The Right Way to Get Creative with Black Tie
Black tie used to be a safe place. Safe—but kind of boring. Dress codes, ostensibly created by the privileged to ensure everyone would fit in (or, to look at it another way, to keep the riffraff out), were never stricter than when a big night out was on the cards. With black tie, your job was to blend in; you toyed with the rules at your peril. James Bond knew it only too well. Fashion and the occasional show-off managed at times to flout these rules, but their bold exceptions generally proved the rule the rest of us lived by.
Thankfully, we live in a more relaxed, less exclusive place now. Taste (and fashion) give us plenty of elbow room to express ourselves and be comfortable while doing it. Yet even now dressing up is not without its risks. You only have to look at black tie as it is often worn on the red carpet these days to see that, in the name of a viral photo op, some men will take diabolical liberties.
For the rest of us, the goal is to find a comfortable niche somewhere between hidebound convention and being an individual. To do that you have first to know what convention is. With dressing up, the operative word is up. Which means you have to push the boat out to look like you made an effort. Of course, you’re never entirely wrong with a black tux, a white dress shirt, a cummerbund, a bow tie, and all the other fixings. A potential snooze-fest it may be, but you’ll never be faulted for it. If that’s too much for you, probably stay at home.
But you can go one better by tweaking just one or two elements of your black tie. Look for interesting cloth for a jacket, or choose a plain cloth in midnight blue, deep burgundy, or dark green over plain old black. If there’s one guiding principle here it’s that the more unusual the cloth the more the rest of your gear should appear classic and subdued. Let that be your mantra. Here are three ways to shine and look like you own it.
Etro – Silk Brocade
Pattern is part of the DNA of Etro, the Milanese brand best known for its love of opulent fabrics worn with a relaxed attitude. While this suit, which is reminiscent of the peacockery of 1960s psychedelia, is a lot for the unready, you can also tone the look down by wearing the jacket with a pair of classic black tux pants.
Suit Supply – Midnight Blue
If you lean more toward the classic but need the subtlest of twists, take a cue from the Duke of Windsor’s wardrobe. He found that a midnight-blue tux looked darker than black under electric lights (while black had a propensity to pick up a brown tinge). It’s also a low-key way to look like you thought about your outfit just that little bit harder.
Tom Ford – Sequins
From a distance, all black tuxes look the same. But with all-over black sequins, this jacket catches the light in alluring ways, license enough to wear it with a voile open-neck shirt and classic tuxedo pants.
Photographs by Ruben Chamorro
Styling by Nick Sullivan
Grooming by Devra Kinery
Model: Joseph Wakile
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