If you’re the kind of guy who has likened the feel of herringbone to a religious epiphany; is synced up to the rhythms of the Thom Sweeney release schedule the way that millennials were once synced up to the rhythms of Buzzfeed clickbait; and prioritises a lint roller (and emergency rolls) over travel insurance when packing for the red eye, then, like me, you probably know of the puritanical virtues of a suit.

In a good suit, perhaps one done out in a versatile tone that the stitching whisperers have a penchant for, say navy or charcoal grey (or tan, if that’s what your inner Obama yearns for), I concurrently feel the most comfortable version of myself I can ever be — a nomad whose soul has been recovered; myself squared — and someone else entirely, the sort of man whose time many might think is spent (it is not) perusing racks of Persols in the duty free, noting down inspired lamentations and podcast ideas with a Montblanc, and extolling the virtues of New World wines. Staring at a good suit, I begin to comprehend the notion of possibility, as the supple, luscious exoskeleton of fabric yells out to be filled — with grace, with potential, with the poise of someone whose gait leaves behind a trail of rare air.

Sean Connery: an exponent of tailoring at its finest — and in its heyday, perhaps


For decades, luxury was synonymous with the acquisition of some fine Brioni or new lace-ups from Crockett & Jones. The likes of Connery, McQueen, Kennedy, and, in more recent times, Gosling and Craig gave rise and validation to the two- and three-piece. Tailoring trends shifted from flared, looser cuts, to power pinstripes, to the Hedi Slimane-inspired cigarette-slim silhouettes of the Noughties. And for every wedding or company do that yearned for a polished statement or your finest Mark Ronson impression, the suit would always take a gent’s fancy.

Yet, as the dial of fashion has continued to turn towards the bolder and brighter, the louder and faster, athleisurewear and stretchy streetwear, fadwear and dadwear, and the slow bleed of formalwear was dealt its most recent blow by M&S who recently announced that it has dropped suits at over half of its 254 stores, it feels as though the worlds of Savile Row and 

 may have their days numbered. With client meetings at Cecconi’s having been swapped with Zoomathons in frayed loungewear, and the living room becoming the defacto boardroom, you can’t resist the thought that with every sale of a boxy BAPE hoodie comes the premature retirement of a slick-handed fabric-cutting prodigy.

To be sure, that’s not to demean the latest trends entirely. A sleek pair of Nike Waffles will help elevate your ‘fit when heading out for a loaf of Hovis and carton of milk, and you definitely won’t understand aeration until you’ve slipped your calves through a pair of pillow-soft Axel Arigato joggers. That sheepskin Stüssy number does look like a good thing to thrown on after a long slumber, and it has to be said that those Gucci mules sure look snug, the way that Egyptian-cotton bedsheets in a gilded duplex overlooking Miami Beach looks snug.

For a brief moment, last week, I shifted my menswear fidelity across the divide, taking my wardrobe’s most garish item of clothing – a cheesepuff-toned overshirt, the type of thing a hypebeast might have six of – out for a spin in Shoreditch. The fit is giving, yet cut clean enough so that I’m not swallowed by a vortex of fluorescent fabric; the colour providing sufficient contrast to give me a degree of distinction in east London’s sea of French-blue chore jackets. But when catching a glimpse of myself in a shopfront window, I wondered, along with all that walked past me – flat-white sippers, small-plates seekers and canvas-tote slingers – whether the man in the reflection was on his way to tarmac the A10.

When in a good suit, the type that’s fine enough for Camus to contemplate, Rothko to paint, and O’Hara to compose poetry about, where the legs do not flop and flow in the breeze, and the sleeve lengths refrain from billowing at the wrist, I am simply a navy profile with a posture that is less Anglepoise-shaped than usual, I blend inconspicuously into the city’s texture, and I am not judged nor even remotely close to being attired for an afternoon of manual labour on a heavily trafficked thoroughfare. In a good suit, vertically challenged men like myself (tall enough to ride the log flute, but too short to reach the packs of pappardelle at Waitrose) often like the fact that the finely tuned proportions do not make a mockery of their frames, the way an oversized Palace T-shirt might – and the fact that the ticket pocket is both remarkably antiquated yet all-out coveted sure is neat.

Suit sceptics may often find themselves questioning whether the two- or three-piece still has reason to exist – but when contemplating how a puffa jacket with matching battery pack and bucket hat will go down at a wedding, or whether a Supreme x LV x Russell Hobbs parka can ever be a welcome guest at the conference table, they will surely have their answer.

Bob Dylan might have once rendered that the times they are a changin’. But, certainly, surely, hopefully, the appeal of a suit — an item of pure lust and infinite desire, a thing that some might suggest is 

 object of a man’s gaze — never will.

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