Is British style not what it was (or maybe never was in the 1st place)?

[Hal]

The tie is something I have had trouble understanding, and have been glad to see it as less necessary for many types of dress occasions...Aside from certain formal occasions that require a suit with tie, I would always opt out of wearing one.

I gain no advantage from wearing one, and don't believe I will be perceived as badly dressed if the rest of my outfit is nice. With many prominent people now having opting for the tieless look for some time now, I believe it is certainly acceptable on a widespread basis and not considered to be any sort of fashion mistake.

I think that Patrick's posting answers your points admirably. But surely aesthetic and stylistic judgments are not validated by the numbers choosing one style over another - that is mistaking fashion for style.

 

[MuyJingo]

A mistake, no. There are no fashion mistakes anymore. But what if going tieless is a missed opportunity? Men of all ranks used to hang a functionally dubious strip of cloth about their necks to confront the daily grind, I suspect for the same reason they wore generously proportioned hats with wonky and idiosyncratic creases - ties are subtle, artistic gestures of identity. I also suspect (as was said above) that your comfort issue has more to do with ill-fitting collars than with a tie, which can be infinitely tightened or loosened.

Thanks Patrick. You may be right RE the collar, as I have little experience wearing ties as I have had few occasions where it has been necessary. When I have worn one, I have found it might uncomfortable around the collar. Perhaps I need to give it another try.

I think that Patrick's posting answers your points admirably. But surely aesthetic and stylistic judgments are not validated by the numbers choosing one style over another - that is mistaking fashion for style.

My point was more about a style becoming widely acceptable when it wasn't previously. I may be wrong, but as I understand things ties used to be essentially mandatory for business men in an office setting. That isn't the case anymore, and most of the time people won't be judged harshly or considered a slob for not wearing a tie, and I think that's a good thing.

 

[tropicalbob]

That's putting it rather mildly. These days you'll draw far more attention if you do wear a tie and/or a jacket, as I do pretty much every day. In fact, I never even noticed that I was the oddball until someone pointed it out to me. I teach in a college, and they noticed my tie and jacket. Slob culture is triumphant right now, but that's no reason to surrender.

 

[Patrick Hall]

Thanks Patrick. You may be right RE the collar, as I have little experience wearing ties as I have had few occasions where it has been necessary. When I have worn one, I have found it might uncomfortable around the collar. Perhaps I need to give it another try.

You're welcome! You should have at least a finger's worth of ease in a collar, when your shirt's buttoned all the way up. Could be that you're a half size - like between a 15 and a 16. Generally such sizes are hard to find off the rack.

point was more about a style becoming widely acceptable when it wasn't previously. I may be wrong, but as I understand things ties used to be essentially mandatory for business men in an office setting. That isn't the case anymore, and most of the time people won't be judged harshly or considered a slob for not wearing a tie, and I think that's a good thing.

I actually agree with this. Forcing people to wear things diminishes the pleasure of wearing them. Perhaps that is why our culture developed such a contemptuous insolence about suiting in the 60's. I think I'd take much less pleasure in my suits and sport coats if I felt like wearing them was demanded.

 

[GHT]

Seen at this year's Goodwood Revival.

 

[Hal]

That's putting it rather mildly. These days you'll draw far more attention if you do wear a tie and/or a jacket, as I do pretty much every day...I teach in a college, and they noticed my tie and jacket. Slob culture is triumphant right now, but that's no reason to surrender.

I agree a thousandfold! I was also a college teacher and wore jacket and tie to the end of my working days. On retirement I largely adopted casual clothing, but in the colder seasons increasingly "revert" to jacket and tie, partly because the closed collar gives a thermal advantage and partly because so much casual clothing is, quite simply, nondescript. There MAY be a slight change in the wind since Bob wrote his posting - London acquaintances tell me of small signs of a "new formality".

 

[Edward]

I last remember collar and tie being epsecially fashionable in the late eighties, but it'll make a comeback at some point. Fashion is a pendulum. Notably, as I may have mentioned erlier in the thread, the late nineties / turn of the century trend to 'dress down Friday' in the City has all but died out now, mainly because most men found they had to buy a whole new wardrobe for it (as opposed to the denim and sportwear they wore at home), and consdiered precious little advantage in being allowed to dump the jacket, or wear jacket and trousers rather than a matching lounge suit on a Friday. I gather a lot of firms with customer-facing employees also found their customers perceived it as less professional.

