Have we now cut all ties with smart clothing?

IREMEMBER a long-ago holiday in France back in the days before paying flexibly for everything overseas on a debit or credit card became the norm.

I needed francs. Remember those? So, I went into a bank to cash a travel cheque. Remember those, too?

Anyway, the transaction, complete with required production of passport, was no problem. What struck me, however, was the informality of the place as compared with its British counterpart.

None of the male staff had a suit between them. None were wearing ties. There was no corporate uniform and, good grief, a helpful customer-greeting chap on my side of the counter was clad in a tee-shirt and shorts.

This ultra-casual approach to male workwear was a revelation.

Back home in the UK and first day back at work and it was into an office where all of us turned up wearing orthodox attire.

I know that, gradually, along the following years this stiff upper lip approach to what blokes wear to work has been gradually eroded, with the tie, especially, taking a big hit but nothing has been quite as explosive as the clothing style changes being wrought by the Covid virus.

This came into sharp focus when I was doing some wardrobe reorganising recently. In a move that’s worryingly far too efficient for what might pass as my normal behaviour, I decided to remove all my lightweight summer clothes in storage bags to the loft room and retrieve the heavier duty autumn/ winter clobber I had put there back in the spring when lockdown boredom had first set in.

Alongside all this was a large wicker basket stuffed to overflowing with my neckwear. Goodness knows how many silkworms must have given their all to produce these over the years for me – and now what am I going to do with them?

What I realised was that loads of clothing, not just my ties, had remained fashionably unworn since the nation shut up shop in March.

With our social life now eclipsed by Covid, comfortably scruffy has become my new norm.

I cannot remember the last time I wore a pair of trousers which boasted neat creases in all the right places. The same goes for a formal shirt. Trainers, including a particularly old and battered pair, have usurped any footwear in shiny leather or suede.

Most telling of all, though, were the four jackets swaying gently on their hangers, all redundant for months, two of them were brand new, unworn, bought for spring and summer jaunts which didn’t happen and still in their plastic shop coverings.

I scarcely give them a second glance when I ponder what to wear each day. T-shirts, polo shirts (my wife loathes these), sweatshirts, jumpers and jeans are my regular garb now.

Which brings me to the saddest clothes hanger in the wardrobe – the one from which drapes the jacket and trousers which comprise my dinner suit. When will that get another outing?

Being confined to home and its near surrounds for weeks and months on end it really doesn’t matter how you decide to clad yourself. No one else is around to notice unless you are desperately keen to impress the postie or one of the many delivery couriers who come calling.

So the big question is: when the virus is finally brought under control will we chaps all rush straight out and buy ourselves a whole load of new neat-looking clobber? Will the British man about town start looking more fashionably structured again? I am not sure there will be a headlong rush.

Casual menswear is now king and I don’t reckon it will be abdicating any time soon.

Goodness knows how many silkworms must have given their all to produce my neckwear over the years – and now what am I going to do with them?