Close-up on Humphrey Bogart.
His hair is impeccable. Pulled back with a comb. There is a faint glint of nostalgia in his eye. His lips pout. What's the matter Humphrey, are you sad tonight?
He is sitting at a table. In front of him, we see a bottle. It is almost empty. It is not mineral water. Humphrey has drunk. And not just a little. And he has smoked. A pack perhaps, judging from the thick cloud that envelops him.
The camera moves away and then we see what he's wearing : but it's a... yes, it's a t-shirt he's wearing. It's a V-neck and fits his no longer young chest a little too tightly. It's wrinkled too. We soon see his hairy arms. Very, very hairy. Really very hairy. Here are his pants. They're light gray, it seems. Elasticated at the waist in thick fleece. It's a... jogging pants, there's no other way of saying it.
The camera pulls back again and the set is splendid. It is a velvet and gold cabaret. And on the polished parquet floor, Humphrey has holey socks.
CUT!
Yes, I know. It's unthinkable. The mere name Humphrey Bogart is an invocation of elegance. You say Humphrey and the mind sees a suit or a tuxedo, the white double-breasted jacket with a shawl collar, the bow tie that leans just enough to make it seem as if nothing is calculated.
(Photo by Warner Brothers/Getty Images)
And when his character is tortured, at least on screen, it is a Sunday torture. If he is nostalgic, it is a dashing nostalgia. And if he pouts, it is a magnificent pout.
Humphrey, in addition to his job as a man, added that of an icon. And for the impressionable young man that I was, the suit he wore and especially the way he wore it was a trigger. I was on the edge of the precipice called #menswear, I contemplated what was happening there without daring to join the party, I was a little dizzy and Bogart in Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942), it was the equivalent of a guy arriving at full speed jumping with both feet between my two shoulder blades.
Free fall. Free yes, but with the costume firmly in mind, firmly screwed into my impressionable head as one of the surest ways to achieve elegance.
And although I've come a long way since that fall, I still tend to think so. I wonder: what would be left of Edward Hopper's Night Owls without the brooding guys in suits next to the lady in red?
What would Julian Kaye have left without his Armani clothes in American Gigolo?
Copyright: Courtesy Everett Collection MMDAMGI EC001
All that would remain would be the gloomy. The unbearable.
The costume saves appearances. It does even more, it sublimates human destinies, it makes them bearable. And it is also very often the purpose of art to make life a little more bearable.
I'm not saying that costume is art, I'm saying that it comes close to it in its effects when it is well made, when it is well worn, when it is well represented.
Because that’s the whole point: wearing it well.
And the reason why contemporary elegant people do not cite other contemporaries as a stylistic reference is that actors, musicians, artists, today wear the costume as a disguise. They disguise themselves as elegant.
Look at me, I'm wearing a suit.
Where for Bogart and others, wearing a costume was as natural as seeing, smelling, tasting or hearing.
Dressing up is a sport, it takes practice. Wearing a costume cannot be improvised.
We must find the causes that give rise to desirable effects. And we must still know what is desirable! And how could our contemporary actors know this when the costume is no longer worn on a daily basis.
- Three million costumes sold in 2011 in France.
- 1.4 million between August 2018 and July 2019.
The reason for this fall is simple: the suit is no longer considered the regulatory uniform for representation professions and banking and finance.
For example, Goldman Sachs, the most stringent investment bank when it comes to dress codes , announced in 2019 to its 36,000 employees that they could now dress less formally .
Tie Day is over. Casual Friday is all week now. A new usage is defined, a new world order of clothing, it is the majority who have decided. And too bad for those who felt good in their suits.
Are we going to mourn him?
No way.
You thought that after my introduction which reeked of “it was better before”, I would have answered “yes” to this question.
I have three points to make on this subject:
- It is absurd to ask your employees to come in suits and ties to meet customers who barely make the effort to put on a shirt.
- Are we really going to mourn the end of the business suit if it means fewer ugly ties and jackets with sagging shoulders?
- The global pandemic of 2020 has definitely finished off the office suit.
Good riddance.
Now, the suit is no longer the garment of power. It has even become the opposite. It dresses the one who has none, the one to whom the rules are imposed. The one who dictates them, he dresses in hoodies, jeans, New Balance and sometimes he wears flip-flops.
Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk and the new figures of power do not wear suits.
(Photo by Kim Kulish/Corbis via Getty Images)
They find it frivolous to ask themselves which tie goes best with their shirt. It is one decision too many in a day that already includes too many. They want to concentrate on business because that is where the real salvation lies for them.
