James Bond is the suited warrior. A hard man in a good fitting jacket.
The suit is the pinnacle of a man’s wardrobe. The modern gentleman’s suit or armor. As such, it needs to be chosen carefully. It’s easy to get overwhelmed with all the styles available, so keep things simple.
SUIT BASICS
When selecting your suit, don’t go overboard with edgy fabrics, cuts, or styling.
For your first suit – the one that will serve you in everything from a wedding to a business meeting to dinner at the most expensive restaurant in town – you want to go with navy blue or charcoal gray. If you went with navy for the first suit, your second suit should be charcoal gray, and vice versa. Black comes next, then everything else, knowing that light/medium gray and khaki are less formal daytime colors, and everything else from brown to olive green to burgundy is less formal still.
With very few exceptions, your suits should be:
- Jacket:
- single breasted
- two button
- notch lapels
- Trousers:
- flat front
- no cuffs
- Dress shirts:
- white, then light blue, then you can branch out from there
GET IT TAILORED
All of the above must be impeccably tailored. Unless you have purchased a bespoke suit, you should assume that the jacket, trousers, and dress shirts all need adjustment.
Find a good tailor in your area and get to know them. Almost every article of clothing you own will require some work from them, from slight adjustments in the jacket, to taking in your shirts, to adjusting the waist and inseam on your pants.
Proper tailoring is the single most important thing you can do to dramatically enhance your style, whether your suit came from Express, Brooks Brothers, or Tom Ford.
QUICK-START GUIDE:
If you’re just starting your journey towards becoming 007, hold off on buying suits until you’ve spent a couple months building your body. Whether you lose weight or put on muscle, you don’t want to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on new suits you’re going to outgrow in a few weeks. Focus on building your casual wardrobe first, as this will see you through more daily activities and body changes than a perfectly tailored suit.
Once you are ready to purchase, you have tons of options. You will want to be careful selecting a suit that fits and is styled properly. Slim and very tailored fits with high arm holes and aggressive waist suppression will look much better on the slim or athletic physique than the standard fit of many off the rack and older styles.
You won’t want to trash the look of a perfectly tailored suit cheap rubber soled shoes, so pick a pair of leather-soled black oxfords or dress boots and pair them with a matching dress belt.
Ready for more, or need more detailed information?