Are leather driving gloves the quintessential douche bag element in car culture?
It seems that the leather driving glove trend has all but dwindled away into obscurity…reserved and kept woefully alive by a certain few elite car culture members who keep those dying embers burning. We throw some 95 octane on those embers lighting up the conversation once more around the functional necessity turned pop-culture and unpack some insights gathered.
We’ve seen the Instagram photos. Overly emphasised focus on the staged shots with a setting thoroughly set out in a manner that flaunts some sort of re-enactment of an old Steve McQueen movie. The carefully selected watch is always part of the scene and always sits proud, displaying the “Porsche Design” or “Tag Heuer” label. We can't tell if it’s original or ‘Fong Kong’ thanks to the VSCO filter used. The placement is anything but coincidental. Urban legend is that there are extra points if you’ve taken the shot with the button undone or so I’ve heard. The plebs won’t know this. This all on the wheel of a ‘99 Honda Ballade 160i. I too have been guilty of such ‘accidents’ at times in the pursuance of creative license. Don’t hate the player…hate the game.
“All the gear and no idea” I hear some mutter out there on the internet from the haven of a keyboard, while thrusting a right hand into the packet of lightly salted lays before shoving a handful into a waiting mouth, afterwards letting out a loud burp. Excuse us. But riddle me this, under the hot African sun, while navigating the top section of Bainskloof, have you ever tried clamping down on the grip of a leather steering wheel while sweating like a pig in Palestine? It’s a tough ask if ever. I think not. Those leather gloves could come in handy but if I do fall prey would I be part of the problem here as the title suggests? You ask. Perhaps if you never used the words “rotate” or “understeer” loosely as a way to elevate your driving knowledge then so be it…you have my blessing.
Other ‘solutions’ I’ve seen, regrettably, involve making the use of proper racing gloves. Branded of course. As the self-appointed spokesperson on why this doesn’t work stems back to the nature of a racing steering wheel (the best kinds) which are always made from alcantara or suede and those materials work best with racing gloves. Those gloves then just don’t work well with leather steering wheels or for the upper elite in the classic car game who have wooden wheels. Despite what the weekend warrior may feel. It’s somewhat embarrassing. Just don’t go with that option, ever.
Yeah sure, for those that have gone out and bought leather driving gloves, I’ll humour the situation a bit for the sake of playing advocate…perhaps you’ve romanced about the early days of motoring nostalgia with Alfa, Mercedes or Ferrari and fancied yourself to be a bit of Stirling Moss on the Mille Miglia. I assure you that you’re needing to reassess something then. For guys like Stirling (First name basis, I know), I’ll stress that it was a functional necessity that spelt the difference between life and a fiery death in the Italian countryside, driving a Mercedes 300 SLR. Your spurt in an SLK200 to go buy a morbidly expensive flat white on the Sunday breakfast run just doesn’t quite stack up so wearing gloves shows you up to be part of a rather pretentious act. It’s ok though. I’ve been guilty of it too.
Some may argue that it’s the apex of attention-seeking. “Well, At least I never bought those Mr JWW glasses” you say as you wipe the sweat from your brow and look awkwardly into the corner of the room, whistling. Well, fuck…***cancels order***…but car culture, just like every other culture, needs its characters. It needs that Wikipedia-inspired-narcissistic character who seems to correct every statement made in the car WhatsApp group like it needs the driving glove elite otherwise we’d all be those true all-knowing self-aware types that seemingly know better all the time and life would be boring. If you feel attacked, I assure you that you’re not alone. I too have felt attacked by my own words and sit naked in the shower contemplating every decision made in life and not just my monthly lusting for driving gloves. We’re stuck in our feelings together.
As admin and the reason why this page was named over exposed knuckles being whitened from gripping that wheel tight from spirited driving, I too am conflicted. On some late nights after one too many glasses of merlot, I’ve sat on the Petrolicious site wanting to depart with a large chunk of hard-earned cash that would leave me forced to consume soup from Checkers for the last week in the month, many times.
The truth is that despite my stance on the entire driving glove trend, I’m on the fence about it but I do feel that if we’re going to commit, we need to reinforce a certain sincerity about it and if that fails then default to that fallback buzz term of a saying: “Live your truth”. I still frequent those sites that sell driving gloves and still hover over that “check out” button every month. Checkers is running a special on soup. Perhaps now’s my time to be part of the problem. Click.
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