Tailoring Gone Wild: Why Animal Prints Are Popping up in Classic Menswear

Eric Twardzik

31 January 2025 at 11:00 am·4-min read

In 2025, custom tailors are drawing inspiration from an unorthodox source: the zoo. Leopard spots and zebra stripes, formerly relegated to womenswear or edgy streetwear brands, have begun showing up on tailored topcoats, dinner jackets and even full-on bespoke garments.

“We’re in this era where dressing is not about blending in, it’s about standing apart,” says the designer Fred Castleberry, whose same-named label offers a snakeskin-patterned wool dinner jacket among its ready-to-wear and a double-breasted snow leopard wool overcoat available made-to-order.

More from Robb Report

In both instances, Castleberry views their appeal as being appropriated from womenswear— “borrowing the best from the girls, I suppose”—while at the same time embodying a rebellious, even punk spirit. He relates the former item to the snakeskin leather jacket sported by Nicolas Cage in Wild at Heart, and the latter to Jesse Frohman’s famous photo of Kurt Cobain in a leopard-print jacket and alien-eye sunglasses.

As the celebrities cited above suggest, it requires a certain personality to pull off an animal print, event when hewing to the codes of classic menswear. One man that does so with aplomb is Angel Ramos, who spent the most recent Pitti Uomo in a zebra-patterned, cotton-linen cocktail jacket from his eponymous label.

“I’m sure it probably gets reactions like, ‘Whoa, that’s a bold jacket,’ or even, ‘That guy looks like a psycho,” Ramos tells Robb Report. “But more often than not, I get people who appreciate the boldness and creative expression of the jacket.”

Both designers’ exotic wares are available in strictly limited runs, making each completed garment something of an endangered species. Castleberry personally sourced only enough fabric to make six snow leopard coats (from which four have already been made), while Ramos plans to retire his label’s zebra cocktail jacket and zebra alpaca-wool greatcoat from its made-to-order and made-to-measure program once the styles sell out.

“I prefer to keep dynamic pieces like this limited to short runs, making it exciting to own something not many people have,” he says.

Savile Row tailor Richard Anderson also sees value in keeping exotic patterns fenced in, so to speak. Since 2023, Anderson’s house fabric selection has included a jaguar print (complemented by a leopard print for women) available exclusively through its bespoke program.

“It’s a piece that catches peoples’ eyes,” he tells Robb Report. “Keeping these prints to our bespoke range adds to the allure and exclusivity of the collection.”

As alluring as a jaguar jacket might be, it’s certainly not for everyone. Even so, its mere existence has drawn willing prey into Anderson’s front room. “They’re a statement piece that gets word out about the brand, and we’ve had plenty of customers come to us having heard or seen about the prints but then decide to go for something more everyday,” he continues.

Even so, it has netted one particularly memorable client. “The first person to purchase a bespoke jaguar jacket was an Australian gentleman who spotted the piece in the window. He was attending a wedding and wanted to upstage the groom, which we think he succeeded in,” Anderson says.

There’s another, subtler way to work exotics into a tailored ensemble: as an accessory. London-based black-tie outfitter La Bowtique has produced a leopard-print silk necktie inspired by one of Jack Nicholson’s gonzo outfits in The Departed, which it will re-release in a monochrome iteration at the end of February.

“I think it will be easier [to wear] in the sense that the colors are more discreet,” La Bowtique founder Mickael Korausch says of the new design, which is exclusive to his business. “You’re still going to be wearing a leopard tie, so it is still a statement, but it won’t be so bold.”

Animal prints may be the last thing that come to mind when concepts like “versatility” or “approachability” are considered. And yet, there’s a way of looking at exotic patterns that reveal they may not be so hard to crack as assumed. Castleberry, himself the owner of a leopard-print coat from his own label, looks beyond its spots to wear it as he would a brown herringbone or houndstooth-patterned coat.

“The way I think about it, leopard, specifically in the brown family, can almost be considered a neutral,” he says.

The designer also has a nifty trick for sporting zoological patterns: deflection. “There has to be something a little louder than the leopard going on in the outfit,” Castleberry continues. “Whether it be a brightly colored scarf tied around the jacket or a bright red burglar cap, I think that helps as well.”

Tips and tricks aside, it all comes down to the factor that makes or breaks all menswear swerves: confidence. “I don’t think it’s for everyone,” Korausch says of animal prints. “You’ve got to make sure that you are 100% confident wearing it, because you will get comments. There’s no question.”

Just how you handle the resulting attention may determine whether you’ve truly earned your stripes.

Best of Robb Report

Click here to read the full article.