvet dressing-gown — all in the order named — ...
** Kyril Bonfiglioli, Mortdecai's Endgame (1973), p. 41
* Of course I missed Titina and the children, but I had been granted an experience that more than compensated for the lack of a new Charvet tie.
** Noel Barber, The Natives Were Friendly, So We Stayed the Night (1977), p. 157
* She sat shortly after, rosy-footed, in a pair of my black Charvet pajamas, sipping warm milk.
** Anthony Burgess, Earthly Powers (1980), p. 179
* [S]ilk dressing-gown and Charvet pyjamas for the murder, and a very natty check lounge suit for the England interludes.
** Richard Huggett, The Curse of Macbeth, and Other Theatrical Superstitions: An Investigation (1981), p. 160
* Armand was wearing striped silk pajamas, purchased at Charvet, and the somewhat oversize Russian collar gave him more than ever the look of a plucked bird.
** Françoise Sagan, The Painted Lady(1983), p. 151
* He wore an expensive-looking blue suit cut in Parisian business style, a white broadcloth shirt, and a very English-looking tie, probably from Charvet.
** William Gibson, Count Zero (1986), p. 118
* They did striped shirts for him, brought the cotton from Charvet in Paris...
** William Gibson, Mona Lisa Overdrive (1988), p. 46
* "Watch out! I cried- and a column of vomit fell diagonally across his bed. Look what you've done to my Charvet dressing-gown!
** Bruce Chatwin, What Am I Doing Here? (1989), p. 62
* For Julian, making love to each new leading lady was as easy as tying his Charvet tie.
** Joan Collins, Love and Desire and Hate (1990), p. 144
* … Hocken in the village turned a white-dotted navy silk Charvet dressing gown into "a best dress" for Sunday.
** Shirley Conran, Lace (1992), p. 39
* The dining room was empty except for a few country people eating their dinners, all of whom looked up at us [...], at our dark suits and spectacles, at Francis's monogrammed cufflinks and his Charvet tie, at Camilla with her boyish haircut and sleek little Astrakhan coat.
** Donna Tartt, The Secret History (1992), p. 234
* All the while Horowitz felt himself under close scrutiny. The collar of his very expensive Charvet shirt felt tight suddenly.
** Henry Denker, Mrs. Washington and Horowitz, Too (1993), p. 174
* I dressed the part to perfection: old but good houndstooth jacket, Jermyn Street shirt and Charvet tie — red, just to be mischievous ...
** John Banville, The Untouchable (1998), p. 9
* Every Christmas Alec received a tie from Charvet and a check drawn on a bank he had never heard of.
** Ward Just, Echo house (1998), p. 175
* Absently, he picked up a gayish tie that was laid out beside a heavy silk shirt. 'Charvet' said the label. Where had he read of Charvet?
** Ngaio Marsh, Killer Dolphin (1998), p. 25
* You should always carry a handkerchief. Two, even. One for show and one for blow, my father, the ambassador, used to say. Here. Charvet, Paris. You can keep it. Nice color, don't you think? Go ahead, cry. No one's looking. Get it out of your system. I think it's marvelous to cry.
** Dominic Dunne, A Season in Purgatory (1998), p. 263
* The sun was very hot, so I took off my coat. It got hotter still, so I took off my shirt. It went on getting hotter, so I took off my vest and my pants, and there I was, my dear, practically in the nude, apart from a dainty little number by Charvet, which cost the earth considering that nobody ever sees it...
** Beverley Nichols, Sunlight on the lawn(1999), p. 88
* [T]he richest-looking ensemble he possessed: a navy hard-finished worsted suit with pinstripes, nipped at the waist, a tab-collared shirt with a white collar and spaced-out pale-blue stripes on the shirtfront, a solid French-blue crepe de chine silk necktie from Charvet in Paris...
** Tom Wolfe, A Man in Full (1999) p. 97
* He stopped in the Charvet shop and bought a dozen shirts and neckties [...] instructing that his old clothing be discarded.
** Stuart Woods, Worst Fears Realized (2000), p. 165
* At seven o'clock he took a shower and put on a clean white shirt and a Charvet tie — a gift from a grateful client.
** Jackie Collins, Hollywood Wives - The New Generation (2001), p. 344
* In Liechtenstein, the plumage of an international business man - the Kiton double-breasted suit, the Hermes tie, and the Charvet shirt — was protective coloration, nothing more.
** Robert Ludlum, The sigma protocol (2001), p. 145
* We'll get you dressed up in the finest dark suits and white stiff collars — no color except for a gorgeous Charvet tie.
** Louis Auchincloss, Manhattan monologue stories (2002), p. 54
* Charvet, the legendary chemisier opposite the Ritz hotel. He could happily have lived in Paris forever. He did not know where he had acquired such tastes.
** Ken Follett, Jackdaws (2002), p. 12
* [T]he dinner guests were undoubtedly rail-thin young things in perfect Boldini-portrait tailored frock coats and Charvet floppy bow ties.
** Christopher Whitcomb, Black (2004), p. 56
* Mitchell wore a gray Savile Row suit and a Charvet oxford so tightly woven it shimmered like mica.
** Jeremiah Tower, California Dish: What I Saw (and Cooked) at the American Culinary Revolution (2004), p. 36
* [N]or by the hundred-dollar pink Charvet shirts from Paris he could ill afford on the clerk's salary he earned at the French embassy in Knightsbridge.
** Ted Bell, Pirate (2005), p. 21
* "I want you to wear something conservative and elegant, made by a gentile tailor." Rothstein gave him hundreds of neckties from the house of Charvet ...
** Nick Tosches, King of the Jews: The Greatest Mob Story Never Told (2006), p. 233