So, I have a fun story about clothing that challenges the norms but which is not explicitly mentioned in the dress code. And yes, that meant pantyhose, always. Then in the 70s disturbingly short mens casual shorts called stubbies came in and our long national nightmare began, but at least these days they wear proper trousers to the office. I would want a very sheer, subtle look. And shorts are extremely comfortable :) Just depends on the material/cut of them. I got a pair last summer to wear under a dress that turned out to be shorter than I expected. I wear skirts all of the time in the summer. And I have a LOT of friends my age (50s) who have never stopped wearing them as pants either. I think the problem with shorts is that most shorts are beachy when it is okay to wear shorts you would have people in athletic shorts, daisy dukes and other very short shorts and a lot of stuff that looks anything but business casual. I would kill for the right to wear them to work. The kind of dress violates my personal style rules so I try to look the other way! Every week on Open Thread, Vanessa will answer a readers fashion-related question, which you can send to her anytime via email or Twitter. Formal shorts! Always exceptions, but same for any article that would normally be ok (ie must be clean, no fraying, no holes.) ), they always said how comfortable it is and they wished they could wear them frequently. Non-flesh-colored tights just read as tights. One is all business. https://images.app.goo.gl/RCMcScTGvQvJyWAb9. I havent seen one that isnt a full skirt for a long time. Furthermore, the relaxed fit makes the shorts comfortable to move in, especially when you're working under the extreme heat of the sun. Im actually here to give kudos to the OP for being all over covering that topic in the weekly check-ins. We dont have a dress code, she isnt customer facing, and doesnt work with business units outside her own very often. Crying with laughter. She was right, she shouldnt have been reprimanded for wearing shorts. But they werent going to send me home. Dresses and skirts just arent as freeing. Weve carried that over. I am thin and have tried every style. :-). Break an ankle? Thats interesting because I was actually thinking that skirts typically do end up on business casual by default. Yeah, I absolutely had work shorts in the 90s, both more of suiting material and a split skirt romper. For skirts, this meant youd have to wear pantyhose. Im pretty open-minded about clothes, but I always laugh internally when a certain guy in my office comes in with 90s dad jorts on. I couldnt. Common items in a business formal dress code include: A well-fitting suit in a neutral color, such as black or gray. Everything you said about shorts would still apply. Bermuda shorts only, black, no patterns) because there are too many versions of shorts youd need to exclude (i.e. I dont know? Sometimes even work ;). Actually, I just did my utmost to wear nothing but full-length trousers, but anything above mid-calf got tights under it. Put On the Right Shirt If you want to achieve a business casual outfit with your shorts, avoid t-shirts and performance polo shirts. Yes women were often banned from wearing trousers. I am a 60-something male with too much belly, and I wear a Utilikilt anytime the temp is above 40. Finals. Oy went and changed into pants and spent the rest of his shift marveling at how fast they made the dress code specific when properly motivated. A man's unbuttoned shirt shouldn't show off his chest hair. I admit Id be really weirded out to see someone at work in a kilt, for the same reason Id be weirded out to see someone at work in a tuxedo or evening dress. Jacket = most of them are Prince Charlie style jacket. The tights help with thigh chafing! I work in a casual dress environment and the rule is also an unofficial no shorts, no flip flops/sandals. lol But yea I never got the no shorts thing, they have some that are decent looking for the office. Surely you can do good work in either one but as a society, weve always used clothes to communicate messages about who we are and what were doing. Due to my hideous but necessary compression stockings most of my skirts/dresses are maxis but I still find the shorts comfy to wear underneath them. Lol, and when you dont wear dresses and are forced to wear one, the dresses you do have are always humiliating. Privacy Policy and Affiliate Disclosures. Purse = sporran No matter what top or shoes I wore it with. Wrangler jeans tend to be a darker wash like cowboys wear. Su suggests something like, "I want to give you feedback on your overall presence and make sure that your appearance is aligned with the high-quality . It suits her, but it doesnt look professional at all. There I was, sitting in my interview suit. I went on PantsQuest 2k19 a couple weeks ago. But that doesnt make them less irregular and inconsistent. All rights reserved. Thank goodness I work for a biotech company where pretty much anything goes as long as youre not naked. When I got my first office job, the HR person training me said, Were business casual here. I never liked fashion in the sense of you-have-to-wear-whats-in-the-magazines, and I always took the attitude of wearing what I want. I still have a couple that are so ridiculously cute from the 90s but dont want to look totally off. that you might choose to go with a dress, skirt, or suit. I saw men wearing business suits, but the pants were shorts!! To this day Im still bewildered by it. I realized there really wasnt any reason at all that men couldnt wear skirts, other than an arbitrary rule enforced by society. All of which is to say: Yes, you can wear shorts in the workplace but not