The London Lounge

I just finished watching High Society, a 1956 film with a star studded cast including Grace Kelly, Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, and Frank Sinatra.

The plot centres around a high society marriage at a large estate. Of course there is a large party on the night before the wedding (and the next morning even the wedding guests all turn up in morning dress along with the groom).

What is remarkable about the party scene in the evening is that the majority of the guests and musicians wear informal dinner clothes ie Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, and Frank Sinatra are all in "black tie". However, only the older gentlemen wear proper full dress ie "white tie".

Now, if we consider traditional dress rules the older gentlemen are the more correctly dressed:



Black tie is really meant only to be worn as "informal dinner clothes". There was once an English gentleman who while exploring the jungles insisted on changing into his dinner clothes to eat dinner out in the wilderness. In general however dinner clothes are strictly meant to be worn in intimate and private circles only. For large formal events full dress is strictly speaking the more correct form of dress.

There seems to be a long history of informal dinner dress creeping in as an acceptable form of erstatz formal dress. The dinner jacket caused consternation in New York when the members of the Tuxedo Club started to wear their dinner jackets out to full dress events, where traditionally dress coats were de rigeur.

You also see pictures from the Edwardian era and immediately after in which dinner clothes are depicted as though to suggest it as a possible alternative to full dress:



It would seem that the practice of wearing the more casual alternative for formal occasions turned from an acceptable lesser alternative into the norm.

Now, strictly speaking dinner clothes at a formal event are about as much of a modern adulteration of the rules as Bing Crosby's spectator shoes and sport coat in which he marries Grace Kelly at the end of the film.

So the question is now: why shouldn't one wear full dress today to any formal event - irrespective of the fact that the invitation might say "black tie"? After all it is no more a faux pas to wear "white tie" to a "black tie" event than is to wear informal dinner clothes to a formal event. The older gentlemen in the movie High Society do just that. So what is stopping us?

http://www.cutterandtailor.com/forum

Thank you for the fascinating history, and for raising a point about which I have often agonized. I believe that it should be acceptable, rejoicing, as I do, in any opportunity to put on the 'fish and soup' (or am I misquoting Wodehouse?).

But on my first visit to Glyndebourne, with hundreds of Britain's dearest and best, I found my white tie to be the solitary example in an ocean of black, and all (including, if my memory serves me, the conductor) tailless. No-one remarked on it of course, but it would take a bolder man than I to repeat the performance.

If the event has stipulated "Black tie" then go in black tie. ( Not HBT!!!! Gawd the Baftas the other day was horrible, with Hollywood Black Tie, suits. )

If they have stipulated Black tie and the event is traditionally 'White Tie' e.g. Opera, call the host to to confirm, if it was a 'error' on the printers behalf! - nice way to prompt them in case they are not savvy in protocol. At this point you can express that you were considering going in White tie - and would it be acceptable - if the host says yes then you can go in White tie.

If on the other hand the host says no balck tie, then defer to the host's wishes. A similar questionis what to wear to a wedding which hasn't specified a dress code - do you go in Dress tails? - Yes if host ok it, but maybe the bride wishes a less formal doo, respect their wishes.

If after responding to the invite, there is no dedicated host , and event is major one, and they never respond back ( e.g. to members of the public as too many) , then damn it, I say go for it go in Correct Dress, if they can not be bothered to call you back than follow correct protocol.

Pip pip

Doug

At a typical event these days you could probably get away with white tie even if the invite says black. If "creative formal," of course, anything goes, from full whack to white d/j and Bermudas.

At an extra stuffy event - say at a proper club or around older folks - you might be seen as a show-off.