Wearing flashy/status clothes makes people less likely to cooperate with you(digest.bps.org.uk) |
Wearing flashy/status clothes makes people less likely to cooperate with you(digest.bps.org.uk) |
Learn what expensive fabric feels like. Have a friend buy you 4 price tiers of clothing with the exact same fabric composition; try them on blindfolded. Focus on fabric only, not fit. At some price point you will stop feeling a difference. There's no reason to pay for what you can't feel.
A 100-dollar shirt tailored for 30 dollars exceeds a 500-dollar shirt in appearance but not in feel.
A hoodie is a hoodie at any price point.
All denim looks identical. Jeans that are the exception to this rule usually come from smaller makers, usually cost over 250 dollars, and usually last 5 to 7 years, and will look best midway through its life when the way in which the threads wear betrays its quality, like a proper Persian rug.
A 200-dollar suit is like a paper bag, no matter your tailor.
Your tailor is your shirt's second-best friend. Your shirt's best friend is diet and exercise.
If you dress too similarly to your colleagues, you are a school of fish. If you dress too differently, you are a shark, or a squid, or some other thing. Neither of these is a great idea.
Never mention the brand of your clothing. Ever. Seriously.
A logo is a brand's way of forcing you to mention them.
And finally, my favorite:
Look on the street. Nearly everyone is wearing something boring. And everyone got up in the morning and looked in the mirror and thought, "this is okay." If you saw one of my models walking along the street before we shoot, they would be the same! — except they're wearing beauty, also. But nobody believes buying the clothes could ever make you look that way. So that can't be what we're selling, no? What we are doing is taking a beautiful human and deciding what furniture to place them on, how to adjust their posture and expression, what country we'll be in, the exact hour of day, whether our photographer makes it all seem triumphant or melancholy or joyful or pensive. There must be some art to it, or everyone on the street would walk around looking as though they are moving from frame to frame in a series of friezes, and no one would pay me. You even know you are buying a fantasy from me, don't you? [Sure.] And can you tell me what that fantasy is? Not beauty... even the model's beauty is in service to, the idea that for a moment, everything in life falls into this perfect kind of space, some harmony... So to be stylish is to both take all this constantly in the same moment you appear that these things do not even exist to you — that you are as you might find a bird perched in a tree, just being, and meanwhile God smiled a beautiful poetry upon you. But I am guessing this is not the recommendation you were looking for.
“Science”
This line caught my eye...
> ...when a group that participants wanted to join stressed its desire for co-operative, prosocial people — the participants tended to become strategically modest...
In some camps and groups at least, cooperative and prosocial people are what you want. And in theory that's what the larger Burning Man experience is/can be. There are some pretty chill camps I've been in where very unassuming people are actually very fascinating individuals with very intriguing lives.
But at the same time, costumes and clothing are part of the fun. People wear some wild stuff. That said, there is clearly a boundary you can step over with clothing that will create a very negative reaction. Think feather headdress, sequins, etc. Think so called "influencers" trying to get their next photo shoot out to Instagram.
That I've noticed, most grown-ups have a fairly decent sense of what social messages their clothing might send, and how others will likely react.
If at a trade show, or big internal presentation, then some degree of ‘flair’ is helpful.
This puts me off. If I Google how much the corporation is paying the workers on average and then see flashy office, expensive suits and workers make average sums... I mean why not pay that money to the worker? I don't understand.
The third study regarding social media would be interesting if I had access to it. But I'm still wondering if this translates to in person communication.
[0]https://www.cbsnews.com/news/midtown-uniform-patagonia-will-...
The experimental design had participants believe the branded (virtual avatar) clothes were acquired at zero cost, making them useless as a signal of wealth.
Often we don't have the choice.
Years later I worked with a guy, a multi-millionaire, the guy lives in one of the wealthiest neighbourhoods in London. Again dressed in a normal pair of jeans and t-shirt, nothing too noteworthy. I remember him telling me how dry and boring his neighbours are, too concerned with 'things'. When he wants to go for a pint rather than go to his local, he heads to the less well off area a few streets over to the pub there and enjoys the company of normal people.
From these and other experiences I've come to think that the more you look, and act, like you've 'got money' the less you actually have.
There are many layers of status displays. I think SSC's analysis of fashion as cellular automata is the most coherent writing on this.
I have been buying $150 jeans most of my adult life and recently read a comment on Reddit that expressed disbelief that someone would pay more than $30 for a pair of jeans.
