The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, November 24, 2003, Page A7, Image 7
PHOTO COURTESY OF KRT CAMPUS
ivid Sulaski, an investment banker In Chicago, wears a classical
menegildo Zegna suit with a Movado watch.
Young generation suits up
for stiffer dress standards
BY WENDY NAVRATIL
CHICAGO TRIBUNE (KliT)
CHICAGO — When rebellion
wears a suit and tie, you know
that times and guys are
changing.
“You don’t want to dress like
your father. Fathers have done
the khakis for several years
now,” said Arnold Brant, a
Canadian designer who outfits
CBS Sports anchors and has
contributed to “The Bachelor.”
He was in Chicago recently for
the “Sharp Dressed Men 2003”
event at Saks Fifth Avenue’s
Men’s Store.
From sports to business,
dress codes tend to stiffen in
tough times.
But Brant rattles off evi
dence that a new generation ife
choosing to dress up: “Dumb
navy blazers” of sports an
chors are being replaced by
pattern-on-pattern coats,
shirts and ties; Justin
Timberlake is trading slouchy
looks for sleek suits at awards
shows; “The Bachelor’s” Bob
Guiney has gravitated toward
“more sartorial offerings” dur
ing fittings.
The same goes for many
others.
“I put the jerseys and jeans
away,” Chicago Bulls center
Eddy Curry, 20, said. “I’m get
ting older now; I’m not a
teenager anymore. ”
In a suit custom-made by a
Detroit clothier — “It’s a lot
more comfortable than my bag
gy clothes” — with 3-karat-plus
diamond studs in each ear,
Curry was among the 12
“Sharp Dressed” honorees at
Saks’ first such event a couple
of weeks ago.
This season, Bulls general
manager John Paxson and
coach Bill Cartwright are re
quiring players to wear at least
jackets when injured and on
the bench for the game;
sweaters are not enough. The
policy stops short of requiring
leagues are
leaning toward formality
again. His relatively conser
vative profession had loosened
up in recent years.
“The go-go days of the ’90s
are over, and there’s a return to
traditional values all over the
place,” he said. “I won’t go so far
as to use old labels like business
dress or business formal. I think
those are yesterday’s rules.
“But classic is in.”
Suits have gained strength
from new sportswear-like fab
rics and construction, which al
low the parts to be worn sepa
rately, said designer Alexander
Julian, who launched his
“Private Reserve” menswear
last fall.
“Particularly the younger
guys are choosing the suits be
cause they can get more versa
tility out of them,” Julian said.
“The idea is to be able to do a
Clark Kent-to-Superman
(transformation). ”
Accessories and underpin
nings follow suit.; Julian’s
Convertible Shirt has a
squared-off bottom and vented
sides, dark buttons and dfago
nauy cut
button
placket, so
that it looks
fine with or
without a
tie, tucked
or untucked
— or un
tucked with
a tie and
coat.
“It’s a look I call South
Beach Formal,” Julian said.
Retailers, such as the 185
year-old Brooks Brothers, are
reversing course and empha
sizing tailored offerings again.
And designer Ike Behar, whose
CEO shirts ($155 each) were
highlighted by Forbes maga
zine as a holiday best buy,
scheduled stops at Saks,
Nordstrom and Neiman
Marcus in Chicago recently to
promote his expansion into
leather goods.
Analysts have said that
clothing sales figured into high
er gross domestic product in re
cent months. Sulaski certainly
feeds into that.
“Either as a direct result of
(dressing up more) or my opti
mism about the improving
economy, or both,” he said, “I
have never bought more
clothes in my life.”
He likes Nordstrom and Saks.
He also just tried Tom James
(www.tomjamesco.com) for the
first time. A representative of
the menswear maker went to
Sulaski’s office, measured him
and will deliver clothing.
’ “Talk about a timesaving de
vice,” Sulaski said. “In 20 min
utes you can have two new
suits, four new shirts and six
new ties.”
That points to the distinc
tion between the formality
trend and the metrosexual one,
which posits that men are em
bracing shopping and other rit
uals previously associated with
women.
“I have a friend in
Milwaukee who comes down for
facials, but that’s not for me,”
said Dan Shapiro, 31, who was
speed-walking out of a Marshall
Field’s store around noon on a
recent workday. “I’m uncom
fortable even with a massage.”
He wears suits for his job in
corporate real estate and said
the Thomas Pink shirtmaker
shop lured him back into
“Field’s for the first time in a
long time. He bought a couple
of colorful shirts, left them to
have the sleeves tailored, and
was on his way.
suits.
Similarly,
even at com
panies where
suits aren’t
compulsory,
investment
banker
David
Sulaski, 35,
said his col
“The go-go days of the
’90s are over, and
there’s a return to
traditional values all
over the place.”
DAVID SULASKI
INVESTMENT BANKER ^
Queer Eye’ food guru talks straight about his new television fame
YSTEVE JOHNSON
ICAGO TRIBUNE (KRT)
.CHICAGO — Six months ago, it
flk [aid have been just a sandwich
itween two Chicago journalists.
But now, almost overnight, it’s
sandwich created by Ted Allen,
Uionally known food expert,
ste guru, man over whom the
ilden wand of television has
issed. And it’s a whole lot heav
r than the usual ham-and-turkey
semblage.
There is reputation on the loaf,
1 image between the slices.
And smoke in the kitchen.
Suddenly, as the conversation
>out the new season of Allen’s
trprise TV hit, “Queer Eye for
e Straight Guy,” distracts him
om his lunchtime creation, the
intest hint of smoke curls up
am over by the toaster oven.
