🔗 Share this article

Coming of age in London during the 2000s, I was constantly surrounded by suits. You saw them on businessmen hurrying through the Square Mile. They were worn by dads in Hyde Park, playing with footballs in the evening light. Even school, a inexpensive grey suit was our required uniform. Historically, the suit has functioned as a uniform of seriousness, projecting authority and performance—traits I was expected to embrace to become a "adult". However, until recently, my generation seemed to wear them infrequently, and they had all but disappeared from my consciousness.

Then came the newly elected New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani. Taking his oath of office at a closed ceremony dressed in a sober black overcoat, crisp white shirt, and a distinctive silk tie. Riding high by an innovative campaign, he captured the public's imagination like no other recent contender for city hall. Yet whether he was celebrating in a music venue or attending a film premiere, one thing remained largely constant: he was almost always in a suit. Relaxed in fit, contemporary with soft shoulders, yet traditional, his is a quintessentially middle-class millennial suit—well, as typical as it can be for a cohort that seldom chooses to wear one.

"This garment is in this weird place," says style commentator Derek Guy. "Its decline has been a gradual fade since the end of the second world war," with the real dip coming in the 1990s alongside "the rise of business casual."

"Today it is only worn in the strictest settings: weddings, memorials, and sometimes, legal proceedings," Guy states. "It is like the traditional Japanese robe in Japan," in that it "essentially represents a custom that has long ceded from everyday use." Numerous politicians "don this attire to say: 'I am a politician, you can trust me. You should vote for me. I have legitimacy.'" Although the suit has historically conveyed this, today it performs authority in the hope of gaining public trust. As Guy elaborates: "Since we're also living in a democratic society, politicians want to seem relatable, because they're trying to get your votes." To a large extent, a suit is just a nuanced form of drag, in that it enacts manliness, authority and even closeness to power.

Guy's words stayed with me. On the rare occasions I need a suit—for a wedding or black-tie event—I dust off the one I bought from a Japanese department store several years ago. When I first selected it, it made me feel sophisticated and high-end, but its tailored fit now feels outdated. I suspect this sensation will be only too familiar for numerous people in the global community whose families come from somewhere else, especially developing countries.

It's no surprise, the everyday suit has lost fashion. Similar to a pair of jeans, a suit's shape goes through trends; a specific cut can therefore characterize an era—and feel rapidly outdated. Take now: looser-fitting suits, echoing Richard Gere's Armani in *American Gigolo*, might be in vogue, but given the price, it can feel like a considerable investment for something likely to fall out of fashion within five years. Yet the attraction, at least in certain circles, endures: in the past year, department stores report suit sales rising more than 20% as customers "shift from the suit being daily attire towards an appetite to invest in something exceptional."

The Symbolism of a Accessible Suit

The mayor's go-to suit is from a contemporary brand, a Dutch label that sells in a mid-market price bracket. "He is precisely a product of his background," says Guy. "In his thirties, he's not poor but not extremely wealthy." Therefore, his mid-level suit will appeal to the group most likely to support him: people in their 30s and 40s, university-educated earning middle-class incomes, often discontented by the cost of housing. It's precisely the kind of suit they might wear themselves. Not cheap but not lavish, Mamdani's suits arguably don't contradict his stated policies—which include a capping rents, constructing affordable homes, and fare-free public buses.

"It's impossible to imagine Donald Trump wearing this brand; he's a luxury Italian suit person," says Guy. "As an immensely wealthy and was raised in that New York real-estate world. A status symbol fits seamlessly with that tycoon class, just as attainable brands fit naturally with Mamdani's constituency."

The history of suits in politics is long and storied: from a well-known leader's "shocking" tan suit to other national figures and their suspiciously polished, tailored appearance. Like a certain British politician learned, the suit doesn't just dress the politician; it has the power to define them.

The Act of Normality and A Shield

Maybe the key is what one academic calls the "performance of banality", invoking the suit's long career as a uniform of political power. Mamdani's specific selection taps into a deliberate understatement, not too casual nor too flashy—"conforming to norms" in an inconspicuous suit—to help him appeal to as many voters as possible. But, some think Mamdani would be aware of the suit's military and colonial legacy: "This attire isn't neutral; historians have long noted that its contemporary origins lie in imperial administration." It is also seen as a form of defensive shield: "I think if you're from a minority background, you might not get taken as seriously in these traditional institutions." The suit becomes a way of asserting credibility, perhaps especially to those who might question it.

Such sartorial "code-switching" is not a new phenomenon. Indeed iconic figures previously wore three-piece suits during their early years. These days, other world leaders have started exchanging their usual military wear for a dark formal outfit, albeit one without the tie.

"In every seam and stitch of Mamdani's public persona, the tension between insider and outsider is apparent."

The attire Mamdani chooses is deeply significant. "As a Muslim child of immigrants of Indian descent and a democratic socialist, he is under scrutiny to conform to what many American voters expect as a sign of leadership," says one author, while at the same time needing to navigate carefully by "not looking like an elitist selling out his non-mainstream roots and values."

Yet there is an sharp awareness of the double standards applied to suit-wearers and what is read into it. "This could stem in part from Mamdani being a millennial, skilled to assume different identities to fit the situation, but it may also be part of his multicultural background, where code-switching between cultures, traditions and clothing styles is common," commentators note. "White males can remain unremarked," but when others "seek to gain the power that suits represent," they must carefully navigate the codes associated with them.

Throughout the presentation of Mamdani's public persona, the dynamic between somewhere and nowhere, insider and outsider, is visible. I know well the awkwardness of trying to conform to something not built for me, be it an cultural expectation, the culture I was born into, or even a suit. What Mamdani's style decisions make evident, however, is that in public life, appearance is not without meaning.