Men's Black Suit
by G. Bruce Boyer
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The question of the hour is, at the fin of
this siècle: Are there any rules left? The answer to that is a
definite maybe.
But perhaps the more interesting
question is: Do we still have a sense of occasion? The idea of
social ritual, where a certain etiquette and dress are prescribed?
The answer to that is not as clear.
I'm thinking about what used to be
called evening dress. It was worn in the evening, of course, but at
its height in the Edwardian Age, evening wear constituted a variety
of outfits worn for different occasions. There were smoking jackets
and dinner jackets (worn for house dinners and informal evening
parties, but never when ladies were present; it was a Victorian
verity that the ladies were too refined and delicate to see a man's
legs covered only by trousers), tailcoats (for evenings in public),
and court dress (should one be lucky enough to be invited to an
official royal function).
In the early years of the
twentieth century, a gentleman's wardrobe was prescribed by the
hour: morning coats till noon (or a short "stroller" jacket at a
private gathering), lounge (business) suits until 6 p.m. (although
swallowtails, striped trousers and top hats were still de rigueur in
many professions), then evening clothes of one sort or another,
depending on the occasion.
Of course, the high degree of
prescription in dress was merely an objective correlative for the
greater sense of rigidity and ritual about occasions. Every sport,
for instance, not only dictated its own specific outfit for
participants, but for observers as well. The most famous story about
a breech in this etiquette took place one day in the early 1900s
during the London season. King Edward VII happened to glance out a
window and saw his master of the household, Sir Derek Keppel,
entering the palace wearing a bowler hat. "You scoundrel!" the king
yelled at the man. "What do you mean by coming in here in that
rat-catcher fashion? You never see me dress like that in London!"
Tough man with the proprieties, was Edward.
The king was a stickler for detail
in an age of details. He once told a friend, who had proposed to
accompany him in a tailcoat to a picture exhibition before lunch: "I
thought everyone must know that a short jacket is always worn with a
silk hat at a private view in the morning."
Edward would be rotating in his
hand-carved coffin if he could see what some people's approach to
coordinating outfits is these days. While we're mercifully relieved
of all that stifling rigidity, the downside to it is that, when the
rules are thrown out, unbridled freedom often leads to chaos,
confusion, frustration and terrible insecurity. Not to mention that
some folks should be given warnings about assaulting the
environment--you know, like obscene billboards and such.
Fortunately, there's still one
garment, the time-honored tuxedo, that prevents such fashion
fiascoes. The one decidedly good thing about wearing a tux is that a
man doesn't need to make any decisions or worry whether he's making
a mistake: the prescribed outfit, top to toe, works perfectly fine.
That is, works well if one knows the occasion calls for "Black Tie."
There again the Edwardians provided the rules governing the occasion
by stipulating on the invitation what type of dress was expected.
These days "White Tie," "Full Dress," "Decorations and Medals" and
other such instructions are quaintly arcane at most functions. And
the best place to see a tailcoat is in an old Fred Astaire film.
Generally, the only men who own their own tails are diplomats and
symphony orchestra conductors. If you are escorting a debutante to a
fancy ball, rent.
On the other hand, the
tuxedo--which has been with us since the late
1880s--is very much still an option for sartorial p.m. elegance.
"There used to be a dress code,"
says Derrill Osborn, vice president and divisional merchandise
manager of
men's clothing at Neiman Marcus. "And we seem
to have gotten away from it for a while. But we're noticing a
movement towards dressing up--which includes the area of formal
wear. There is a bit of protocol coming back into life, and our job
is to educate our consumer about what to wear. For example, many
invitations these days read 'Your Interpretation of Black Tie,'
which can be fun. It's not protocol as we're accustomed to thinking
of it, but it gets people thinking."
While the dinner jacket can be the
simplest of outfits to wear because no choices or decisions need be
made, that doesn't mean there aren't plenty of choices if you want
them! In a sense, we've come full circle back to the Edwardians
again--but without all the stifling rules. In other words, the
choices without the restrictions.
There have never been as many
alternatives to the tux. "One of the signals, I think," says Osborn,
"that the opportunities for a more individual approach to evening
wear is afoot is the growing interest in the odd dinner jacket.
We've done a number of them, made for us in mohair wool by Oxford
Clothes, in wonderful iridescent colors like burgundy and green.
That dimension of color is returning to formal wear, and it's a
telling indication that elegance is again on the rise."
The tuxedo is still the
unassailable black-tie outfit for an evening on the town. Perhaps a
double-breasted one with sweeping shawl collar, done in a good
year-round weight black or midnight blue barathea?
"Well, we could do you up
something like that very nicely," says Bill Fioravanti, the
incomparable custom tailor on 57th Street in Manhattan.
