The fashion formula | Nature

Access through your institution Buy or subscribe Performed in the bedroom, or in front of a mirror, or even at the breakfast table - the donning of your average necktie is a common enough

scene. But why are there just a handful of knots in everyday usage? The answer has now emerged - not from some fashion house, but from the physics department at the University of Cambridge

as Thomas Fink and Yong Mao report in _Nature_ [4 March 1999]. The duo have been mentally grappling with this familiar item of urban apparel. Their approach is mathematical, but the findings

are definitely hands-on; for not only does this research explain why we knot ties in the way we do, it also predicts several new styles. This is a preview of subscription content, access

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Log in * Learn about institutional subscriptions * Read our FAQs * Contact customer support Authors * Karen Southwell View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed 

Google Scholar RIGHTS AND PERMISSIONS Reprints and permissions ABOUT THIS ARTICLE CITE THIS ARTICLE Southwell, K. The fashion formula. _Nature_ (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/news990311-6

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