Massimo Alba Florida Jacket

Three fibres, each doing a job the others cannot. The wool, at fifty-five percent, provides the crimp and the memory: it is what makes the jacket come back into shape after a day rather than growing. The silk, at thirty, gives the cloth its faint lustre and a coolness in the hand, and it is what stops navy from going dead and flat under indoor light. The cashmere, at fifteen, is doing nothing structural at all. It is there so that the cloth is soft against the back of the neck and the inside of the wrist, which is where a jacket is actually felt.

Left unlined, that cloth is the entire garment. There is no canvas, no padding, and nothing between the wool and your shirt, which means the jacket takes the shape of whoever is inside it and has nowhere to hide a bad pattern. The patch pockets and horn buttons keep it on the informal side of tailoring. What you end up with is a jacket you can push the sleeves up on.

This is the wool, silk, and cashmere Florida. Alba cuts the same model in cotton and, in other seasons, in linen and silk, and they are genuinely different garments. Nothing on this page describes those.

If one jacket explains what this house actually does, it is this one, because it is made almost entirely out of a fabric decision. It also travels better than a jacket of this weight has any right to: it folds into a bag, comes out wearable, and covers a dinner and a plane in the same trip.

The Florida recurs in Massimo Alba's line every season in a new cloth, and the wool, silk, and cashmere version is the one that carries the most of it.

Fifty-five percent wool, thirty percent silk, fifteen percent cashmere, made in Italy. Single-breasted shirt jacket, unlined, with patch pockets and horn buttons. Relaxed, loose fit. Colour: Navy.

Unlined jackets read closer to the body than lined ones, because there is nothing between the cloth and your shirt, so expect it to feel less like structure and more like a shirt with authority. Cut relaxed and loose, it takes a shirt or a fine knit underneath easily and a thick crewneck with some crowding. The shoulder is what to judge in person: with no lining and minimal build, this jacket will not disguise a shoulder that is wrong for you. An unlined jacket is also the garment a measurement would tell you least about, so try it on if you can, and call us if you cannot.

Over the Genova shirt with the Ionio2 in Caffe. Over the Liam sweater in blue, navy on blue, which works because the silk in the jacket cloth reads differently from the cashmere in the knit. With the Oceano jean for the least formal version.

Air it, brush it, and hang it on a shaped hanger. Clean it only when it needs it and choose the cleaner carefully, because an unlined jacket has fewer places to hide a bad pressing. Our general care guidance covers the rest.

The Florida Cotton Shirt Jacket in Smoke and the Florida Jacket in linen and silk are the same model in lighter cloths. The Baglietto Jacket is the virgin wool, the Bali Jacket is the cashmere, and the Liam Sweater goes under either. Everything we carry from Massimo Alba is listed together.