The 2010’s saw wearing your clothes too tightly as what was fashionable. Its almost the antithesis of the baggy, loose clothing trend of the 90’s. While we’ve been slowly progressing away from the tight fad in the latter years of the decade, there’s enough evidence to suggest that in 2020 there are still many men who believe that tight clothing is correct clothing.
So why are men doing this? It may be they have the wrong idea of what tailoring itself is. Tailored garments are meant to follow the natural lines of your body. This will certainly make the garment form fitting, but not tight, though men may mistake it as such. Another factor may be simply that a man is attempting to make himself look a certain way. I’ll use myself as an example. I was always a pretty scrawny guy growing up. An absolute rail. I went through a phase where I wore tight clothing because I believed it would make me look bigger. Maybe even a little strong for once. It wasn’t until I was made aware that my tight clothing was the butt of a joke during a team meeting I wasn’t present for, in a former job position, that I realized this appearance clearly wasn’t accomplishing the look I wanted. To see what I mean, just check out this picture of me wearing a shirt that is probably questioning its existence in this cruel world.
Far too tight. Common characteristics of a tight dress shirt include those creases jetting out horizontally from the buttons, as well as the vertical “hills” between the buttons themselves. This shirt was under more pressure in my stomach area than up top. Perhaps I had just gorged myself on a wonderful meal, but it was ill fitting to begin with.
Style Icons
Part of the blame actually lies with one of my largest style inspirations: James Bond. In particular, Daniel Craig’s iteration of him. Bond has always been superbly dressed with his accompanying tailored suits, tuxedos, dinner jackets, casual outfits, and even swimwear. He’s been a men’s style icon from the get-go since the first film Dr. No was released in 1962. It should be safe to say that any sartorially minded man has derived some level of inspiration from Bond. For those who haven’t, their personal style would have been indirectly influenced by him anyways for the trends he has helped push.
Traditionally, Bond wears suits that properly follow the lines of his body and flatter his build, regardless of which actor is playing him. It wasn’t until Skyfall when a new costume director, Jany Temime, came on board that Craig’s suits became shrunken and taut. Tight suits were already a popular look in 2012 when Skyfall released. Temime purposely costumed Craig in these small suits because she wanted him in an iconic look for the time. And so, the popularity of Bond took what was a trend and made men to believe it was proper.
There are other potential factors that go into Daniel Craig’s shrunken suit as Bond: It could have been an artistic decision to show a reflection of Bond’s rebellious nature or his rough methods of getting the job done.
In the end, no matter the reasoning, his suits still fit poorly. His jackets consistently pull at the button when fastened and the back of it isn’t always long enough to cover the seat of his trousers. There are even multiple instances where his suits have torn from running while shooting a scene.
Athletes
Generally speaking, celebrities and athletes aren’t known for their style prowess. This doesn’t stop them from being lauded over for their sense of fashion, of course. A massive advantage of being rich and famous is that you can benefit from the double standard of wearing whatever you’d like no matter how ridiculous and be admired for it, even though if a man of average status wore the same outfit he would be ridiculed. Look no further than the Cleveland Cavaliers as an example.
There is no way around it. The Cavs appear to be wearing children’s clothing in that picture. Their suits aren’t actually tight but are still far too small length-wise. The skinny jacket lapels on their tall, athletic build only reinforces this juvenile appearance. To nobody’s surprise, countless fashion publications and social media commenters praised this look. Vogue referred to them as “fashion-savvy” while GQ claimed they were “undeniably, stylish as hell.”
The Cavs are actually wearing suits made by Thom Browne, a New York fashion designer famous for his shrunken, cropped attire. I considered giving Thom Browne a section in this article but I believe his unique style, success, and influence warrants a more detailed article in the future. Admittedly, there are contexts that work for wearing your trousers a tad bit cropped depending on factors such as fabric, body type, and weather. However, its clear that the Cavs are wearing something more attune to capris than a normal cropped trouser. Vogue was correct; this look is indeed fashionable, but that is a word I relate more to passing trends than to lasting style. Will this trend last? Only time will tell.
Muscle Fit Brands
The largest offenders I’ve seen that advertise clothing that is far too tight are the brands that cater to muscular men. Over the last few years there have been a good handful of these brands that flash across my screen while scrolling through social media. I always take the time to flip through their pictures and videos. Not once have I ever seen any of these brands model a muscular dude with clothes that weren’t bursting at the seams. We’re talkin’ buttons that are about to fly off with such intensity that they’ll reach escape velocity within seconds. Maybe there’s a muscle man brand out there that doesn’t do this, but I haven’t seen them.
Fellas, this isn’t a good look. Some of you have put a lot of hard work, discipline, and sacrifice into making your body look like you regularly put up sets with Hercules himself. You’re strong, and you want to show off the effort you’ve put into the aesthetic. Far be it from me to say you shouldn’t. But like my own poor attempt to show off what size I had with shrunken clothing, the tight clothes don’t show off size or muscle. Instead they just tell everyone around you that you don’t know how to wear clothes that fit.
The reason tailored clothing works so well on everyone, regardless of body type, is because its meant to accentuate your good physical qualities, while downplaying or even hiding your bad ones. For an example of how properly tailoring can help accentuate a muscular build, look no further than this photo of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.
Needless to say, The Rock is a big dude. Notice how a well tailored suit, not a tight one, helps flatter his build: the jacket’s wide lapels and tapered waist both accentuate the size of his chest. His trousers are wide enough to hold his thighs while tapering at the bottom where one’s legs are slimmer. There is minimal creasing from strain on his jacket button, and hardly any creasing or folds in his trousers. There is some wrinkling in the arms and left leg, but this will happen naturally as you are moving or gesturing. If you didn’t know who The Rock was and you saw him in the street wearing this suit there would be doubt he could wrestle a gorilla and win.
Here some more examples of close fitting but well tailored suits:
Are you guilty of falling in the tight clothing trend? Are there any muscular focused brands out there that do it right and I’ve just missed them?
Recommendations:
- see a tailor! Have them take your measurements and recommend garment sizes if you are buying off the rack
- when buying a shirt off the rack on your own, find one that fits your neck and shoulders well but is otherwise slightly too large in the body. A tailor can slim the rest of it down for a much improved fit
- buy custom suits or shirts
- for my muscular brethren, be sure to buy or customize shirts with pleats so the fabric isn’t so strained when you move
- if your garments stretch or crease while you’re just standing around, they’re too small. Time to go up a size