TOM UTLEY: I write this in chinos and a fraying shirt… but has the virus really killed off the suit and tie for good?
As I write, I’m sitting at an enormous mahogany desk in my oak-panelled, book-lined study, attired in formal evening dress.
My starched shirt-front, dazzlingly white, is as stiff as a sheet of tin. You can see your face in my patent-leather shoes, polished to a brilliant shine.
My black tie and matching cummerbund are spun from the finest silk. In my buttonhole, I wear a delicate pink orchid, plucked from our conservatory this afternoon.
Indeed, I’m now wondering how many of us men — after all these weeks in which we’ve slobbed around happily in whichever casual clothes came to hand — will ever want to go back to more formal office attire when it’s all over [File photo]
On my desk sits a glass of rare vintage port, to which I’ve treated myself in the hope of lubricating the flow of my thoughts…
But enough of fake news! As you’ve certainly guessed, I’ve made it all up.
In fact, I’m writing at our kitchen table, with only a mug of instant coffee to oil the cogs of my brain. Alas, I have no study in my suburban semi and no conservatory.
As for my outfit, I’m dressed in time-faded brown chinos from John Lewis and a favourite checked shirt, bought on a trip to Scotland at least ten years ago. Its collar is frayed, there are cigarette burns down its front and Mrs U has long had ambitions to tear it up and turn it into dusters.
But she doesn’t press the point, bless her. I think she realises, in her heart of hearts, that this would mean divorce.
To complete my lockdown look, over the back of my chair hangs a crumpled blue linen jacket which, if my wife is to be believed, has become distinctly whiffy since its last visit to the dry cleaners more than three months ago. I can’t say I’ve noticed the reek of tobacco and stale sweat, which she claims to have detected.
Standards
But no, there’s no denying it. Like millions of others I’ve let my standards of working dress plummet since March 23, when the Government imposed mass house arrest on the country, obliging those of us who can to work from home.
Indeed, I’m now wondering how many of us men — after all these weeks in which we’ve slobbed around happily in whichever casual clothes came to hand — will ever want to go back to more formal office attire when it’s all over.
Alas, I have no study in my suburban semi and no conservatory. As for my outfit, I’m dressed in time-faded brown chinos from John Lewis and a favourite checked shirt, bought on a trip to Scotland at least ten years ago [File photo]
Could it be that among its many unexplored social consequences, the coronavirus may have hastened the disappearance of the suit and tie from our workplaces?
An ominous straw in the wind is this week’s news that Brooks Brothers — America’s oldest tailoring firm and the USA’s nearest equivalent to Savile Row (patriotism compels me to insist that it’s not a patch on the real thing) — has been driven to file for bankruptcy.
Founded in 1818, and once owned by our own Marks & Spencer, this is the company that claims to have kitted out 41 of the country’s 45 presidents, including Franklin D. Roosevelt and Barack Obama.
Appropriately, since its headquarters are in New York’s Madison Avenue, it also supplied most of the snappy outfits worn in the TV series Mad Men, about its neighbours in America’s advertising industry.
Crumpled
Of course, there are no prizes for guessing why Brooks Brothers has gone to the wall. Since the start of the pandemic, according to analytical firm Global Data, sales of office suits around the world have plummeted by almost three quarters (I’m only surprised it’s not more).
As for dinner jackets, when was the last time any of us was invited to a social occasion specifying black tie?
Now, I’m the first to admit, for most purposes, casual clothes are a great deal more comfortable and practical than suits and ties which, in my experience, tend to attract beer stains and cost a fortune to clean when they do. But I still feel there’s much to be said for wearing them at work.
For one thing, as many a traditionalist schoolteacher will testify, any sort of uniform is a great leveller.
If we’re all dressed in roughly the same way, expressing our individual personalities only in our choice of tie (in my book, the more discreet and conservative, the better), I reckon this fosters a business-like, corporate spirit, the feeling that we’re all part of the same team — from the managing director down to the lowliest intern in the accounts department.
Indeed, I’ve often noticed the paradox in companies that go in for dress-down Fridays: employees tend to look far less comfortable in jeans and trainers than on any other day of the week, when suits and ties are de rigueur.
As for tycoons such as Virgin’s Sir Richard Branson and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, who attend even the most formal business meetings dressed like teenagers at the seaside — or Dominic Cummings at Number 10 — doesn’t their ostentatious choice of casual wear scream ‘look at me, me, me’ far more loudly than even the priciest, best-cut suit?
There are other advantages, too, in wearing business suits to the office. For example, we male traditionalists have always been spared the agony suffered by so many women, who have to decide every morning: ‘What will I wear today?’
My wife tells me that when she took a job as a London bus driver, after the Utley finances had gone belly-up, one of the joys of her new life was that the daily decision was taken out of her hands, since she had to wear a uniform.)
Indeed, I’m now wondering how many of us men — after all these weeks in which we’ve slobbed around happily in whichever casual clothes came to hand — will ever want to go back to more formal office attire when it’s all over [File photo]
Over the years, I’ve also found that rolling home in a suit and tie has given a useful reminder to Mrs U that I’ve been at work, doing my best to bring home the family bacon. God forbid that she should have thought I’d been having fun!
So, yes, I reckon that if Covid-19 turns out to have helped consign the suit and tie to history, we men may come to regret it, in one way or another.
True, a great deal has changed since the 1920s, when the BBC’s founding father Lord Reith decreed that, as a mark of respect to listeners and fellow performers, all radio announcers should wear formal evening dress after 8pm, despite the fact that nobody could see them.
At the time, most presenters seem to have thought this a perfectly reasonable requirement, although some had certain reservations.
Take the late Stuart Hibberd, the BBC’s chief announcer until 1951, who is famous for having broken the news of the deaths of George V in 1936 (it was he who uttered the famous words: ‘The King’s life is moving peacefully towards its close’) and Adolf Hitler in 1945.
Duty
Looking back in 1950, he recalled: ‘Personally, I have always thought it only right and proper that announcers should wear evening dress on duty.
‘There are, of course, certain disadvantages … I remember that more than once the engineers said that my shirt-front creaked during the reading of the bulletin!’
All right, I have never gone as far as to compose my weekly musing in formal evening wear. But though you’ve never been able to see me, let me assure readers that as soon as the all-clear sounds, after this wretched lockdown finally ends, I’ll revert to my old practice of addressing you respectfully, dressed in a suit and tie.
That’s assuming that my work clothes still fit, after all these months of idle bingeing — or that any tailor survives to replace them.
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