Personally, I rather enjoy the lack of dress code in the university, as it lets me dress to a much higher style standard than would probably be permitted otherwise. I wear a lot of tweed jackets which would never fly in the City.

 

[Vampyre Master]

Greetings from a fellow Anglophile! I, too, am of English ancestry (I don't have to go back very far... my mother was born and raised in England). I'm lucky enough to be planning a visit across the pond this coming summer.
I'll leave it to the gentlemen here to address the points in your post, I just wanted to say hello!

Greetings and hope you enjoy your visit, I am an English Gentleman who has recently moved to North Wales, its like England was 30 years ago

 

[Harry Gooch]

I recently saw a BBC (I think) program about the Orient Express, or some similar train. Most of the people that were going on the trip looked like they had just rolled out of bed - including someone who was wearing what looked like pajama trousers. And there were a number of sweatpants.

While I am one for feeling comfortable, it seems perhaps the pendulum has swung too far. I will be interesting to see how trends progress in the next 10 years!

 

[GHT]

I recently saw a BBC (I think) program about the Orient Express, or some similar train. Most of the people that were going on the trip looked like they had just rolled out of bed - including someone who was wearing what looked like pajama trousers. And there were a number of sweatpants.

I started The Orient Express thread about four years ago. Click on the link, you will see my wife and I in period dress but most passengers looked smartly dressed. As for looking like you have just rolled out of bed. Not the company that I keep.

 

[Harry Gooch]

And not a sign of Kenneth Branagh or Johnny Depp.

 

[STEVIEBOY1]

I am British and when going to my office in London and church, I always wear a suit & tie (Sometimes with a vee neck wool sweater) and usually my Fedora hat. I would say that most of the fellow passengers on my railway journey are dressed in a similar way, however I do see people that are less smartly dressed, but one sees that in most part of the world. There are times to be smart and times when it is ok be casual too as I am when at home or on holiday. I have been complimented on my clothing which is most flattering, especially when it comes from a lady in the acting profession and also from the local rector. When one was at secondary school, they were very strict on the uniform code, especially ties. Failure to have a tie on at all times was swiftly dealt with.

 

[Ticklishchap]

When one was at secondary school, they were very strict on the uniform code, especially ties. Failure to have a tie on at all times was swiftly dealt with.

We had to wear ties to lessons and to chapel - which we wore with white shirts and navy tee-neck sweaters. However in the evenings we could dress more casually (it was a boys' boarding school) which usually meant thick wool sweaters and corduroy trousers. In the sixth form (16-18), we could wear our own sweaters to class underneath the school blazer (dark blue) - they could be crew neck but we were still expected to wear ties underneath. That was in the 1970s and 80s.

 

[Tiki Tom]

My two cents: It's not only Britain that has been changing in the style department. When I first started making trips across the pond to continental Europe in the 1970s, I used to say that I could spot a fellow American from a long way off, just by how they were dressed. I have long since stopped saying this. The key give-away used to be that Europeans generally wore nice, leather footwear and Americans were the ones who always wore running shoes. T-shirts, baseball caps, sweatshirts, khaki trousers, and name-brand anything were other giveaways. Those days are long gone. Thanks to whatever reason (comfort, cost, the influence of Hollywood movies, big international brands, etc.), these days I would argue that "Westerners" from either side of the Atlantic are pretty hard to tell apart, just based on looks. An exception might be that Europeans sometimes wear unusually colored [by American standards] suits and men sometimes wear trousers that are a bit more colorful (red!) than what Americans would usually be caught in. Oh! and scarves. Scarves have not yet caught on in the States to the degree that they are worn in Europe (almost all the time!) Just my two cents. And, yes, in my office hear in Vienna, I am the odd duck who still wears a suit and tie every day. Most of my gentlemen colleagues are in their 30s and 40s and have long since abandoned the necktie.

 

[Jaxenro]

Television isn't reality so I doubt English clothes completely ever reflected the reality television shows.

In the US frontier and Western regions the bowler hat probably far outnumbered the Western hat yet in the TV Westerns from the 50's and 60's except for Bat Masterson no one wore one.

I have been starting for an English country look lately, tweeds and the like, but I realize it is probably more BBC than reality