MODERN LIFE SHANE WATSON
It’s not. Is it? Has it got a…? No! Is that a hood? Jeremy Corbyn’s anorak, the one he wore to lay a wreath on behalf of his party at the Cenotaph last Sunday, did not go unremarked upon, it’s fair to say. No one watching could fail to notice that Jeremy was not only wearing an anorak (having managed to find himself a coat last year) but that it had a hood, the detail that drives the waterproof firmly into the category of aggressively casual. It made you think about all the clothes that can set our teeth on edge in certain contexts. There’s quite a list, when you get down to it.
Hoods up at the table
Or woolly beanies/caps in general. Very occasionally, a young person will attempt this, before being reminded that it’s the sartorial equivalent of wearing headphones and a sign saying: “Yes, I’m in your company, but you are not my people.” Hoods outdoors are rude, too, if the weather does not call for them.
Pyjamas in the day
Obviously if you’re Kendall Jenner, wandering around Bel Air in your Olivia von Halle silk PJS, that is one thing. But all those millennials who imagine that the clothes they sleep in are appropriate everyday wear (and for getting from A to B, if B is just down the road) are very Set Our Teeth On Edge (Sotoe). Will Sotoe take off? Let’s see. It’s pronounced Sowtow, btw.
Slippers (see above)
Once useful footwear for passing between the freezing bedroom and the freezing bathroom, now the No 1 present request of twentysomethings, who like to wear them all the time around the house, like baby-faced Steptoes. (Note the explosion of luxury sheepskin slippers: they all want Uggs or Mahabis… and they cost £80!) The whole sick day aesthetic is depressing beyond belief.
Pockets (hands in)
Pockets have been getting a lot of publicity recently: there was the news that pockets in wedding dresses are newly fashionable (for the bride who wants to stroll down the aisle with her bouquet tucked under her armpit); and it was noted that Meghan had her hands in the pockets of a dress on tour, which was considered fine – albeit a departure from protocol.
Meanwhile, there are still plenty of situations when hands in pockets look somewhere between sloppy and hostile. For example, when you are struggling with the shopping and certain family members are standing around, that’s annoying; but throw in some hands in pockets and the irritation is magnified by a factor of roughly 50. The hands in the pockets say: “Nothing to do with me.” Hands in pockets are the opposite of What Can I Do?
Cycling shorts in the pub
Wearing exercise gear in the world at large is out of control. Your average coffee shop now feels like the losers’ corner of the Olympic Village: you can’t move for ladies in skintight base layers and sweat bands. Unfortunately, we are getting used to this, but Mamils – the thrusty men in the clinging Lycra cycling wear – we are
never getting used to. We wish they could see that a lot of helmet-wearing women, propping up the bar wearing our opaque tights with no knickers underneath, would be equally undesirable.
Visible underpants
Admittedly the on-show tighty-whitie is not as on show as it was a few years ago – when you could fully expect to see 7in of exposed buttocks and groin area, skimmed by a tight pair of jockey shorts, whenever you ventured out in public – but visible pants still have the power to make us wince. It’s not as if the men wearing them are all David Gandys. And it’s not like their tighty-whities are all that white.