D2| Saturday/Sunday, March 21 - 22, 2020 **** THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
with bold suiting: At this
year’s Roc Nation brunch, a
pre-Grammys party, Jay-Z,
DJ Khaled and Kevin Hart
wore suits in pastel pink,
baby blue and emerald
green, respectively, forming
a springy trio on a January
day. Such joyous suits are
familiar to anyone who fre-
quents an African-American
church, where worshipers
often bring out their most
deeply saturated Sunday
best.
While the rest of the U.S.
male population still tends
toward gray and navy, tai-
lors in Mumbai make suits
in radiant reds and mari-
golds and, in Congo, the
dandies of Brazzaville pride
themselves on wearing suits
in orange, blue and violet.gundy and hunter green can
be an easier sell for many
men. Alex Wasilenko, 27, a
TV meteorologist in Green-
ville, N.C., relies on his sig-
nature colored suiting, yet
knows to stick with darker
shades like eggplant. “I
have a baby-blue suit coat,
and it just is way too bright
for on-air with all the stu-
dio lighting,” he explained.
Monotonously somber
suiting still dominates in
America, so wearing a col-
ored version means break-
ing away from the pack—
which has a positive side.
“If two people have the
same suit, it’s awkward,”
posited onesapeurin a
2015 documentary on the
Brazzaville dandies. “It
looks like a football team.”T
HE SUITSof-
fered by Paris
label Berluti
this spring
come in hun-
ger-inducing hues like mus-
tard yellow, tomato-sauce
red and eggplant purple—
shades more typically found
at the supermarket than in
Saks’s tailoring department.
Yet unexpected colors punc-
tuate much of the suiting
this season. Alexander Mc-
Queen wants you to contem-
plate a flamboyant fla-
mingo-pink version; Marni’s
spin is Caribbean turquoise;
and French label Jacquemus
sells a lime-green set that
recalls a Sierra Mist can.
With working at home
now the norm across much
of the U.S., many of us are
operating in flannel-and-ter-
rycloth mode, but we’ll
eventually leave the house
again. And, in the mean-
time, someone’s got to en-
liven those endless video-
conference calls. We advise
that someone to consider a
Crayola-colored suit.
“Designers are really
looking for a different way
to talk about tailoring,” said
Justin Berkowitz, men’s
fashion director at Bloom-
ingdale’s. For many design-
ers, that means stealing
from streetwear, the loosen-
it-up-and-give-it-a-logo
trend that squelched the
suit’s popularity to begin
with. Tailoring in strong
colors once reserved for
graphic T-shirts makes a
full-throated declaration
that this is not your father’s
gray flannel suit.
When it comes to pop
culture, tinted tailoring cer-
tainly fits in. Joaquin Phoe-
nix’s character in last year’s
“Joker” menaced Gotham in
a well-tailored scarlet suit.
Leonardo DiCaprio wore a
pink suit as “The Great
Gatsby” in 2013. And the
comic-book villains of
1990’s “Dick Tracy” raced
around in emerald and
crimson suits. That film was
set in the 1930s when the
oversize drape suit
emerged. Those suits led to
the more common and col-
orful zoot suit of the 1940s.
Off-screen, actors includ-
ing Samuel L. Jackson and
Timothée Chalamet have
confidently walked the red
carpet in Laffy Taffy-hued
formal wear. The music
world is especially smittenBYJACOBGALLAGHERSTYLE & FASHION
Brightly colored suits are far from the norm. Yet tailoring in hues including crimson
and clover is starting to seem less odd in menswear circlesThe Rainbow Collection
POP GOES THE LAPELClockwise from top left: Jacket,
$2,065, givenchy.com; Trousers,$1,040, givenchy.com; Havana
Suit,$599, suitsupply.com; Jacket,$1,900, gabrielahearst.com;
Trousers,$690, gabrielahearst.com; Officine Générale Jacket,
$585, mrporter.com; Pants,$250, officinegenerale.com
A hued suit can still raise
eyebrows in America. Malik
DeCruise, 30, who works in
marketing for a Chicago
clothing company, said that
if he wears his pink suit on
the streets in June or July,
“I’ll get some looks...like,‘Hey, that’s kind of a risk.’”
At work, he finds a more re-
ceptive audience. “In my of-
fice it’s more like, ‘That
looks sharp, I like how you
did the pocket square.’”
Subtler shades like bur-Someone’s got to
enliven the endless
videoconferences.A STUDY IN SCARLETA bright suit is best paired with a simple, noncompeting shirt and
please, no tie. Red Wool Blazer,$1,495, siesmarjan.com; Red Wool Pant,$895, siesmarjan.comF. MARTIN RAMIN/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, STYLING BY ANNE CARDENASUNICEF does not endorse any brand, product or service.Chloé and UNICEF are proud to announce a new global partnership to advance gender equality
through innovative solutions developed with and for adolescent girls to excel in the future workplace.
More information on http://www.chloe.com/unicef
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