Are we too casual?
Dressing casually is so acceptable nowadays, some people are not even bothering to get dressed at all, writes Bess Manson.
There are few things more fantastically cosy than a onesie and a pair of Uggs. The more fleecy and woolly, the better. Snug as a bug in a deeply unfashionable rug – a more perfect way to marinate in your own comfort there never was.
This delicious ensemble is best worn in the privacy of your own company in a Bridget Jones-athome-alone-on-New-Year’s-Eve sort of way. The family cat may be privy to this slothful arrangement. What does it care? It’s practically wearing the same thing, just in more natural fibres.
But with casual being the new formal, this arrangement appears to be sleepwalking out of the house and into the supermarket, down to the school gate, maybe even snuggling down into a comfy booth at the local boozer. Nightcap anyone?
Wearing your jim-jams out in public might cop you some stick, though. When a mum of five from Porirua hit her local Pak ’n Save in pink pyjamas and Ugg boots this week, she unleashed the wrath of a fellow shopper who posted comments on Facebook criticising such people as being lazy, adding something about ‘‘boundaries and standards’’.
Surely there’s time to get dressed before nipping down to the shops for your essentials, came the outraged cry from a Tesco customer, who demanded the British supermarket ban its customers from wearing pyjamas while shopping (though some might argue that with five kids aged between 2 and 13, it’s amazing she’s able to get out of the house at all.)
This trend for dressing down in your dressing gown is nothing new. The Brits are rather fond of this exercise, though, like the Pak ’n Save PJ incident, it doesn’t always go down well.
Tesco banned pyjamas in a superstore in Cardiff in 2010 after customers complained that people shopping in nightwear made them feel ‘‘uncomfortable’’.
Signs were put up in the window headed ‘‘Tesco Dress Code Police’’, asking customers to be ‘‘appropriately dressed’’ when visiting the store.
Less pyjama-phobic and rather more tolerant of this preferred shopping attire is Fresh Choice Green Island co-owner Julie Moyle, who said people shopped in pyjamas in her Dunedin supermarket all the time.
The pyjama-friendly proprietor welcomed shoppers in their PJs, provided the clothing covered people’s ‘‘bits’’ (boundaries and standards, people), and said she could well understand someone shopping in their nightwear in the morning if they had woken up early and noticed an absence of bacon in the fridge when they were hell bent on a fry-up.
Makes you wonder, why bother getting dressed at all? For mufti dress-down Fridays at work you could simply stumble out of bed and into work, with the bonus being that one is all ready for bed when one gets home (via the supermarket/school/pub).
Pyjamas aside, office workplace attire is no longer the formal button-down collar scenario it used to be. Short dresses worn just south of the nursery furniture, ironic band-sloganed T-shirts and jandals have become the norm. The suit has become something of a fashion relic to say nothing of the dreaded tie.
According to the Wall Street Journal, a poll by the Society for Human Resource Management found that just over a third of American employers allow casual dress in the workplace every day.
Workers at the Trade Me office in Wellington are in permanent dress-down mode.
Given the company has installed a slide between floors (stairs and lifts being a dying trend), you’d be grateful for a more casual approach to fashion.
Spokesman Logan Mudge says people are looking past attire to focus on the person doing the graft.
‘‘Our motto is ‘informal but serious’. People here dress in jeans, shorts, T-shirts and jandals. We have never needed to draw a line in the sand about standards. People dress comfortably so they can work comfortably.’’
This less fussy dress code is the norm with many tech companies whose clients are web-based.
‘‘It comes down to the mindset that it’s less about what you wear and more about what you can produce, what you can do.’’
A lot of companies are now thinking more about whether their workers are client-facing and if they can offer teams the chance to ditch the shirt and trousers for something more comfortable and casual, he said.
Fashion guru Paula Ryan says times have changed. ‘‘There are no rules any more. It’s not like the 1940s.’’
But is there a line to be drawn? Funerals, for example. It’s pretty well accepted that black is no longer a prerequisite for this occasion (unless you’re Margaret Thatcher). But are shorts and T-shirts acceptable?
Dana Brown, funeral director at Lychgate Funerals, says the attire of mourners will reflect the person who has died.
‘‘If they were into black jeans and T-shirts, many of their friends will be wearing the same garb.’’
Women are wearing short dresses, particularly young women, she says. For men, jeans and a shirt have become acceptable.
‘‘The fashion at a funeral has gone from formal attire you might wear to a wedding to smart casual. People just don’t wear suits as much any more.’’
Colin Mathura-Jeffree, fashion aficionado and former international model, cuts pyjamawearing shoppers some slack.
‘‘People who wear pyjamas to the shops are just being a bit playful. They’re not being slothful, they’re making a trend, they’re being silly and having a bit of fun.’’
With the blessing of Mr Fashionista, this reporter decided to hit the local Four Square in a onesie and Uggs for some breakfast essentials.
It’s amazing how many people you know shop early in the morning – all of them having managed to get dressed first.
Pyjama shopping might be fun and playful but comfort is too high a price to pay for sartorial humiliation.
Mathura-Jeffree does, however, take no prisoners when it comes to dressing down for funerals, weddings and important events.
‘‘I have an incredible problem with people who dress down or dress badly to an event, or even when travelling. ‘‘Some turn up at events looking like they have just come from cleaning their house, doing the gardening or having just survived an earthquake!’’ he says, incredulous at the very thought. ‘‘It’s disrespectful. When you respect and care for someone, you dress up for their event.’’ All over the world, people dress up at the drop of a hat. They’ll don their sequins for the opening of an envelope, he says.
‘‘When people from Asia and Europe come here, they are shocked at how casual we dress.’’
God forbid they visited Moyle’s Fresh Choice Green Island supermarket yesterday where staff and customers were all wearing their pyjamas for a charity fundraiser.
Perhaps there’s a happy compromise to be found in sequinned nighties.
‘‘When you respect someone, you dress up for their event.’’ Fashion aficionado Colin Mathura-Jeffree