Pvllen rushes over to rescue the
caccia. “Do not say I burned the
•ead. Do not,” he mock-com
ands, his voice as booming and
ithoritative in his North Side
>me as it is on the show, where,
ost people are aware by now,
*’s the “food and wine expert,”
irt of a “Fab Five” of gay men
ho spend a TV hour each week
rning a straight fellow from
ain apple pie, at best, into pie a la
ode.
Allen apologizes for the sand
tch not being what it might have
;en had the interview not been
heduled so hastily, on one of his
.re free weekends home from
3w York, where the show is now
| ing a 40-episode second season,
" oich began airing Tuesday (10
m. EST, Bravo).
And before taking a picture of
e sandwich, he and his partner,
ilumbia College journalism pro
ssor Barry Rice, scramble to
ake it over, selecting just the
ght place mat and napkin,
Iding silverware, fretting about
>w “tragic” the potato chips look
i the plate.
This is what sudden celebrity
ill do to you, the appearance of
public reputation to maintain
here before there was none.
The 38-year-old is casual and
onic about the leap from being
lown a little bit, by a few people,
being stopped in airports by
rangers, but he also recognizes
hat comes with that.
t ;‘Barry jokes about me dressing
^ (y a Straight guy so as not to be
cognized.
“The weirdest thing is just the
tensity of feeling which some
■ople seem to have about famous
;ople — which I have to, I still
nd of stumble over the word, ac
lowledging that I’ve become ...
hatever.”
Whatever, indeed. Since the
iow exploded from an oddly and,
some, offensively named cable
iriosity into the talk of summer
ne television, he has appeared,
ith the gang, on “Today,”
“Oprah” and “Tonight.”
He has had his new salary, a re
ported $8,000 an episode, printed
in the trades, a figure Allen
doesn’t deny. He has been to a din
ner thrown by “Will & Grace” ex
ecutive producer Max Mutchnick
at the home Mutchnick was rent
ing from photographer Herb Ritts.
He has seen lunch with him and
his four TV partners auctioned off
for more than $20,000 for charity.
There is only a little evidence
of financial reward: new land
scaping in the back yard of his and
Rice’s Chicago home and a costly
new apartment in Greenwich
Village, only partly subsidized by
the show, to make spending most
of next year in New York more tol
erable.
But more than any of that, he
says, the “Queer Eye” experience
has helped his family, “a fairly
conservative Republican opera
tion” from the Indianapolis sub
urbs, come to terms with who he
is and how it fits into society.
“They were, to put it mildly, not
at all happy about me doing the
show,” he says. “Now they’re
pissed off when we run reruns.
They’re fans. My mom e-mailed
me an Andrew Sullivan column
about gay marriage, in favor of.
And she was sending it around to
her friends.
“It was a huge evolution. My
mother was affected by the show
in the same way that a lot of people
seem to be.”
She was part of a spreading of
the show’s popularity that Allen
noticed anecdotally, even as the
Nielsen ratings were demonstrat
ing it statistically.
“First it was the gay guys in
Chelsea,” he says. At a restaurant,
“people would stare or ask us to
talk to someone on their cell
phone. And right about the same
time, it was the single women.
Then we started hearing from
ladies my mother’s age, you know,
around 60.
“Now we’re starting to get high
school boys and college guys,
straight guys, in airports coming
up to us and saying, ‘Dude, thanks
for that shaving tip, man.’ ‘Dude, 6
ounces, 10 minutes, 400 degrees, to
make a filet of fish. I did it on this
date.’ And they’re just like the
straight guys on the show. They’re
proud of it, and they want to tell
it.”
The show turned out to be
sweeter in tone than the use of the
edgy “queer” in the title would im
ply. And while it certainly exploits
stereotypes of both gays and
straights, it also undercuts them,
Allen says.
“People concerned about the
stereotype question totally miss
the subversive, accidental, best as
pect of the show, I think, which is
that we’re taking those stereo
types they’ve made fun of all these
years and teaching them to them
in order to help them get the girl,
which I think is kind of hilarious,”
Allen says.
It’s also, straight up, a service.
“We all want to know how to dress
cool,” for instance, he says.
“Everybody does. And it was not
acceptable for us to ask about it.
You couldn’t go into a men’s shop
and ask another guy, ‘Do these
pants look good on me?’ It was just
way too ‘gay.’”
higher
test scores m“7
guaranteed “
or your money back
Attend all required classes or make-up sessions, complete all
scheduled tests, and do your homework. If your score doesn't
improve on test day from your Kaplan diagnostic or a prior official
test score, you can choose to repeat our program for free or get a
full refund of your tuition?* It’s that simple.
MCAT classes: 1/10,1/24
FEB LSAT classes: 1/4,1/10 World Leader In Test Prep
GRE & GMAT starts in Jan! and Admissions
■Test twras an regrtWM trade™* <t aw omm. ■ S | ■ ’M H j ■ . < B
*• To be eligible for this offer, you must be
enrolled In Kaplan’s full classroom, tutoring,
or online courses. In addition, you must 1 -800-KAP-TEST I
present a copy ot your official score report
and your course materials within 90 days. K3pt6St.C0m
PHOTO COURTESY OF KRT CAMPUS
Magazine writer Ted Allen, now famous as a host of “Queer Eye,” plays with kitchen utensils in
his Chicago home. ..
■ ■
Advantages:
Summer and $300
^^^^^academic semester stipend
Undergraduate research opportunity
Faculty mentoring
Academic & graduate school counseling
Graduate school admissions assistance
Travel to national conferences
^Qualifications:
L- Must be willing to consider pursuing
a doctoral degree
US Permanent citizen
First-generation college student
'(Parents or guardian have not received a
'college degree)
-Low-income student (visitwww.ed.gov/
r rabout/offices/list/ope/trio/incomelevels.
rhtml to see if you qualify)
^-Must have 60 credit hours be the start
'of Summer Session 2004
-Mu§t have a 3.0 GPA
^_