Contributing Style Editor Matthew Mead fashions summery seersucker into projects that dress your home in all-American good looks.

Outfitted for Summer
Light and breezy, seersucker eschews ironing and fussiness in favor of easy, stripy style. Sewn into a table runner, left, the fabric adds fun and function to any picnic table. Sew the runner to the desired length, trimming it with red-and-white welting. On the drop portion, add a divided pocket to marshal tableware. Follow our instructions.

Matthew’s Secrets
The runner’s utensil pockets make it handy for a buffet table, too.

BEHIND THE SUIT
From Gregory Peck’s Atticus Finch to Andy Griffith’s Ben Matlock, the seersucker suit is iconic garb. Developed in the early 1900s by a New Orleans clothier, the seersucker suit was designed as a hot-weather alternative to dark wool business attire. It’s crinkly texture results from the weaving process, which bunches some threads and raises every other stripe. This gives the fabric buoyancy and encourages ventilation. For Southern gentlemen, the seersucker suit—traditionally blue and white—is worn from Easter through Labor Day. A bow tie is the standard neckwear; but since the late 1990s, when Mississippi Senator Trent Lott resurrected a long-held Senate tradition of wearing seersucker suits on hot days during the session (dubbed Seersucker Thursday), many men opt for pastel neckties instead.