"Traditionally, we'd use grosgrain facings on the lapels, or even a
miniature striped velvet. Very elegant. But for something a bit
different, we do a marvelous cardigan tuxedo, where we sew the
facings directly onto the front of the coat. It's simplicity itself:
no pockets, no flaps, no lapels. Sleeves and trouser legs are narrow
with no pleats. It's a minimum amount of fabric, to enhance the
slimness of the body. Very flattering for the figure." Decidedly
sophisticated, for which Mr. Fioravanti will want $4,500.
A more distinctive option--still
well within the parameters of the tuxedo--is the colorful silk
dinner jacket with black worsted evening trousers. The Italian firm
of Brioni handmakes exquisite Dupioni silk dinner jackets in shades
of apricot, maize yellow, periwinkle, emerald, pale claret and pearl
gray (as well as the more traditional black and white), cut
meticulously in single- and double-breasted silhouettes, with either
peak or shawl lapels (priced at $3,200, including the dress
trousers). These are reminiscent of the 1950s style pioneered by
Brioni, and have that distinctive James Bond look. Brioni also
creates '50s-inspired tartan dinner jackets, in the classic
green-and-navy Black Watch pattern as well as truly sybaritic muted
plaids of black-and-peacock, burgundy-and-navy and Prussian
blue-and-olive, in lightweight and soft twist woolens (at $3,000,
with black dress trousers).
Or, for the holidays, a
double breasted suit. Alfred Dunhill does the perfect one:
chocolate brown, with self-faced shawl collar and frogged (corded)
closure ($795), to be worn with either black worsted or tartan
trousers ($250).
If a dinner for eight or 10 at
home is on the schedule, it's a different matter. The tuxedo is a
tad too formal, but a business suit won't do, either. Fall back on
the old blue blazer? The Duke of Windsor (who as Edward VIII
abdicated the throne in 1936) solved this problem by wearing a kilt
with a short Scottish dinner coat. Wonderful, but perhaps a bit much
for the rest of us. However, there are other stylish alternatives to
mannerly nonchalance.
What about a black 8-ply cashmere
cardigan with a shawl collar ($1,950), worn with a band-collar
cotton crepe shirt (with a fly front, so no studs are necessary,
$250); or a black cashmere shirt jacket ($1,250), with a white polo
collar or turtleneck silk-cashmere sweater ($595)--all to be had
from Sulka. Sulka, by the way, is one of the few firms that still
provide full dress kit: Super 100s worsted tailcoat with faille
facings (and open gussets under the sleeves, to provide maximum
freedom and coolness when dancing), with matching dress trousers,
white pique dress vest, shirt and bow tie (tailcoat priced at
$2,950).
Or perhaps a sybaritic smoking
jacket or dressing gown? For $3,500, English tailor Bruce Cameron
Clark will make you up a very country-house ideal (as he has for
Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts, that consummate English
dandy):
double breasted, shawl-collared, in plum,
bottle green, black or royal blue shades of luxurious Italian silk
velveteen, complete with quilted facings and cuffs, frogged-toggle
closure, and coordinated silk lining (add $900 for either black
worsted or velvet dress trousers).
Custom-made midcalf length
dressing gowns in antique Italian woven silks (with all the
trimmings: tassel sash, corded silk piping, quilted lapels) are the
same price as the smoking jackets. For something just slightly more
sedate, Clark suggests a seven-ounce tropical worsted robe in a
large variety of solid colors, or perhaps a discreet herringbone or
Prince of Wales plaid pattern (like the ones he's made for actor
Michael Nouri for his stint in Broadway's Victor/Victoria, priced at
$3,000).
Literally at the bottom of any
evening outfit are the shoes. Plain black oxfords are always
appropriate, and unadorned black slip-ons are a comfortably nice
touch if a dinner jacket isn't worn. But what about monogrammed
velvet slippers? Sulka's come in five colors, with either monogram
or decoration ($295). Or, particularly natty, a pair of tweed Albert
slippers (from the English firm of Holland & Holland, at $210).
Last year, a professor at
Cambridge, John Harvey, published a lengthy and complicated treatise
on why
men wear black suits. I'm not making this up, you know. The
study runs to 280 small-print pages, including 18 pages of even
smaller-print notes. It's slow reading, and I'm not sure what the
conclusion was (it had something to do with gender-coding and
power-assertive sociological aspects). I found a much more easily
understandable answer reading a survey conducted in 1994 for the
International Formalwear Association by a marketing research firm.
The survey found that 64 percent of the women believe men are more
attractive in a tuxedo than a business suit, while 68 percent of men
think women pay more attention to a man in a tuxedo than in a suit.
And, finally, 55 percent of the men surveyed say they feel more
attractive in a tuxedo than a suit.
A frequent contributor to Cigar
Aficionado, G. Bruce Boyer is the author of Eminently Suitable (W.W.
Norton, 1990).
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