Tibi Liam Blazer- Black

Silk and polyamide is an odd pairing on paper and an obvious one on the body. Silk is the fibre with depth: it takes a black to a place synthetics cannot reach, it has a dry rather than a slippery hand, and it falls with weight. What silk will not do is take strain, hold a shape under stress, or survive being worn constantly. Polyamide does all three, and it brings a faint crispness with it. Blend them at sixty-five to thirty-five and you get a cloth that behaves like a silk and wears like a technical one, and crucially one that is light enough to make a blazer out of without the blazer becoming an event.

That lightness is the whole reason for this version of the Liam. The pattern is the house’s blazer, the one it recuts in whatever cloth it is thinking about, and each cloth changes what the jacket is for. Here it is cut oversized and drapey, so it hangs from the shoulder in long unbroken lines rather than sitting on the frame, and the flap pockets are the only interruption on the front. The buttons are placed so that where you fasten it is a decision rather than a given, which means the silhouette is adjusted by the wearer rather than by a tailor. Cut without a lining, which is why it weighs what it does.

Why we selected it

The reason to own a third version of one blazer is that the cloth changes the occasion, and this is the one for heat. A jacket in this weight can be worn in a Santa Fe July, which is not true of wool tailoring and not quite true of cashmere either. It is also the version that travels, because a silk-polyamide blend goes into a bag and comes out again.

Tibi has been designed by its founder Amy Smilovic since 1997, and the Liam is the blazer the house returns to and rebuilds rather than replaces.

Materials and construction

Sixty-five percent polyamide and thirty-five percent silk. Black. Oversized, drapey silhouette with flap pockets and button placement that lets the wearer set the fit.

Fit notes

Cut oversized and meant to read as volume rather than as a size up, so it hangs away from the body rather than following it. A soft, unstructured jacket is forgiving through the chest and unforgiving at the shoulder, because nothing inside is correcting the line, and it is worth seeing on rather than guessing at. The cloth has drape and no stretch, so it moves rather than gives. It layers over a tank or a fine knit and will feel crowded over anything heavier.

Styling

Over the Pebble Sable Square Neck Cross Back Tank with the Alec Jean, which is the everyday version. Over the Slip Cami and the Slip Skirt for the softest reading of it. With the Tropical Wool Maxi Skirt, where two blacks in two entirely different cloths are more interesting than a matched suit.

Care

Silk and polyamide have opposite tolerances and heat is where they part company: heat glazes the polyamide and takes the life out of the silk, permanently in both cases. Dry clean, and press cool through a cloth if at all. Our care guidance covers silk, and it covers what to do when a garment is more than one material.

Related pieces

The same blazer in cashmere is the Cashmere Suiting Liam Blazer, and in the house tropical wool it is the Tropical Wool Liam Blazer. For a shorter line, the Cavalier Twill Shrunken Blazer. Layering With Tibi is the Library post that puts these together, and everything we currently hold from Tibi is listed together.