In other places I've rented I've had absolute arseh*oles for landlords. They wouldn't give you the time of day, but I bet their tenants were quick to move out! (I was)
High quality perfectly fitted t shirt and pants/shorts with zero logos, that's what I'll splurge on if I ever get rich. And super comfy and effective shoes.
I've always lived in cheap arsed neighbourhoods, my recent place is above average and it makes a lot of things easier - even if I dont really enjoy the boring corporate neighbours.
I made this experiment: I have few really cheap suits (looking OK but that's it) and few very expensive suits. When I wear the cheap ones, people are normal with me. When I wear the expensive ones, people wearing normal clothes don't notice and people "in the know" (wearing expensive suits themselves) will start commenting on the quality of my materials, ask me about my tailor, etc - it's very obvious that it places me in their "friend" category immediately.
Having luxury brand logo on me would get me laughed out of that room - nobody has anything against cheap clothes but expensive clothes with logos are ridiculous to every actually rich person, it's like that meme with an adult trying to be cool among teenagers - and it makes total sense that other people don't like someone trying to level themselves above them by fakery, that's just like driving a fifth-hand Mercedes-Benz S-Klasse from 2010 and talking about the price it had when it was manufactured all the time (and complaining about gas prices in the same sentence).
The average clothing store is decent enough for me. I would buy clothes with no distinctive marks if I could find them. Just plain material and colors.
I probably carry this too far when traveling. I have very light weight traveling sport coats and slacks - all washable in a hotel room and lots of hidden pockets (TravelSmith is a favorite brand). Sometimes it pays off big: when my wife and I were traveling around Central America with a buddy of mine and his wife, my friend just packed tshirts, shorts, and sandals. Every time we walked into a restaurant to eat, his wife complemented me on looking so nice. This bugged my friend, and if we can’t irritate our friends, then what is the joy in life :-) Seriously though, it just feels respectful to be nicely dressed when entering restaurants and people’s homes when traveling.
I like wearing flashy clothes myself, and I would even say it has proven advantageous to cooperation in my line of work, so I was curious about this article. However, nowhere is it stated that flashy clothes make people less likely to cooperate with you. They say wearing clothes with luxury logos and signal high status does.
I am not a billboard. I reject status and status seeking behavior. I refuse to help corporations with their marketing and promotion. I wouldn't even do it if they paid me because I am against advertising. It's all manipulative and depraved and it promotes status and class.
Some other people in the space (non-technical people) thought it was weird that he wasn't more outspoken about his accomplishments, and they even went so far as to doubt that he was heavily involved.
As an introvert, to hear people dismiss someone on the basis of them not boasting about themselves really stuck with me. I just can't express how vulgar I find that viewpoint, and my opinion of the people who dismissed the guy has changed irrevocably.
I lived in a meditation center for a year, and I saw some people there that claimed to be authentic, and worked to look like the stereotype. But they were actually hiding a desire for materialism and the failure to live up to it behind the apparent choice of rejecting it.
Irony can be pretty ironic.
I worked with a gentleman once. He was a tall, handsome, intelligent manhattanite. Very pleasant to communicate with. He told me a story of how he was wearing some very simple clothing after running in Central Park at lunch - sweat pants and a vest. Someone later mistook him for a delivery boy. And on the opposite end, when he wears a suit, he is treated like a total VIP.
Do not underestimate the power of presentation and projection of success.
[1] From one of the online made to measure outfits for a few hundred bucks.
[2] The kind where you get a lot of quality time with your tailor from the start to the end of the process. These will run you into four figures to start.
Does that mean you enjoy dressing up for work?
gone are the days of casual Friday so dress for success and rep your favorite music today
"People who can afford luxury goods tend to buy them, and to show them off."
In my experience, that's a crap shoot - some do, some don't. It also begs the question - what's a "luxury good" vs one that lasts longer, has more utility, etc?
Is it the little Lacoste alligator that sets people off? "How dare they spend $100 on a shirt just to piss me off!"
I don't care much for your plain t-shirt with a fuck all Patagonia logo on the chest, but if I decided to not cooperate with that person, I'd have been out of a job by now.
Like... I got that for 5$ at a bus station in Latin America and all those shirts fell apart within a year anyways.
I also remember going to a club wearing that supreme shirt and this other older guy had a fake supreme shit that just said "millennials" in the red bar instead which was great. He just kept on giving me the stink eye. His shirt was admittedly 10x better
You’ll have an outfit that looks sharp, and you can avoid a lot of the “$200 plain shirt with a logo” bullshit.
i.e. Avatars are free, fungible in quality, and those who choose those symbols they may be signaling an aspiration for these symbols. Rather than signaling an achievement for wealth or an appreciation for luxury, it may be signaling a desperation for wealth. Would the people who can actually afford luxury goods plaster those symbols on their avatars?