without some consideration aforethought. I work an office that seems to range from semi-casual to casual (mostly not client-facing), and admitI wear linen shorts and sundresses (with an occasional nice romper or jumpsuit) come summer. It didnt start seeping into more mainstream looks til the next decade. Too casual for work, but a nice length and fabric. In NYC, there are some summer weeks that are just unbearable and if you are taking the subway to work and waiting in the non-air-conditioned stations, the idea of wearing pants is just brutal. I look like crap in most shorts. I read a great article about this recently, Ill see if I can dig it up, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/bicycle-bloomers-yoga-pants-how-sports-shaped-modern-fashion/574081/. In case youre wondering, no, I dont live in a warm climate. Different places have different cultures. It was very funny looking at first like they were in boxers but I really liked it in the end. Dont @ me.). :-). (Its up there with the male foot and sandals.). I grew up in the 70s and believe me nobody thought a thing of great big sideburns or polyester doubleknit pantsuits. I remember being confused by the no shorts in the office rule when I started a summer internship in college. My dad in 1984 was still sporting skin-tight polyester tennis shorts from the 70s because he refused to throw anything away or acknowledge that time hadnt stopped in 1975. Theres no inherently right reason for this; its just that weve evolved for all sorts of reasons (especially economic and classist ones) to see silk as nicer/more businessy and cotton as less so. A combination of being incapable of tanning and of being highly uncomfortable with my keratosis pilaris being visible. I think one reason might be that many people wear their shorts too short so it seems like more of a flirting thing than a business thing. Dress Code Cheat Sheet. I wanted a new summer weight suit and I had a heck of a time finding pants that werent super slim cut and cropped. I cant fathom who they were cut for they were too loose at the hips but too tight at the calves, and Im basically Carl Wheezer-shaped. Theyre black, and nobodys looking at my knees, so at least its not obvious from 10 feet away, but its a bit of a hassle. With the temperatures scorching I believe it is unjust that women are allowed to wear skirts to work but men are not allowed to wear shorts. Jeans, too, but those are generally Chanel. I do remember them, but I dont think I ever saw anyone wearing them in real life only in the ads. On the other hand, the expression that someone wears the pants, is intended to denote the persons powerful, boss-like aura. My story: In the 90s I worked in desktop publishing, super casual office in the suburbs, populated by nobody over 29. Hell, the jocks often wore their school athletic shorts all the time, and on game days the cheerleaders wore their short skirted uniforms without anyone batting an eye. Long and skinny, just in womens wear, and I didnt have a single friend who worked in an office who was allowed to wear them. I will have to Google this. Sadface. And thenconvention. Business dress codes are classist, sexist, and racist. Ive been doing this since the 80s (SoCal too) because just thought it looked BETTER than bare legs (and while I may wear some eyebrow raising things, I have never been much of a skin shower. Usually on casual Friday, with a blazer for the office air con. how do you balance two big jobs in a family? I work in an office environment that is SUPER casual (to a fault sometimes), and I still would never wear shorts. Also our office is already cold enough when Im wearing jeans/slacks. This is specifically excluded in our company handbook. I wear them in the winter, too, with knee-high socks.. But the way to handle that is to just address the discipline issue, not the dress code. That said, a commenter here once speculated that the no-shorts rule stems from the fact that the rule used to be no bare skin below the waist. Is this OK? There is one guy here who literally always wears them. This season they made appearances on the runways of Givenchy (distressed, cargo), Tom Ford (very short, shiny and athletic), Gucci (long, floral), Herms (tailored, wide) and Isabel Marant (festival-y). Thats really the point of the post there is no logical reason why, other than the many cultural constructs weve come up with around clothes. Its amazing how sometimes clothing seems okay to me at home. Think about pairing shorts with a mens wear tropical wool blazer or a colorful tweed jacket, she said. I used to (ahem) skirt around the no shorts issue by wearing dressier shorts with tights. There is probably a class and age element to the origins of the no shorts thing. I find this really depressing and just another symptom of how our society is moving BACKWARDS as regards to freedom and womens rights. Theyre khaki color and look fairly professional in my view. I thought the same thing about the Chanel jeans!! I get why this is a question. For example, men and women can have different dress codes if the dress codes do Dress Codes and Grooming Read More For that day, we could dress like typical (90s) teenagers. Love the Tail skorts! Its time to discard some sexist tropes about suiting. I be old school, I guess, but when you are one of the only women in your office, with a title like engineer, trying to be taken seriously, it it to your advantage to dress slightly more classically professional than slum casual others (IT / Techs) try to get away with. Shorts is well, short, for short pants, which are what little boys traditionally wore to denote their juvenile status. But she looks like a leprechaun. If you google