IT’S hard to believe that, in a world that once dismissed the bow tie as an accessory fit for fops and nerds, the newly popular bow tie has its own snobbish code. To wit, the T.I.Y. bow (known in industry parlance, a bit confusingly, as “self-tied”) is manlier than the too neat, pre-tied kind, thought to be the province of all-thumbs arrivistes and Chippendales dancers.

That sentiment is detailed, nose up, at Ben Silver, the gentlemanly retailer in Charleston, S.C., which offers bow ties in hundreds of patterns, not one of them pre-tied. Per the store’s Web site: “A bow tie makes a statement of individuality, and nothing contradicts that statement more readily than having it pre-tied.” A bow tie how-to video from Details magazine is even blunter: “There’s no excuse for a pre-tied bow tie.”

Now, though, that attitude is changing, along with the ties. No less a style icon than Jay-Z wore a pre-tied black tie with his tux at an opening night party for the Barclays Center. And while the bow tie renaissance has been driven by neo-traditionalists who prefer their whiskey, their whiskers and their neckwear old-fashioned, some tie makers are finding that, for reasons practical and aesthetic, the pre-tied bow is, noble or not, the way to go.