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"  The models, for once, are more nervous than the designer. They enter this New York showroom, one by one, some tentatively shaking his hand, nearly all of them walking in the wrong direction. &amp;quot;Start at the line,&amp;quot; says the casting director. No start at the line. What is the designer looking for, exactly? &amp;quot;English gangsters,&amp;quot; says the stylist. To clarify, or perhaps, insist, the designer says that his models should have &amp;quot;that swagger a sort of confidence.&amp;quot;  For a thirty-five-year-old preparing his first runway show at New York Fashion Week, Simon Spurr has about as much confidence as John Mayer has stupidity. Maybe it&amp;#039;s because he&amp;#039;s English. Or because he&amp;#039;s one of the most promising new designers we&amp;#039;ve seen in years. But it&amp;#039;s probably because he has to: &amp;quot;The average consumer is starting to look at what&amp;#039;s happening on the catwalk,&amp;quot; Spurr explained during a visit last week, crediting the Internet. And that&amp;#039;s why this weekend, the folks in Vancouver won&amp;#039;t be the only overworked professionals vying for your attention. &amp;quot;[Some athletes] have got a lifetime of practice, and only get ten seconds,&amp;quot; he says, before admitting, of his own six months of work for Saturday&amp;#039;s twelve-minute procession, that &amp;quot;unless you&amp;#039;re Tom Ford, you basically have to have a show to really prove you&amp;#039;ve got what it takes.&amp;quot;   And with more men&amp;#039;s shows than ever, the democratization of New York Fashion Week begins today. &amp;quot;New York, historically, has been monopolized by some big brands showing a few men&amp;#039;s looks in women&amp;#039;s shows,&amp;quot; says Spurr, who worked under Hedi Slimane, Calvin Klein, and Ralph Lauren before starting his own line in 2006. &amp;quot;But that&amp;#039;s starting to change, because there&amp;#039;s now a great group of menswear designers working out of New York now.&amp;quot; Aside from Spurr, Phillip Lim will be showing his new men&amp;#039;s line in a runway show this afternoon. And while those two collections are among the most anticipated, young American faces like Michael Bastian, Tim Hamilton, and Band of Outsiders&amp;#039; Scott Sternberg are here in America to join the traditional greats in menswear like Calvin Klein, who, in 2009, brought his collection back to New York from Milan (the traditional menswear capital). Sure, the tents and the models and the cameras are mostly for the women and the eye candy and the Project Runways of the world, but the clothes more of them for men, and more of them from men with new ideas are making Fashion Week worth noticing (even if you don&amp;#039;t work in fashion).  Spurr&amp;#039;s ideas, meanwhile, stem from Tommy Nutter, a Savile Row tailor who rebelled against traditional rules to deliver a new garde of tailoring. Which means, once you&amp;#039;re shopping for fall, graphic colors (a fuchsia suit, for one), Chinese block prints, blown-out checkered patterns, and chunky sweaters that seem as comfortable as they are luxurious. Having a forty-look show like this allows the designer to highlight his Simon Spurr collection, especially as he prepares to simultaneously launch an everyday-oriented line (truncated, creatively enough, to &amp;quot;Spurr&amp;quot;). For that second collection, he gives us a first look at chambray shirts, camouflage jackets, and an expanded selection of jeans that call to mind Spurr&amp;#039;s beginning as nothing more than a four-pair denim line. Then another model walks in, interrupting the conversation: &amp;quot;My agency would kill me if I was here,&amp;quot; he explains. Apparently this young man was not assigned to this particular casting. &amp;quot;But I saw your collection and knew it was my chance to meet you.&amp;quot; Which means, even for men who make a living wearing clothes, Fashion Week is the first place to find the best new clothes, and Spurr&amp;#039;s are a fine place to start. FASHION WEEK LIVE: Click Here for Runway Pics &amp;amp;amp; Instant Analysis &amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;gt;  "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/style/advice/a7012/fashion-week-for-men-021210/>