Of course, it's also a way of breaking free from the old world , of saying: we're not going to play by your rules. And when Mark Zuckerberg shows up in a suit at a hearing before the American Senate on Facebook's use of data, does that mean the opposite? That this time he's willing to play by the rules of the judicial system?
Mark Zuckerberg testifies before a U.S. Senate panel on April 10, 2018. (Photo By Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)
Although I do not share the view that thinking about the best way to present yourself to the world is a waste of time, I cannot help but think that abandoning this dress code from another time is progress .
I think it's hard to make real progress on gender equality while maintaining these 1950s standards.
I think it might be harder to move forward on issues of gender and sexual identity if we don't relax the rules around personal expression through clothing.
Clothing is not frivolous, it often says a lot about the way we think. It can say a lot about our ideals too. About the world as we would like to see it. And without it being political of course. I wear ecru socks with loafers because it is forbidden by right-thinking people and I would like more people to free themselves from the clothing limits imposed on them.
So what about those who liked to come to work in suits? Oh, the Goldman Sachs memo doesn't say that.
On the other hand, what we can imagine is that a guy in a suit in an open-space full of people in chinos and Stan Smiths is going to get people talking. And we're going to make him take off his suit. Slowly. By the simple weight of looks and remarks under the cover of humor. Come join us in mediocrity.
I don't mean to say that wearing chinos is inferior to wearing a suit. That would be as absurd as saying that a snail is better than a slug. When everyone knows that an albatross is much better. Well, it's obvious, it's obvious.
What I mean is that the norm will become that of the least effort in clothing. Because too many people give an excessive importance to comfort. Even though a well-tailored suit, leaving enough room to move can be as comfortable as a jogging suit.
In short, we are leveling down. We are hindering the creativity of those who expressed themselves through the costume or who found a certain serenity in it.
However, it is a lesser evil. Because if the office suit is dead, the suit itself is not!
There is no mourning to do! Let's stop trying to bury him! Besides, the proof: what would you wear if you had to attend his funeral?
Because yes, we spontaneously think of all those occasions that require wearing one: funerals, weddings, solemn events. They require it because at that moment the costume is a way of showing our desire to be part of the present event. Out of pure respect for the ceremony and the people who organize it. There, in those moments, we need a garment that can say: “I understand you and I am here with you”.
It is the strength of the costume, through its form, to be able to be inclusive when it is worn punctually.
But that's not even what makes me happy.
This is not to say that we will still be able to challenge our inner Humphrey Bogart by wearing our one and only suit once every four leap years for a wedding or whatever! No!
What makes me happy is that now that we no longer have to wear it, we can reconnect with the pleasure of wearing it. Outside of these events! We can reconnect with the real costume.
Not the power suit , not that of politicians, not that of businessmen , not of those who wear the suit as a weapon.
Isn't life a big enough occasion that we want to celebrate it every day?
Why not with a suit?
Nothing is stopping you now.
The suit is dead, so it's time to invent your own way to wear it.
What is a suit, really? It's a top and a bottom that are made of the same fabric. Nothing more. Before, we used to say "complete". Which was much more telling than saying "costume", which is another word for "disguise".
Wear one on the weekend with a t-shirt, hoodie and running shoes.
Wear one in all denim, with a striped sweater, like an old French painter in his studio in Montmartre.
Wear one in black and white houndstooth with a merino wool polo underneath, like Gabin.
Wear it as workwear like in There Will Be Blood .
Wear it cool, in twill or corduroy, like in the Universal Works lookbooks.
Wear a patchwork one at Hansen Garments .
Wear one very chic with a western shirt!
Or do you play the Atelier Saman Amel . The suit without the tie. Without the shirt even possibly. Soft, soft, soft. Soft the shoulders. Soft the lines. Soft the material.
The hardest part about dressing in a suit these days is that you're alone. Desperately alone in a crowd. But just because you're alone doesn't mean you're wrong.
Be your own icon. Become your own Gabin, your Noiret. Your Humphrey!
Don't wear the suit like a precious thing on your shoulders. Put your hands in your pockets like Prince Charles. The same one who loves his suits so much that he has them mended and wears them like that.
(Photo by Niall Carson/Pool/Samir Hussein/WireImage)
Reinvent the suit your way. Become your own Hedi Slimane.
And when I cross paths with you, I will recognize you and you will recognize me. And at a glance we will tell each other that we are from the same family. The family of those who have understood that just because the costume is dead does not mean that we should not resurrect it.
To find out everything Benoît likes about the suit, click here .