history of shorts, you learn that shorts were originally only worn by adults for sports and outdoor activities such as hiking. I have a pair of navy pinstripe shorts that cut off just above the knee that I wear to work, and no one bats an eye. I wonder if they might pass? And none of us were Scottish at all. I have a 34 inch inseamnothing hits just above my knee! Youre giving me flashbacks of the professional shorts-over-tights trend.thank the gods thats over with!! I think Alison is definitely right on the money that business wear is an artificial cultural construct born out of outdated ideas of modesty and the conscious desire to separate work from casual. And they're right to be! We did get a half-hearted talking-to from HR, but it was worth it for the fact that he doubled-over laughing when we all trooped into his office. Obviously they do wear trousers in day-to-day life, but not for official appearances the transition to trousers full-time is about aged 10 or so. . There are many modes of shorts; some, in my mind, are so virtually indistinguishable from skirts that Id consider it hair-splitting for less formal offices to balk at their presence. hard to imagine, I know!) If a guest said anything, thats unfathomably rude. No one looks like a grownup in rompers. Tom and Lorenzo have a lot of feelings about these. Almost 60% of the survey's respondents overall thought they were acceptable for work. The only time Ive seen a man actually wear a kilt (besides the movies) was at my cousins wedding. My jeans with some give in them are way more comfortable than dress slacks without, and at least my jeans have some semblance of pockets. The other is inherently casual. There was, however, no stipulation regarding length or bifurcate legs. Breaks were mandatory, no working off the clock EVER, extremely flexible scheduling, nobody was overworked, we had plenty of associates, managers got excellent training, so on and so forth. Dark tights or socks. just above the knees) and capris should be acceptable attire in todays world. Are jumpsuits work appropriate (say, for a business casual environment where dark jeans and a nice top would be okay)? house-painting and garden planting in cargo styles, of hiking and running. That said, this stuff can be worth pushing back on if youve got capital to spend and are invested in changing it. The OP is right if skirts (of a certain minimum length/coverage) are allowed, so should shorts. Rinse and repeat. The right shirts to pair your shorts with are button-down shirts. Also we can argue that it contributes to racism & misogyny by perpetuating false standards that women are hairless, which is not actually very true except for some very fair & blonde white people. It just barely covered my butt, and sitting down and standing up were exact choreographed moves to make sure nothing was flashed. After all, the term itself is short for short pants, which were historically what children wore to delineate their immature status. Its cute, but always looks like she should be headed to a garden party. Theyre still not office wear, generally. I truly dont know why its so ingrained in my brain, but it truly is. I'm not talking about sports WWE kind of shorts, suitable smart shorts? You are all such lovely people, thank you! Its crazy how that stuff changes. Thank god for full time telecommuting! The look doesnt say Im a professional so much as My big brother is a professional, and I like to wear his outgrown prep school uniforms.. Far more chance of wardrobe oops with a pencil skirt. Shorts have so many more ways they can fit uncomfortably (gapping in the back, digging into your belly, digging into your thighs) where skirts will accommodate your body! my coworker doesnt follow her own fragrance ban, my mentor got fired, and more, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/magazine/wp/2018/12/12/feature/the-designer-who-radically-suggested-that-women-should-wear-whats-comfortable/?utm_term=.d6b4a78f6887, https://danceswithfat.org/2013/09/12/flattering-and-fat-bodies/, https://www.rei.com/product/127135/rei-co-op-sahara-shorts-womens-9-inseam, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bermuda_shorts, http://cdn.sortra.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/shorts-tights-outfits27.jpg, https://i.pinimg.com/originals/81/41/2d/81412d8665fb63e1011c808fba65f37e.jpg, https://images.app.goo.gl/ZxJtzVGHqxzrYCfB7, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walk_shorts, heres a real-life example of an email asking for a raise, my employee is pregnant but hasnt said anything. (Instead of, you know, rolling back an idiotic rule that made people miserable when it was 85 degrees the week before Thanksgiving and the heat was on in the building. A little above the knee is probably fine, but something that is basically a mini-skirt would look out of place to me. And being well aware of fashion history, I knew that that hadnt even always been the case. I can see something with sleeves and wider legs, with heavier fabric in a conservative color (black, navy, gray) being appropriate if paired with businesslike accessories and suchbut it would probably depend on the office. in Arizona (my husband gets asked why hes dressed up if he wears a suit anywhere!). Ah, skorts. Ive always thought this was part of it. Oh, girls also commonly wore halter tops, tube tops, camisoles, and strapless dresses from grade 6 on up, and when leggings & miniskirts both came back into fashion during my HS years, no one had any problems with girls or women wearing them to school. I get mine from the various plus size catalogs (like Roamans) but someone must make them in straight sizes. If you want something knee length, Id recommend the Columbia Saturday Trail II Knee Pants. To each their own, right? It could be a specific set of clothes such as a uniform or standards to follow when picking your own clothing and managing your overall appearance. Meanwhile, an older woman associate was deemed just fine in her faded, pilled cotton dress. The importance of dressing for the office is psychological: Doing so gives you confidence. (As were/are mini skirts and camisoles- never heard a peep about them.). I think. The prevention of thigh rub when powerwalking through the city in 90-degree heat makes it a little less unbearable. Once the air conditioning season arrives, Im in long pants/long sleeves and sitting under a blanket if Im at my desk. This is London, so perhaps that accounts for some difference. 