Fox’s Ed Henry goes with squares to add flair

“I never did the khaki-and-cotton thing. I like how they dressed in `Mad Men,’ and I think that dressing up is something that’s coming out of the recession. People want to look successful,” he says.

There’s also the respect he offers to his job and the people he covers by putting on a suit, tie _ and pocket square.

Henry, 40, has been Fox’s top White House reporter since 2011.

Henry and Obama have at times had a prickly relationship, but they can agree on style. Henry recalls interviewing the president in Moscow in 2009, and Obama taking the extra moment to comment on _ and compliment _ Henry’s cufflinks and tie.

“The president has a real eye for detail,” Henry says. “He’s a great dresser.”

Going around the globe, Henry says he picks up ties and pocket squares as souvenirs, and they act as a bit of a travelogue. His favorite is a tie he bought in Italy, where he was with President George W. Bush.

Running a close second is an Hermes pocket square decorated with little sheep. He wore that for his daughter’s first communion.

He rarely shops for ties and pocket squares together, and it’s his rule they never fully match. “I try to pull out the color of one and pick it up in the other. Wearing two solids is cheating,” he says.

Oh yes, he says, he is indeed a shopper. He jokes that few things make him happier than a bargain at Century 21. “I can’t say anything to my wife when she buys shoes.”

Lately, he’s been getting pocket squares as gifts, including the skull-and-crossbones square he received at Christmas from his sister-in-law.

Still, he’ll buy a special one for the 2013 presidential inauguration _ no matter who wins this year’s election. “I made a trip for a new tie for the January `09 inaugural, but the next inauguration will be my first `pocket square inauguration.’”

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Online:

http://twitter.com/EdsPocketSquare

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