https://twitter.com/dieworkwear/status/1786652819837313115
I get this sort of question a lot: “How should I dress given that I’m XYZ?” The XYZ usually has something to do with age or physical characteristics, such as height, skin tone, or body shape. So, let me do a thread here.
I don’t really believe you have to dress for your age. You may want to consider your lifestyle, which sometimes correlates with age. But I don’t think you have to dress in any particular way. Here are some older guys wearing all sorts of stuff that I think is stylish
Here are some younger guys wearing clothes that are considered by many to be “old man style.”
I do believe in dressing for your body type, but in the sense that clothes should fit and flatter. I don’t believe in pseudo-science rules about how short guys can’t wear X, or big guys can’t wear Y. Here are men of different builds wearing clothes in the same proportions
I also don’t believe in dressing for your hair color or skin tone. But I will reserve that for another thread.
IMO, answering the question “how should I dress” requires you to consider various things.
“Which cultural aesthetics resonate with me?”
Is it tailoring, workwear, smart casual, avant-garde, prep, or streetwear? There’s an endless number of aesthetics. The important thing is to choose something rooted in culture. Can’t be some random thing you make up.
“What are the grammatical rules that allow me to communicate something in that visual language?”
Every aesthetic is defined by a design language. And every language has its unique set of grammatical rules. How you dress punk is different from how you dress Ivy.
“How do I dress for my body type within this design language?”
Dressing for your body type depends on the design language, which in turn depends on culture. You can’t answer body type without starting with culture and then moving on to design language.
Wearing a classic cut suit is very different from wearing a suit from Yohji Yamamoto or Paul Harden. They follow different design languages around proportions and fit. Once you understand that design language, you can figure out how to dress for your body type.
There are other layers to this.
-
You have to find clothes that you’ll love wearing not just on the first day you get them but ten years from now. I can’t answer what makes you excited. You have to be attuned to this when you get dressed.
-
You have to figure out what works for your budget. If you want to dress like the King of Spain but can only spend $100, that’s going to be tough. If you have a smaller budget, you are probably better off with aesthetics like workwear.
Essentially, more important than knowing how to judge quality, you have to develop TASTE.
And you can’t really lean on other ideas to replace your sense of taste. These ideas of “only buy classics” or “dress respectably” are crutches people lean on when they have no taste.
I’ve been writing about men’s style for ~15 years now. Most of my service writing is at Put This On, so if you have a question, you can Google “[topic] putthison” and find something I wrote. Use the site’s nav bar and tags to find stuff. One article:
And here is a longer article on the idea of developing taste.
This is a long process and I can’t give you a wardrobe over a tweet. That would be like me giving you a personality. You have to figure out what you want to express & what makes you excited