Where Have True Haberdashers Gone?

Dear Miss Manners: Instead of renting a tuxedo, my husband wants to purchase one, but the salesmen we encountered were surprisingly ignorant about tuxedo types.

More than one suggested a tuxedo with striped pants. I thought such a tuxedo appropriate for morning weddings and called a “morning suit.”

Please explain the types and degrees. What is a matter of style, and what is a matter of appropriateness? When is a white jacket with black slacks appropriate? Vest versus cummerbund? Shirt buttons or studs? French cuffs or no? White bow tie vs. black bow tie vs. gray bow tie vs. ascot vs. necktie?

Gentle Reader: Miss Manners wept when the merchandisers of gentlemen’s clothing switched from priding themselves on their expert knowledge to the popular attitude known as “whatever.”

Pink ruffles? Sure. Mix and match from different styles of clothing? Why not?

So before Miss Manners undertakes explaining gentlemen’s proper clothing, allow her to bemoan the scarcity of self-respecting haberdashers (you can recognize them from the tailoring chalk on their hands and the attitude that if you want to be silly instead of correct, you should go elsewhere) and advise you that if you can find one you should treasure him. The term “tuxedo” (we etiquetteers prefer to say “dinner jacket” or “black tie,” although why it should be tonier to refer to part of the outfit than the whole is not clear) describes only one such outfit: The black suit with black-satin or faille lapels and black-satin stripe or braid down the outside of the pants (worn with pleated white shirt, studs, cuff links, black bow tie, and black cummerbund or black waistcoat) which is now standard formal evening wear.

It should not be tarted up with innovations such as band collared or ruffled shirts and colored or patterned accessories, and it should never see the light of day. Substituting a white jacket in summer is as jaunty as is permissible - and even that is considered somewhat juvenile by stuffed shirts.

There is also ultra formal evening wear known as “white tie” (tail coat, black pants with black braid down the side, white pique waistcoat, stiff wing-collar shirt, white tie) but that is rarely seen now except on orchestra conductors.

And there are two degrees of daytime formal clothing for gentlemen:

The daytime equivalent of black tie for evening is a neglected but fetching outfit called a club coat, sack coat or stroller - consisting of a black or gray jacket and waistcoat, striped trousers, gray tie.

The more formal daytime outfit consists of the cutaway coat with striped gray pants, waistcoat and gray tie or ascot - the morning clothes you describe.

But alas, now that even presidents are timid about seeming elitist if they dress up for their inaugurations, these are seen almost exclusively at daytime weddings.

Dear Miss Manners: After the funeral of a family member (which was held in the beginning of the year; therefore, this is the first year of the beloved’s passing) friends and relatives seem all too anxious to bestow Christmas cards, along with verbal or written “be happy” communications on how the immediate family should celebrate. For example, happy suggestions include going ahead and putting up outside lights and a Christmas tree with all the trimmings. Is this proper?

Gentle Reader: Once, nothing would have been easier than for Miss Manners to recite exactly what was proper for those in deepest mourning. Oppressive as that system was, it at least precluded the hurt feelings that arise when individuals mourn differently and then start attacking one another for being heartless or morbid. While it is proper to have a quiet, religious first Christmas in mourning, Miss Manners is not prepared to declare it improper to return to one’s previous Christmas customs after nearly a year has passed.