cultural meaning of a flannel suit

[zaki]

I am wondering what is the cultural significance behind a flannel suit? Why in the past they were so popular?

Term man in a gray flannel suit was very popular in USA in 50's and 60's and refereed to a faceless, loyal and conservative businessman who spends his all life at work in a large corporation. Did you use that term in UK too or it is strictly US? Why flannel and not worsted?

Other interesting source about flannel I found in Great Gatsby: "and Gatsby, in a white flannel suit, silver shirt, and gold-colored tie, hurried in" (Fitzgerald 84).

What is the status and meaning of flannel nowadays? Based on my observation it has become bespoke only fabric and lost its former business meaning. It tells that a man is quite wealthy, is interested in his cloths and quite likely a dandy.

PS. I understand the significance of colours.

[rodes]

If the implied meaning of the flannel suit today is that a man is "quite wealthy, interested in his clothes, and likely a dandy" then those are three good reasons to have one. In descending order of importance of course.

[Costi]

Not very much of a "business" cloth, zaki...

Alas for my peace of mind, I had none of the detachment that all these people shewed. To many of them I gave constant thought; I should have liked not to pass unobserved by a man with a receding brow and eyes that dodged between the blinkers of his prejudices and his education, the great nobleman of the district, who was none other than the brother-in-law of Legrandin, and came every now and then to see somebody at Balbec and on Sundays, by reason of the weekly garden-party that his wife and he gave, robbed the hotel of a large number of its occupants, because one or two of them were invited to these entertainments and the others, so as not to appear to have been not invited, chose that day for an expedition to some distant spot. He had had, as it happened, an exceedingly bad reception at the hotel on the first day of the season, when the staff, freshly imported from the Riviera, did not yet know who or what he was. Not only was he not wearing white flannels, but, with old-fashioned French courtesy and in his ignorance of the ways of smart hotels, on coming into the hall in which there were ladies sitting, he had taken off his hat at the door, the effect of which had been that the manager did not so much as raise a finger to his own in acknowledgment, concluding that this must be some one of the most humble extraction, what he called ‘sprung from the ordinary.’

Marcel Proust, Within A Budding Grove

[Rowly]

....and eyes that dodged between the blinkers of his prejudices and his education,

...., because one or two of them were invited to these entertainments and the others, so as not to appear to have been not invited, chose that day for an expedition to some distant spot.

......... but, with old-fashioned French courtesy and in his ignorance of the ways of smart hotels,....

I'm sure , if he were confronted with a tasting menu, he would have eaten his hat

Costi, your literary references are as excellent as your sartorial insights!

[Costi]

Why, thank YOU, kind Sir!