I started a new job recently.
It’s going pretty well, and I’m happy that I got to stay in my current state of Connecticut so that me and my wife’s lives aren’t too uprooted.
There’s still plenty of uprooting. I now live in the center and work 75 miles away in the deep left corner of the state. I went from the middle-class residential town life to working in the richy-rich, I-95 corridor, New York-suburbs part of Connecticut.
It’s been fine. My brain is getting used in new ways, the people are nice. And so I have been thinking a lot about clothes, fashion and glamor, as I now work in near-New York.
Butting up against those Manhattan fashions has left me feeling a little fish-out-of-water. I knew all these rompers, ballet flats and wedge heels from the Ivy League days and Girls episodes, but I wasn’t used to seeing them anymore. And the men — the young, skinny men with their flat-front pants and button-down shirts. I look around, and it’s like, people try here.
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| You can’t try harder than a Gordon Gartrell |
Most workaday places in the United States don’t look like this at all.
And then there’s me. I forgot this is what the world can look like, and now I am back in there with them. It’s been nearly a decade since I had this daily uniform of dress clothes and button-down business casual. I haven’t even worn jeans yet.
Don’t get me wrong, I dress pretty well. And compared to the so-called average man, I dress really well. I buy clothes that fit, or get them fitted. I like colors and patterns, love to coordinate and mix. Suits, ties, funky lapel pieces, hats, vests, suspenders, I dig them all, but with my own twist.
If anything, I like for my clothes to be as blerdy as possible – the true nexus of of nerdy tropes and black culture’s longstanding love of flamboyant, uplifting fashion sense.
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| Blerd |
I like to dress like the baddest nerd alive, plain and simple. Bladed brainiacitude. Pimped-out geekiness.
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| Cee-Lo pushing the envelope for “Business Casual” |
Truth be told, I kinda missed this kind of official glamor. I’ve spent most of my life dressed up by necessity, from Catholic elementary and high school’s uniforms, to taking on the international-collegiate ethic at Harvard, to ties every day at my newspaper job.
But the past eight years at my previous job was the kind of dress code where slacks were considered fancy. I was well-dressed, and (by my standards) I wasn’t trying that hard. It’s just time to update and find new things for this new chapter, especially as my body has and most things don’t fit right.
Finding the best clothes for this body isn’t always easy for this body, which I would describe as overdeveloped – all shoulders, chest, arms and tree-trunk legs. Relaxed-fit pants are skin tight, and jackets that fit my shoulders are billowing at the waist. But I try.
I have some new stars to chart my way, too. Here are some of my favorites of black, nerdy glamor – combining old and new into something classic.
This is the same guy who can rock sweatsuits in The Wire AND robo-suits in Pacific Rim with equal aplomb. He’s very handsome and well-built, sure, but those two qualifications can turn a guy into a living mannequin and less like a man who chooses good, well-fitting clothes that looks like he lives easy and comfortably in them. Elba does the latter. (On the opposite end, Johnny Depp dresses terribly nearly all the time.) Elba even adds weary grace to his cartoon character-like wardrobe of the same form-fitting charcoal wool blazer, topcoat and worn-down ties on Luther. It’s rough-necked sophistication of the highest order, people. That’s why my friend Tish calls him the black James Bond.
Janelle Monae
Have you seen her? What couldn’t I learn from her? The black-and-white tuxedo uniform of her stage persona hasn’t looked this good since Marlene Dietrich. It’s funky, serious, classic and future-forward all at the same time, just like her music. When I want to look sharp, official and like I could explode at any moment, I think of Janelle.
André 3000
Colors of every kind. Fabrics of every kind. Accessories a-plenty. I have days where I live out dandy fantasies. A whirlwind of baroque, more-is-more combinations of knits, silks and linens, dots and stripes and checks and paisleys. Sybaritic bliss. Lovely.
LeBron James
I think there’s something very confident about someone as uber-jock as basketball superstar LeBron James taking on the vest – the nerdiest piece of clothing in the world.
I’m not talking a three-piece suit, which went from being plain in the days of King Charles to being seen as over-the-top in our times. I mean a shirt and vest, no jacket, no suit.
LeBron does this a ton, with ties, a contrasting belt, and some jeans and bowling shoes or sick sneakers, polished off with thick black frames. Prep-school dweeb meets hip-hop flash while not falling down the high-fashion rabbit hole of other basketball stars such as Russell Westbrook, Dwyane Wade or Amar’e Stoudemire.
It’s nice to see guys who aren’t stick-thin dress like this. It gives me hope.
RuPaul
I really respect drag performers and their representation of outlandish, super-strong femininity. And RuPaul Andre Charles is at the top of the heap in American pop culture and perhaps the most famous drag queen in the world. And, damn, he looks about as good as a man, too. Sleek elegance, dynamic pairings of loud colors and muted shades. And he makes cravats and other neckerchiefs not look ostentatious.
Kyle Barker from Living Single
Yes, Kyle’s not real. He was a character, played by T.C. Carson, on everyone’s favorite ’90s Queen Latifah vehicle putting a black, urban spin on Designing Women.
But his suave stockbroker was the epitome of when I grew up knowing to be black male fashion sense. Rich suits, shirts, ties, topcoats, hats, shoes, scarves, gloves. Tie bars, cufflinks and money clips.
Everything in perfect place.
Barker reflects a sentiment in mainstream black American culture by which you tried to project the best possible image. And that image alone could combat prejudice, in a society where appearances matter with sometimes lethal results.
Barker dressed in his Sunday best every day. Nothing trendy, always classic pieces.
The men of my family dress this way.
Lando Calrissian
Only two guys in the nerd Mecca that is Star Wars wear capes, and both are black as hell: Darth Vader, and Lando Calrissian. But what Lando taught me is that, if you’re gonna wear something ridiculous, you’d better be pretty as all get-out, and the ridiculous clothes had better look good. Lando had both.
And so I keep all these heroes of black nerdy fashion with me as I shop. They encompass all that I am, and all that I want to be.
Who are your fashion guides?