13 things you should never wear to work in the summer. an abusive volunteer is holding our website hostage, boss says its unprofessional not to start an email with a greeting, and more, how to professionally say I told you so, the managers who feel personally betrayed when workers quit. Theres gazelle women they look good on, but the same women would look better in something else. For men wearing shorts, I think it is also because (in the UK at least) only young boys wore them, so they still have the subconscious thought that if you are wearing shorts at work, you are young, therefore junior and not to be taken seriously, maybe? Similarly, as a culture, we read shorts as more casual than skirts or pants. (e) Federal Court Cases. The private school WITH uniforms was FAR worse in every way- academic standards were lax, teachers were awful, the religious staff were total hypocrites, the kids were HORRIBLE. No kidding. And no one wants to be the shorts adjudicator. Example - R prohibits the wearing of shorts by women who work on the production line and prohibits the wearing of tank tops by men who work on the production line. I explained that shorts arent appropriate work attire, even at our semi-casual office. That song will now be in my head for eternity. They have skirts for little girls now that have shorts built in. I know this is sexist, but I really, really do not want to see my male coworkers hairy naked legs at the office. Back then they were simply known as stretch pants. I really hated those short suits, partially because it was a drag to go somewhere like Marshalls to look through the suits, see something that appealed to me, pull it out, anddarn, shorts. Tail Activewear has great golf skorts that potentially could be used for work apparel. On casual Friday I sometime wear casual khaki pants, golf polo, and shoes in between sneaker and a dress shoe boat shoe I guess, and in that office outfit I would be under dressed for a club. (Unless your office requires super conservative dress, in which case probably better not to risk it.). I definitely go to bars in my business casual work clothes all the time. There was an attempt to popularize the Bermuda short suit for men in North America in the 1950s, but it didnt catch on. Came here with the same speculation. The shorts may be the same length as a skirt, but may appear to expose more skin/expose differently. That was an awful show, but it had the best music ever! So they wore skirts which accorded with the dress code. Especially if its warm! I also would be a little shocked at shorts in a business office, which is totally a weird thing to be shocked about! I worked my way up to bright pink hair. Depends on the material of the shorts, denim ones arent to comfortable. So silly! I got shorts like this, but they were from Kohls. Professional meaning, knee length and not jeans and either black or dark blue. is it OK for my employee to do needlepoint in meetings? I am thinking of the one time at an OldJob when the AC broke down in the middle of a summer. I think they. I really wish I could wear jeans and casual shoes to work. Were the bagpipes played? That is the one and only shorts as fashion example I could think of, too. Does not interfere with performance of duties. Nothing that well thought out, lol. She thanked me for letting her know, and asked if dresses and skirts are okay office wear. Many men in my old office (tech/media company; huge international corp) would wear shorts in summer. My skin isnt as firm and my veins are more visible. My uniform is thick leggings + tunic top + cardigan or duster jacket + Doc Martens. Our office is a jeans always ok, and some staff do wear t-shirts and flip flops (although not in my department which is a tad more formal); so I just also wanted a check that my expectations werent out of line (as like Jane earlier this week). I honestly have never owned a regular pair of ladies pumps in my entire life (and Im over 50.). Its definitely a golf meeting in Palm Springs vibe, but clearly curated and intentional, rather than haphazard or comfort-driven. Today during our weekly check-in, we were talking about the weather getting warmer and she made a comment about needing to buy more shorts for during the week. "Because nobody wants to look at your ashy f****** knees." being-towards-memes. Er, You must be like me and dont try things on before you buy. Depending on where you work, some of the below clothing might be acceptable. Fortunately I was still at home when my skirt unbuttoned itself and fell off. They were really in style for men in the 1770s, according to the back of the 2 dollar bill. In my old job one of my Big Bosses wore smart jumpsuits (black, long pants, sleeves, nice gold jewellery, red lipstick) a lot for presentations or events, but she was the type of cool, slightly edgy boss who was trendy enough to get away with it.
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