Bulletin Board 46—Building a better travel bag, a favorite rosé find and the jungle jacket reloaded

Along with shorts, striped tees and safari shirts, one of the items I’m most ready to get back into once the weather warms is the jungle jacket. A cousin of the M-65 field jacket made famous by De Niro in Taxi Driver, the Vietnam-era army issue is notable for having four, slightly angled patch-flap pockets which are incredibly useful for holding everything from AirPods to ticket stubs to sunglasses when I travel.

The jungle jacket’s been having a moment in menswear lately, with plenty of brands rolling out their own versions. But I noticed that they were nearly all in the expected olive-drab, and that nobody was doing a reproduction of the 1st-pattern jungle jacket, marked by exposed buttons on the exterior of the pocket flaps, which just looks a little more rugged to me (even if I’m not intending to wear it anywhere near combat).

So, I called up my friends at Chesapeake’s, an under-the-radar Italian brand doing really cool reproductions of U.S. military clothing to make my own version of the 1st-pattern jungle jacket in navy. I’ve written many times about my love for the color, particularly in the summer where its nautical charm really shines. I think it makes the piece even more versatile, something like a more casual stand in for the navy blazer during the warmer months of the year. 

Anyhow, the jacket is up for pre-order now on our recently redesigned website (check it out if you haven’t been!) and orders are expected to be fulfilled in early June. 

For more stories from Bulletin 42, sign up for the WM Brown Weekly.