Reigning Men, a new exhibition at Los Angles County Museum of Art, charts the history of men’s fashion from the 18th century to the present day.

What goes around comes around. Or, rather, what clothes around comes around. That’s one of the main menswear lessons to be gleaned from Reigning Men: Fashion In Menswear, 1715-2015, an exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art that examines 300 years of the male wardrobe through 200 looks, some of which prove to be dizzyingly on trend. Reigning Men – hallelujah, we say. Below, we showcase five of the outfits in the show that aren’t so much sepia-tinted as Instagram-ready.

Can we celebrate the continuing appeal of tartan, that buoyant Scottish tribal regalia, as exemplified by this heather-ready AW14 suit by the Italian colour maestro Etro? Yes, we clan – its allure to designers is far from plaid out, as we can see in the snappily warped-and-wefted AW16 collections from Boglioli and Bottega Veneta, among others, while Etro itself continues to keep it Highland-reel.

“Hey ho, let’s go,” as The Ramones themselves put it so eloquently in “Blitzkrieg Bop”, because two of AW16’s biggest style stories come pogo-ing together in this vintage punk jacket from the late 1970s: the thrift shop rock ’n’ roll style popularised by Mr Hedi Slimane’s hugely influential tenure at Saint Laurent and the distressed look – the pre-fraying, the pre-tearing and pre-chafing – in evidence at Raf Simons, Marni, TAKAHIROMIYASHITA TheSoloist and more.

This smoking jacket from the 1890s reflects the epoch when Englishmen (such as the eponymous Mr NP Stanley of the jacket above) would don such a bespoke silken robe de chambre and retreat to their dens to puff on the newly popular Turkish tobacco. Today, it resembles nothing so much as the reconstituted artisanal pieces crafted by Maison Margiela, or the patchwork extravaganzas of Junya Watanabe, though any accompanying nicotine fug would be decidedly less à la mode.

This French frock coat from the 19th century is a tribute to the embroiderer’s art, and its swirls and arabesques anticipate one of this year’s key trends: the exuberantly stitched tigers, palms, hummingbirds and other tropical flora and fauna emblazoned on knitwear, shirts, bombers and souvenir jackets by the likes of Saint Laurent, Gucci and Dries Van Noten. They’re sumptuous, opulent and splashy – and that’s the whole (needle-) point.

If you’re feeling no windowpane as you admire the exuberant check of this European suit from 1915, you’re obviously one of those guys who’s partial to the peacockery on display at the bi-annual Pitti Uomo menswear fair in Florence, and who certainly wouldn’t be averse to the vivacious tailoring – the stripes, grids, foulards, plaids and pastels – practised by the ebullient likes of Rubinacci, Caruso and other modern Italian luxury brands.

Reigning Men: Fashion In Menswear, 1715–2015 runs from 10 April to 21 August 2016 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art