Man Crush of the Year: Eddie Redmayne

by Nathan Beesley

Despite my pristinely made bedding, zealously strict grooming routine and severely bloated wardrobe, I am actually a happily heterosexual guy with a healthy fondness for all things female. This even extends to, though very rarely, actually entering relations with the fairer sex.

I tend to take a somewhat uncompromising stance with regard to my sexuality (unlike the rest of my family and friends, I never thought I was gay) and this can create difficulties when one is trying to express ones respect for an attractive role model of the male persuasion.

Luckily, the growing number of English colloquial idioms has provided us with the perfect solution, namely the expression ‘man crush’. This expression allows even the most Neanderthal of homophobes to express their affection for anyone from Joey Essex to Boris Johnson, (although if you have a man crush on either of the aforementioned characters, I would seek immediate medical advice).

The New Year seems like an appropriate time to look back and assess which guy has left the deepest impression on me and, as far as I’m concerned, there is only one contender.

I first came across Burberry darling Eddie Redmayne in the television adaptation of Sebastian Falk’s Birdsong, a book which holds the record for bring me to tears at least twice. I was immediately struck by his impeccable attire, which radiated personal style even when he was donning military uniform. Anyone who can look dapper running into a hail of German machine gun fire is sure to be an idol of mine.

I was made more conscious of him by my favourite style publications, including GQ, who featured him on their list of 50-dressed men. It was Redmayne who later influenced me in quiffing my hair, though I’m still working on replicating his tousled, boyish take on the classic style.

Redmayne’s personal style is everything I aspire to. He takes minimalist, versatile pieces of tailoring and mixes these separates to create something truly inspired and refined. There’s always a healthy dose of Sprezzatura, or ‘artful dishevelment’, in everything he does. In a world where men button things up to the extreme, Redmayne takes the opposite approach. Blazer collars are popped, pocket squares are stuffed in, casual henleys and knits are layered effortlessly under sharp, crisp suiting. You just get the sense that Redmayne has just thrown on what he’s wearing, but there’s clearly a strong thought process behind creating this impression.

Jessica Punter, the style and grooming editor for GQ, puts it better than I ever could:

‘Baby-faced charm, artfully dishevelled hair and a killer suit. It’s a really simple formula, but boy, does it work’.

Boy, does it indeed.

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