Have the suited finally been booted ?

In February 2020 I decided to refresh my suit collection (for collection read three) and I took advantage of the M&S sale to acquire a few nice new suits perhaps with a slight variation on the former waist measurements. In hindsight that doesn't look like my finest retail investment.

Two weeks ago I wore a suit for the first time since early 2020. I went to a legal mediation meeting where I felt it was appropriate to wear a suit as it was a formal process and I assumed, reasonably I thought, that the other side and their advisors would also be suited. I was wrong and indeed one of the other side's lawyers was in jeans and jacket. It prompted me to wonder if the end of the business suit , perhaps accelerated by the pandemic, really is in sight ? Here are some random thoughts on the subject, for what they are worth.

I started work in the mid 1980s in a professional services environment and I have never worked in any other sector. In those days the suit for men was the default, of course with a tie and a blue or white shirt, in fact it was almost certainly a condition of my employment, contractually documented. Woe betide whoever transgressed that rule and I am fairly certain I remember people being disciplined or even sacked for breaking that convention, dishonouring that vow of omerta.

Dark grey or dark blue, double or single breasted, a waistcoat if you fancied the more sporty approach and pin-striped if you wanted to look like an aspiring merchant banker although make sure that the stripes were not too wide or you would cross the line into different territory. There was no "brown in town" and again people would mysteriously disappear after being seen wearing brown shoes with a dark grey or blue suit.

As you do something everyday so it becomes no longer a chore but a habit and wearing a suit became an automatic task, it was a uniform, it was a comfort zone and at times it was also a suit of armour when I was facing a challenging conversation, an interview or some other scenario where not for nothing do we "put our best suit on". There was little room for individualism other than perhaps a fancy brightly coloured silk lining that you carefully revealed to onlookers as your little secret or you proudly waived the jacket around as you took it off so the lining flared like a flamenco dancer's dress. Or you might be flamboyant and sport a colourful tie which screamed "I am not an accountant, I am a free man".

And so it continued for the best part of the next 30 years, with the only noticeable changes being the emergence of dress down days, usually Fridays, "dress for your diary" and the slow but inexorable demise of the tie. Dress down for men spawned a whole new dilemma due to our inability to deal with this new challenge and an industry developed of beige chinos and polo shirts mostly with a horse logo, as nothing else would do. We began to look like an army of preppy USA Ivy League students. In fact I can still think of colleagues whose idea of dressing down was simply to loosen the tie.

And so now we have spent the last 16 months wearing mostly anything but the suit. My work from home attire has changed through the seasons during lock-downs but has recently consisted of shorts, t-shirt and flip flops. After all people only see your top half on Teams so does it really matter ? I think people are probably more interested in the books on the shelves behind you or the pictures on your walls, than what you are wearing.

Few if any of us in professional services will return to a traditional full time office based environment and even if we do, is there any need to wear a suit when you are there ? We often think we need to mirror our clients but of course they are like us and their ways of working have changed as well as their conventions. Yes there will be times when it feels appropriate to put a suit on but I am struggling to think that will be very often.

One group that seems to staunchly defend the suit convention is politicians, exemplified by Jacob Rees-Mogg who was possibly born wearing a suit and again quite possibly wears pin-striped pyjamas, although I wouldn't know. He has never knowingly been seen in public without his tightly buttoned double breasted pin stripe and I think I have even seen him wearing it in his holiday snaps.

The Royal Family are also strong upholders of the faith and traditionally start their male heirs off in suits at an early age , witness Prince George at Wembley recently.

So for those of us who are not politicians or royalty, what will be done with the millions of suits languishing in wardrobes at the mercy of moths and the vagaries of fashion ? You can give them to charity shops by all means, which is of course a decent thing to do, but is there a demand out there ? I am sure there is.

While vinyl LPs are making a slow but sure comeback, it's hard to see suits heading in the same direction, although I guess we might see a short term bounce as people realise that their suits no longer fit or have been food for the moths. After all, it's easier to buy a new suit rather than try and lose a few kilos ! And perhaps people will want to create a more distinct boundary between home work and office work and perhaps the suit will become a way of helping to establishing those boundaries ?

I, for one, will miss the suit if it continues to slowly disappear from our working lives. What do you think ?