(FASHION) I Finally Wore The Suits In My Closet To Work And This Is What Happened!

 

by  Matt Ortile

I love suits so much that I have five suit sets and over twelve blazers — but I rarely wear them.

They only ever see the light of day during weddings or funerals, which are (thankfully, re: weddings) few and far between. But when I wear a suit on an average weekday, I’m compelled to take it off and swap outfits because:

1. I feel like a total douche-canoe wearing a suit to work.

They say to dress for the job you want, not the job you have, but America is increasingly being run in jeans and Patagonia fleece. The same goes for when you work at BuzzFeed dot com the website and all its commonwealth realms of distributed #content, where comfort — often in the form of a sensible jort — reigns supreme.

Despite that, suits are welcome, certainly! But when your CEO is deciding the fate of the company in a tasteful branded hoodie, it feels pompous and precocious for me to wear a suit as a 23-year-old in an entry-level job.

2. Besides, putting together a suit outfit can be really intimidating and scary.

Whenever I look through the pages of GQ or give Pinterest a quick “menswear” search, I can’t fathom how any man without a team of stylists can appropriately pair this shirt with this tie and these shoes and know that it’s all exactly right. There are so many things to think about, I wouldn’t know where to start: Colors! Sizes! Fabrics??? POCKET SQUARES?!?!

I do not have that kind of sartorial knowledge, let alone self-assurance. As someone constantly plagued by self-doubt, it’s par for the course on a suit day for me to look in the mirror and suddenly realize that blue with white is an atrocious color combination and that I should have never left the house.

3. And it’s currently summer in New York.

Couple the 98-degree heat with the sweltering subway, crowded trains, and steaming asphalt everywhere, a crisp white shirt will turn yellow at the pits as you cook in a suit that feels more like sausage casing. Really, I don’t wanna be these guys.

My issue: I’ve bought so many clothes only to hide them in my wardrobe. As someone who knows what it’s like to spend significant time in a closet, I didn’t want my suits going through the same.

Enter the BuzzFeed Suit Week Challenge:

Why not? I thought to myself, constantly refreshing my Dark Sky app and willing the weather gods to cooperate for at least a week. And really, I had all the equipment, so I had nothing to lose.

Also because I love the USA network series Suits and I’ll take any opportunity I can to even slightly resemble Gabriel Macht.

 

USA

USA

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