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If anyone at the Emmys is reading, we’d like to humbly suggest a new award: Best Menswear Grail. Almost all the nominees, of course, would come from The Bear. There’s Carmy’s (Jeremy Allen White) bicep-hugging T-shirts, which launched an internet-wide hunt—and led to a tasting menu’s worth of top-tier tees worn by other characters on the show. Then there's Carmy’s vintage denim pieces, plus the custom Thom Browne chef’s apron worn by Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) last season.
And then, of course, there's the most legendary of the show’s grails: Carmy’s cropped-waist, patchwork wool stadium jacket, which had been discontinued by the brand, Copenhagen-based NN07, before the show’s pilot aired. Until now. We’re pleased to present the Emmy for Best Menswear Grail in a Series to the NN07 Gael 8267, which has been blessedly resurrected just as temps drop and The Bear withdrawal kicks in.
If you’re looking to add some tormented hot-guy chef flavor to your wardrobe, stay ready. Carmy’s jacket (re-)launches today, October 4th, at 6 a.m. EST (set those alarms, West Coast). Only 100 will be available in Carmy’s own brown/slate check, though NN07 says there’s another restock planned before year-end as well.
Courtney Wheeler, The Bear’s costume designer, saw the jacket’s star potential the moment she spied it in a Chicago Bloomingdale’s. “We had the sales associate take it off the mannequin because we were like, ‘No, that one,’” she remembers. The NN07 Gael 8267 entered Carmy’s costume racks as a “wild card”—a piece that could be killer or a big L, and won’t be decided on until the actor gives it a shot. It was locked in as Carmy’s signature outerwear the second Jeremy Allen White slipped it on.
The Bear debuted in late June of 2022, and within days menswear fiends were hitting Reddit, begging for an ID on the patchwork jacket. That’s about when NN07 discovered its jacket, already discontinued, had a supporting role in the show. The label could have cemented the piece’s grail status by keeping the jacket on ice, but NN07 designer and product director Anders Frost is no gatekeeper. “We’re not about producing items that are hard to come by,” he says. So Carmen Berzatto’s Gael 8267 gets the encore it deserves.
If you do manage to score TV’s heretofore most-unobtainable grail, know that it’ll do more than get you noticed by menswear freaks and The Bear superfans. Besides being toasty enough to handle a walk-in freezer, the wool jacket, with its dyed patchwork check pattern, is an antidote to Succession-style stealth-wealth monotone malaise, says costume designer Wheeler. “I feel like this ‘quiet luxury’ stuff is stopping people from making a choice that can punch up a wardrobe.” Should you need more fit inspo, NN07 designer Frost suggests…Carmy. “You only need a cool white tee in nice fabric, good vintage jeans, and a strong piece of outerwear in a standout fabric.” In chef’s terms: a few simple, quality ingredients can make a standout dish.
Missed the drop? All good—we cherry-picked a few Carmy-adjacent alternatives right here.
