Laurie Haspel has an outfit laid out in her room at the ritzy Windsor Court Hotel in New Orleans. It’s a short little number with blue and white stripes, paired with Saint Laurent pumps. The dress is seersucker, the ruffled Southern summertime staple, but she’s not just wearing it because it’s hot in Louisiana.
Haspel is seersucker royalty. Her great-grandfather Joseph Haspel Sr. sewed the first suit out of seersucker in 1909, adapting what was once workwear to tailored menswear. She’s here for a “Seersucker, Sazeracs, and Hats” themed luncheon, another stop on her seasonal tour. Soon she’s off to New York for National Seersucker Day—yes, there is such a thing. Then to Nashville for the Seriously Seersucker party. Then an event at the American Saddlebred Museum in Lexington, Ky. “Then, good Lord, where is my next?” an exasperated Haspel says in a soft Southern accent.
