What is Mogul Style? Why the Bland Billionaire Style Is Out | Fashion

TThe casual revolution of the 1990s and the rise of tech billionaires in the early 2000s supposedly ushered in a new era that freed employees from the constraints of dress codes. Mark Zuckerberg made hoodies and jeans a symbol of new-economy meritocracy, the uniform of aspiring hackers upending the suit-and-tie aesthetic of traditional Eastern industries. In the digital economy, many imagined that the most successful companies would allow their talented employees to wear whatever they wanted while jumping in colorful ball pits.

But as Facebook engineer Carlos Bueno wrote in his 2014 blog post, Inside the Mirrortocracywe simply traded our tightly written dress codes for smoothly coded dress standards. In fact, the new world is not so free. The cognitive dissonance is evident in the faces of recruiters who pretend that clothing is no big deal, but are clearly disappointed if you show up to a job interview in a dark worsted wool suit. You are expected to conform to the rules of the culture before you can demonstrate your true worth, Bueno wrote. What wearing a suit really says is that I am not inventing this nonconformity, one of the gravest sins.

As the rich got richer, they seemed increasingly determined to appear as bland as possible.

That reality was made clear earlier this month at the Sun Valley Conference, often billed as a summer camp for billionaires. Since the tradition began in 1984, organizers have brought together some of the world’s wealthiest and most influential people for a multi-day conference. A trove of top CEOs, tech entrepreneurs, billionaire financiers, media moguls and others gathered for the invitation-only gathering to privately decide the future of our world.

This year's attendees included Jeff Bezos, who continued his remarkable transformation from geek to strongman. Looking like a successful Soul Cycle instructor, he strolled around the complex in pearl grey jeans, a tight black T-shirt and an assortment of colourful bracelets (apparently from American luxury company David Yurman).

David Zaslav, the CEO of Warner Brothers, at least tried to look respectable, wearing a beige corduroy trucker jacket with slim-fit blue jeans, tasteful white sneakers, and a white bandana tied around his neck. But most of the male attendees arrived in slouchy polos, T-shirts, and simple button-downs. Sam Altman, the billionaire CEO of OpenAI, wore a plain gray T-shirt with blue jeans, a black backpack slung over both shoulders, as if he had arrived for freshman orientation.

It’s not that the outfits are necessarily bad, though many are, but one might wonder if we’ve lost something in the shift away from the coat and tie. A few generations ago, men of this social class would have worn something more visually interesting. In the 1930s, Apparel Arts, a leading menswear publication that advised men on how to dress for different settings, recommended the following outfits for vacations: navy double-breasted sports jackets with polka-dot mufflers and high-waisted pants in Cannes, mocha linen beach shirts and wide-leg pants secured with hook-and-loop straps for vacations on the French Riviera, and white shawl-collar tuxedo jackets paired with midnight-blue tropical wool pants and white silk dress shirts for semi-formal evening wear.

The advantage of these garments has nothing to do with respectability or class, but rather their ability to create a distinctive silhouette. The tailored jacket is particularly useful in this regard. Constructed from layers of horsehair, canvas, and padding, sewn together with stitches and then shaped with darts and deft pressing, a tailored jacket creates a flattering V-shaped silhouette even when there is none. The presence of a silhouette is why Stacey Bendet, founder of the fashion company Alice & Olivia, is consistently the most stylish person at these conferences (this year, she wore flared pants, long leather coats, giant sunglasses, and cowboy hats, each element contributing to a distinctive shape). In contrast, Tim Cook’s basic polo shirt and skinny jeans only recreated his body shape.

In his book Distinction, Pierre Bourdieu rightly acknowledged that the notion of good taste is nothing more than the habits and preferences of the ruling class. Of course, he was not the first to make this observation. At the turn of the 20th century, German sociologist Georg Simmel noted that people often used fashion as a form of class differentiation. According to Simmel, styles trickle down as the working class imitates its perceived social superiors, and members of the ruling class then move on. However, the publication of Distinction in 1979, based on Bourdieu's empirical research from 1963 to 1968, sets him apart, particularly in our understanding of men's style. These were the last years of the suit and tie. By the time the book was translated into English in 1984, the suit was on its last legs before men's attire would be forever changed by the rise of Casual Fridays, tech entrepreneurs and remote work.

Today’s ruling class is hardly inspiring in terms of taste. The preponderance of tech vests, which have replaced navy blazers, demonstrates that socioeconomic class continues to determine sartorial practices, even if the shapes are less appealing. The irony is that while elites increasingly dress like middle-class people preparing to make a run at Whole Foods, wealth inequality in the United States has worsened every decade since the 1980s, the last time men were expected to wear fitted jackets.

If there’s one lesson to be learned from all this, it’s that the history of 20th-century fashion is a reflection of shifting influences. As the century progressed, men began to draw inspiration from a variety of social classes, artists, musicians, and workers, not just those with financial or political power. Many of the most inspiring fashion moments of the period were those of rebellious youth who took a rebellious stance against the swing kids and hep cats of the establishment, the bikers, rockers, and outlaws, the beatniks and beatniks, the modernists and mods, the drag queens and dandies, and the hippies and bohemians, among others. In recent years, Zuckerberg and Bezos have made efforts to break out of fleece conformity, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang looks rather dapper in his head-to-toe black uniforms, complete with various leather jackets. But in most cases, it's best to look elsewhere for clothing trends these days. The ruling elite may shape our world, but don't let them shape your wardrobe.