Dress Codes

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Being so traditionally minded, the Brit­ish are less fashion-conscious than other Europeans. The majority dress conservative­ly rather than fashionably. For example, the upper and upper middle classes tend to dress 'safely' in the well-tried styles of the past fifty years or so. During the 1980s this style appealed to a wider clientele which, inspired by the romance of the upper classes, par­ticularly by the Royal Wedding (Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer), in 1981, began to imitate them. For all its simplici­ty, this old-fashioned style of the upper and upper middle class is distinctively exclu­sive.

The British suit is not an ostentatious display of wealth and privilege but a dis­creet system of signals... through which the subtle working of the establishment is re­vealed. At official functions throughout the land, the tie, the suit's colours, signal to the assembled company the allegiance of the wearer — which school or university he attended, which club or company he be­longs to.... And those who imagine that the code has become redundant in the mod­ern world do not understand the strength of the patriarchal system in this country.

The suit is the uniform of traditional Conservative MPs, while Labour MPs wear the clothes of the ordinary middle classes, with the suburban look of off-the-peg suits from a major retailer like Marks and Spen­cer. There is, of course, an equivalent dress for women. For those who want to under­stand the mystique of the upper class, all is revealed in Peter York's book.

The Official Shane Ranger Handbook ex­plains precisely how to decorate your house, how to wear your clothes (and what clothes to wear), how to word your letters and how to educate your children.

For those 'Young Fogeys' as they are known in Britain, who want to wear the clothes of 'good breeding', there are a number of shops which specialise in the look, like Hackett's (specialists in upper-class clothes).

Most people, of course, do not imitate top society. Nevertheless, the 1980s was a decade when wealth and power were strongly expressed, for example in 'power dressing', an echo of the dominant political ideas of the Thatcher decade.

The old upper class continues to dress as it always has, but there is a swing in the 1990s back to a more classless informal look more in keeping with Britain's greater in­tegration into Europe.

That does not mean that the British are merely going to adopt 'Eurostyle'. As not­ed, Britain has a strongly individualistic culture. The British may be among the least smartly dressed people in Europe, but they wear what they want when they want. There is as great a tolerance of personal appear­ance as anywhere in Europe. The British hate the idea of appearing the same.

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