🔗 Share this article

Coming of age in the British capital during the 2000s, I was constantly surrounded by suits. You saw them on City financiers hurrying through the financial district. They were worn by fathers in the city's great park, kicking footballs in the golden light. Even school, a cheap grey suit was our required uniform. Historically, the suit has functioned as a costume of gravitas, projecting authority and performance—qualities I was told to aspire to to become a "adult". However, until recently, my generation seemed to wear them infrequently, and they had all but vanished from my consciousness.

Subsequently came the incoming New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani. He was sworn in at a closed ceremony wearing a subdued black overcoat, pristine white shirt, and a distinctive silk tie. Riding high by an ingenious campaign, he captivated the world's imagination unlike any recent contender for city hall. But whether he was celebrating in a music venue or appearing at a film premiere, one thing was mostly unchanged: he was frequently in a suit. Relaxed in fit, contemporary with soft shoulders, yet conventional, his is a typically middle-class millennial suit—that is, as typical as it can be for a cohort that seldom chooses to wear one.

"This garment is in this strange place," says style commentator Derek Guy. "It's been dying a gradual fade since the end of the second world war," with the real dip coming in the 1990s alongside "the rise of business casual."

"Today it is only worn in the most formal settings: weddings, memorials, to some extent, court appearances," Guy explains. "It is like the traditional Japanese robe in Japan," in that it "fundamentally represents a tradition that has long retreated from everyday use." Many politicians "don this attire to say: 'I am a politician, you can have faith in me. You should vote for me. I have authority.'" But while the suit has historically conveyed this, today it performs authority in the hope of gaining public confidence. As Guy clarifies: "Because we are also living in a liberal democracy, politicians want to seem approachable, because they're trying to get your votes." In many ways, a suit is just a subtle form of performance, in that it enacts manliness, authority and even proximity to power.

Guy's words resonated deeply. On the infrequent times I require a suit—for a wedding or black-tie event—I dust off the one I bought from a Tokyo department store a few years ago. When I first selected it, it made me feel refined and expensive, but its slim cut now feels passé. I imagine this feeling will be only too familiar for numerous people in the diaspora whose families originate in somewhere else, especially developing countries.

It's no surprise, the working man's suit has fallen out of fashion. Like a pair of jeans, a suit's shape goes through trends; a specific cut can therefore characterize an era—and feel quickly outdated. Consider the present: more relaxed suits, reminiscent of Richard Gere's Armani in *American Gigolo*, might be trendy, but given the price, it can feel like a considerable investment for something destined to be out of fashion within a few seasons. Yet the attraction, at least in certain circles, endures: in the past year, department stores report suit sales rising more than 20% as customers "shift from the suit being daily attire towards an appetite to invest in something special."

The Politics of a Mid-Market Suit

Mamdani's preferred suit is from Suitsupply, a European label that sells in a mid-market price bracket. "He is precisely a reflection of his upbringing," says Guy. "In his thirties, he's not poor but not extremely wealthy." To that end, his mid-level suit will resonate with the group most inclined to support him: people in their thirties and forties, university-educated earning middle-class incomes, often frustrated by the expense of housing. It's exactly the kind of suit they might wear themselves. Not cheap but not extravagant, Mamdani's suits plausibly don't contradict his proposed policies—such as a rent freeze, constructing affordable homes, and free public buses.

"It's impossible to imagine Donald Trump wearing Suitsupply; he's a Brioni person," says Guy. "As an immensely wealthy and grew up in that property development world. A power suit fits seamlessly with that tycoon class, just as attainable brands fit well with Mamdani's constituency."

The history of suits in politics is long and storied: from a former president's "shocking" tan suit to other world leaders and their suspiciously impeccable, custom-fit sheen. Like a certain British politician learned, the suit doesn't just dress the politician; it has the power to define them.

Performance of Normality and A Shield

Perhaps the point is what one scholar calls the "performance of banality", summoning the suit's long career as a standard attire of political power. Mamdani's specific selection leverages a studied understatement, neither shabby nor showy—"respectability politics" in an unobtrusive suit—to help him appeal to as many voters as possible. But, some think Mamdani would be cognizant of the suit's military and colonial legacy: "The suit isn't neutral; historians have long pointed out that its contemporary origins lie in military or colonial administration." It is also seen as a form of defensive shield: "I think if you're from a minority background, you might not get taken as seriously in these traditional institutions." The suit becomes a way of signaling legitimacy, particularly to those who might question it.

This kind of sartorial "changing styles" is not a new phenomenon. Even historical leaders once wore formal Western attire during their early years. Currently, certain world leaders have begun swapping their typical fatigues for a black suit, albeit one without the tie.

"Throughout the fabric of Mamdani's image, the tension between insider and outsider is visible."

The attire Mamdani chooses is deeply significant. "Being the son of immigrants of South Asian heritage and a progressive politician, he is under scrutiny to conform to what many American voters expect as a marker of leadership," notes one expert, while at the same time needing to walk a tightrope by "not looking like an elitist selling out his distinctive roots and values."

Yet there is an acute awareness of the different rules applied to who wears suits and what is interpreted from it. "This could stem in part from Mamdani being a millennial, able to adopt different identities to fit the situation, but it may also be part of his diverse background, where adapting between languages, traditions and clothing styles is common," it is said. "White males can go unremarked," but when women and ethnic minorities "attempt to gain the authority that suits represent," they must carefully negotiate the codes associated with them.

In every seam of Mamdani's public persona, the dynamic between somewhere and nowhere, insider and outsider, is visible. I know well the awkwardness of trying to fit into something not designed with me in mind, be it an cultural expectation, the culture I was born into, or even a suit. What Mamdani's style decisions make evident, however, is that in public life, image is not neutral.