🔗 Share this article

Coming of age in London during the noughties, I was always surrounded by suits. You saw them on businessmen rushing through the financial district. You could spot them on dads in the city's great park, kicking footballs in the golden light. Even school, a inexpensive grey suit was our required uniform. Historically, the suit has functioned as a costume of gravitas, signaling authority and professionalism—qualities I was told to embrace to become a "man". However, before lately, my generation appeared to wear them less and less, and they had all but vanished from my mind.

Then came the incoming New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani. He was sworn in at a closed ceremony wearing a sober black overcoat, pristine white shirt, and a distinctive silk tie. Riding high by an innovative campaign, he captured the world's imagination unlike any recent contender for city hall. But whether he was celebrating in a music venue or attending a film premiere, one thing was largely unchanged: he was almost always in a suit. Relaxed in fit, modern with unstructured lines, yet traditional, his is a quintessentially professional millennial suit—that is, as common as it can be for a generation that seldom bothers to wear one.

"This garment is in this strange position," says men's fashion writer Derek Guy. "Its decline has been a slow death since the end of the Second World War," with the significant drop coming in the 1990s alongside "the advent of business casual."

"Today it is only worn in the strictest settings: weddings, funerals, to some extent, legal proceedings," Guy states. "It's sort of like the kimono in Japan," in that it "fundamentally represents a custom that has long ceded from everyday use." Many 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 signaled this, today it performs authority in the hope of winning public trust. As Guy elaborates: "Since we're also living in a democratic society, politicians want to seem approachable, because they're trying to get your votes." In many ways, a suit is just a subtle form of performance, in that it enacts masculinity, authority and even proximity to power.

Guy's words resonated deeply. On the infrequent times I require a suit—for a wedding or formal occasion—I retrieve the one I bought from a Tokyo department store a few years ago. When I first selected it, it made me feel sophisticated and expensive, but its slim cut now feels outdated. I imagine this sensation will be all too recognizable for many of us in the diaspora whose parents come from other places, particularly global south countries.

Unsurprisingly, the everyday suit has lost fashion. Similar to a pair of jeans, a suit's shape goes through trends; a specific cut can thus characterize an era—and feel rapidly outdated. Consider the present: more relaxed suits, echoing a famous cinematic Armani in *American Gigolo*, might be trendy, but given the cost, it can feel like a considerable investment for something likely to fall out of fashion within five years. Yet the appeal, at least in certain circles, endures: recently, department stores report tailoring sales rising more than 20% as customers "shift from the suit being everyday wear towards an appetite to invest in something exceptional."

The Symbolism of a Accessible Suit

Mamdani's preferred suit is from a contemporary brand, a European label that sells in a moderate price bracket. "He is precisely a product of his background," says Guy. "In his thirties, he's not poor but not exceptionally wealthy." To that end, his mid-level suit will resonate with the demographic most likely to support him: people in their thirties and forties, university-educated earning professional incomes, often frustrated by the cost of housing. It's exactly the kind of suit they might wear themselves. Not cheap but not extravagant, Mamdani's suits plausibly don't contradict his proposed policies—such as a capping rents, constructing affordable homes, and fare-free public buses.

"It's impossible to imagine a former president wearing this brand; he's a Brioni person," says Guy. "As an immensely wealthy and was raised in that property development world. A power suit fits seamlessly with that elite, just as attainable brands fit naturally with Mamdani's cohort."

The history of suits in politics is long and storied: from a well-known leader's "controversial" beige attire to other national figures and their suspiciously impeccable, custom-fit appearance. Like a certain UK leader discovered, the suit doesn't just clothe the politician; it has the power to define them.

Performance of Normality and A Shield

Maybe the key is what one academic refers to the "enactment of banality", invoking the suit's long career as a uniform of political power. Mamdani's specific selection leverages a studied modesty, neither shabby nor showy—"conforming to norms" in an unobtrusive suit—to help him appeal to as many voters as possible. But, some think Mamdani would be aware of the suit's historical and imperial legacy: "The suit isn't neutral; scholars have long noted that its contemporary origins lie in imperial administration." Some also view it as a form of protective armor: "It is argued that if you're from a minority background, you might not get taken as seriously in these traditional institutions." The suit becomes a way of signaling legitimacy, perhaps especially to those who might question it.

This kind of sartorial "changing styles" is not a recent phenomenon. Indeed iconic figures previously wore three-piece suits during their formative years. Currently, other world leaders have begun swapping their usual military wear for a black suit, albeit one without the tie.

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

The suit Mamdani chooses is highly significant. "As a Muslim child of immigrants of Indian descent and a democratic socialist, he is under pressure to meet what many American voters look for as a marker of leadership," notes one author, while simultaneously needing to navigate carefully by "avoiding the appearance of an elitist betraying his distinctive roots and values."

But there is an acute awareness of the double standards applied to who wears suits and what is interpreted from it. "That may come in part from Mamdani being a millennial, skilled to assume different identities to fit the situation, but it may also be part of his diverse background, where adapting between languages, customs and clothing styles is common," it is said. "Some individuals can remain unnoticed," but when others "seek to gain the authority that suits represent," they must carefully navigate the codes associated with them.

Throughout the presentation of Mamdani's official image, the tension between somewhere and nowhere, inclusion and exclusion, is evident. I know well the awkwardness of trying to conform to something not designed with me in mind, 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, image is never neutral.