My office went tie free - but we still have to wear a suit

[DocDave]

So my office has gone tie free. But we are still required to wear a suit. For me, the edict seems kind of silly. If I'm going to wear a suit, I might as well wear a tie. So I've continued to do so.

What are the thoughts here on the forums? Do you wear a suit without a tie? And if so, under what conditions? For example do you need a special shirt with a different collar, etc. Or do the two always go hand in hand. Suit + tie.

Cheers.

[ronrob]

So my office has gone tie free. But we are still required to wear a suit. For me, the edict seems kind of silly. If I'm going to wear a suit, I might as well wear a tie. So I've continued to do so.

What are the thoughts here on the forums? Do you wear a suit without a tie? And if so, under what conditions? For example do you need a special shirt with a different collar, etc. Or do the two always go hand in hand. Suit + tie.

Cheers.

I go suit without tie fairly regularly. I wear a suit about 10-12 days a month, and 2-4 of those are tieless. I have the build (exercise regularly) and the scruffy face for it, so it's still visually interesting. I enjoy showing up to church that way, given that many of the people there are appalled.

If I had to wear a suit for work, I'd mix tie and tieless pretty much 50-50.

I'm definitely not in the camp that believe a suit dictates a tie being a must, nor a long sleeve shirt and tie dictating a jacket is a must. Find what works for you, it's probably different from me, and you'll still be better dressed than the masses (and more importantly, still occasion appropriate unless you're very old school).

[LesserBlackDog]

Requiring a suit but not requiring a tie is stupid IMO. I know there are some fans of the look here (including Joe Dappered himself) but to me it looks unfinished and unpolished, and making it essentially mandatory for an office dress code is just silly. To me, a suit requires a tie. Even the most "casual" suit (full tweed, unstructured linen, seersucker, corduroy, whatever) is still sufficiently formal that it requires a tie - just a tie of a similar level of formality to the suit itself (wool knit, cotton bowtie, whatever).

I think you have to get into the very casual end of the odd jacket/trouser combo spectrum before you can go tieless with any kind of tailored jacket. An unstructured cotton sportcoat, rumply linen trousers, OCBD? Fine, you can go without a tie. Elbow patch tweed jacket with dark denim and a sweater layered underneath? Sure, no tie necessary there.

Otherwise, wear a tie with a suit.

I would keep wearing a tie in your circumstances.

[hockeysc23]

How did they phrase going tie free?

I agree that majority of the times if wearing a suit I wear a tie. Usually only fridays if I don’t have a good pairing pants and sport coat I’ll go tieless with a suit.

Usually when I do my jacket is staring on my chair or hung up. And I brought the jacket for warmth in meetings because for some reason the guys here decided they want the meeting rooms to feel like the planet Hoth.

[armedferret]

Suited without a tie has its place, but on a daily basis....eh. Not my cuppa.

Maybe Fridays or Thursday/Friday (since it's a "tieless" work center overall) or something, but definitely wouldn't do it daily.

But then that's me, and my view may (and apparently does) differ from that of those in charge.

If suited is required I'd just stick to wearing a tie most of the time.

For going tieless, as has been mentioned a few times in previous articles around here, a non-full-spread collar with decent collar stays that have maybe a tiny bit of curve to them (easily done manually) is ideal.

[armedferret]

And I brought the jacket for warmth in meetings because for some reason the guys here decided they want the meeting rooms to feel like the planet Hoth.

From experience, you get a conference room even half full of people for a significant amount of time, HVAC controls be damned, that temp is going up....and as temperatures increase, so can tempers. People get uncomfortable, they get irritable, and suddenly everyone's pissed off and nobody can really place why.

If the room is kept cooler off the bat, it can prevent such a drastic temp rise during the meeting.

If the room is kept at about the equivalent of a walk-in freezer, well that's just silly, and the result of someone not understanding that 2-3 degrees is all it *really* takes.

[mebejoseph]

So my office has gone tie free. But we are still required to wear a suit. For me, the edict seems kind of silly. If I'm going to wear a suit, I might as well wear a tie. So I've continued to do so.

What are the thoughts here on the forums? Do you wear a suit without a tie? And if so, under what conditions? For example do you need a special shirt with a different collar, etc. Or do the two always go hand in hand. Suit + tie.

Cheers.

For going out at night, my wife has encouraged me to adopt this suit with no tie look, and with the right shirt with metal stays and magnets holding the collars in place, I'm starting to like it. I sometimes go with a pocket square as well.

But if I were still working at my old law office, instead of at home, if I wore a suit, I'd also wear a tie. But if I didn't want to wear a tie, I'd go with a blazer or sport coat and button down collar most likely.

[Kddub2001]

So my office has gone tie free. But we are still required to wear a suit. For me, the edict seems kind of silly. If I'm going to wear a suit, I might as well wear a tie. So I've continued to do so.

What are the thoughts here on the forums? Do you wear a suit without a tie? And if so, under what conditions? For example do you need a special shirt with a different collar, etc. Or do the two always go hand in hand. Suit + tie.

Cheers.

My office must be a bunch of heathens, we wear that daily 😆

[JBarwick]

I am in the LBD camp...go with a tie. The only thing worse than no tie and a suit is a slouchy tie and a suit. A slouchy tie and a suit, no matter the occasion, is a not a good look.

[DocDave]

Yeah, I'm pretty solid in the tie wearing camp. It doesn't bother me and I feel like I am more put together.

[MENTION=13934]hockeysc23[/MENTION] I don't know how they informed us to be honest. I heard about it second hand some someone else. The higher ups though still wear ties, and I meet with them on a semi-regular basis, so for that reason alone I think wearing a tie is a good idea.

[hockeysc23]

Yeah, I'm pretty solid in the tie wearing camp. It doesn't bother me and I feel like I am more put together.

[MENTION=13934]hockeysc23[/MENTION] I don't know how they informed us to be honest. I heard about it second hand some someone else. The higher ups though still wear ties, and I meet with them on a semi-regular basis, so for that reason alone I think wearing a tie is a good idea.

Gotcha, I was curious how presented. In that situation I would still wear a tie. I consult for a government office and they sent us a memo indicating people need to remember to wear shirts with collars and no hiking boots ... it's the wild wild west out here. We've got from well-dressed, to bad pinstripe suits, to athletic team polos, to uniformed LEOs, to untucked hawaiian shirts and jeans.

[Tacitus]

Minority view here, but I see suit + no tie as being an intermediate half-step of formality between sports coat + slacks and suit + tie. I think that it looks fine as long as you avoid excessively bland (e.g. charcoal suit + white shirt) color combinations.

[Galcobar]

I think I'd find going tieless to be more of a hassle, simply because I wouldn't be satisfied with a floppy open collar. Shopping for button-down collar dress shirts, or having to position magnets and collar stiffeners, would be more of a time-consuming annoyance than throwing on a tie (I'll admit to the bad habit of leaving my ties knotted).

[joekloo]

I think it depends on the suit. Sounds like your current suits may be on the more formal side and then I would agree that a tie may be needed. But, I actually really like the casual suit no tie look (linen suit or patch pockets / unstructured shoulders). I am on the shorter side and I think having the suit with consistent color sometimes looks better on me then having a different color sport coat that breaks up the lines.

[77Pat]

I only wear a suit around the city outside of work (IT, usually polo/ocbd and Chino/slacks). Usually only wear when I feel like dressing up a little, going to a museum or Broadway show. Generally don't wear a tie, similar to https://dappered.com/2018/03/in-revi...linen-un-suit/