> The results showed that participants elected to co-operate with partners whose avatars had unbranded clothing 57% of the time, but when the avatar sported a luxury logo, this figure dropped to 45%.
> A second study, in which participants could first choose the design of their own avatar, found that those who chose branded rather than unbranded clothing themselves were still less likely to choose to co-operate with partners with brand-boasting vs logo-free avatars.
They wear expensive clothes, but it's not noticeable, unless you really look. I suppose they "put on the ritz," when they go to industry events, but I don't attend those.
Some of the humblest, most down-to-earth folks I've ever known.
https://www.wmagazine.com/story/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-bru...
If you have even a mild eye for clothing you would still be able to see that they are not just a hanes shirt with levis. Casual fashion is a thing too.
This whole comment is bizarre to me, I'm not sure what to make of it. Who cares what is ridiculous to "actually rich people"? You realize they're also just people right, with their own biases and flaws?
The actually rich people are those who the wannabes want to emulate, that's why I feel it has relevance.
Anywhere south of Texas or the Mediterranean and you just look like you buy a lot of bootleg stuff, though. You're likely to see your uncle come around one day in a fake supreme shirt and he's like 50 and there's barely any irony in it because he didn't just drop a couple of hundred dollars on it, it was probably on sale for 2$
In some environments here, I’d argue being spotted wearing a Rolex in a non-business context would get you laughed out of the room by those wearing the latest YSL shoes, Givenchy pants, and Botega Veneta belts. Sounds bizarre, right?
Like all cultural phenomenons, fashion and the status that goes along with is absolutely regional, and very much dependent on which communities you associate with.
Also know the ones who like peacocking - flaunting the big Armani/DKNY/GUCCI logos.
Most wealthy people IMO don't want to draw attention to themselves.
The nouveau rich are the ones screaming for attention!
You’d think HN would be the last place where you’d see slurs for people who didn’t inherit their wealth.
Maybe we're just oldschool and we aren't in with the new kids. I've always preferred as few logos or brand signals as possible. Materials, aesthetics can speak for themselves. I order my cars de-badged from the getgo.
I mean, another commenter said this class of buyers is class-anxious and class-confused. That seems absolutely true to me - these people can't actually afford this stuff. The actually rich people I know don't have golden credit cards (they have the levels above and never show it) and don't drive expensive cars (most have no cars nowadays, on-demand rent is better).
Uniqlo
A shirt will barely last a few months now, whilst I still occasionally wear a [much be-holed] first generation from way back when and it's kept its size, shape and still feels soft. New ones shrink and feel crunchy after a few washes. Oh, and they're about twice the price. Inflation, I guess.
More than 80% of my wardrobe is from Uniqlo, including 10 dry pique polos, 20 supima cotton tees, and 10 flannel button ups, all black. Makes getting dressed in the morning stress-free because I know I'm going to like how I look every day. The blacks do not fade — I have 5-year-old shirts that look practically as good as 6-month-old ones.
Their jeans, especially their selvedge jeans, are also high quality and priced well. Same for my winter parka, vests, fleeces, shorts, socks, underwear.
Best part: nary a logo in sight.
Edit: ok, they seem to be in larger cities. I'm in the Wisconsin, I was able to find that there are stores in Chicago, for instance.
Also, for excellent quality, US-made clothes with unobtrusive and easily-removed logos, you can't go wrong with https://www.american-giant.com/ .
Frankly, it’s vulgar.
Some people want their fashion to make them blend in. Some people want their fashion to make them stand out. That doesn't mean one misunderstands it and one doesn't.
The understated stuff is usually much more expensive.
I think Vercace is the only brand I know of that's the opposite.
Find a local tailor. Pick the fabrics you want from a catalog. Get your clothes made for your body while supporting someone's small business and artistic craft.
The irony being that actual "high-class" clothing is exactly what you're describing, at least since I've been a lucid adult. Seems like there is a bit of an inverse correlation between a person's income and the amount of logos they'll tolerate on their clothing.
Still, I find it distasteful to pay extra so they don't stick a logo. So I don't.
Where do you shop and how do you dress? Most "corporate wear" mall brands (think Banana Republic, j-crew, brooks bros) sell clothes without logos. If you're into boring casual, Target sells racks of plain colored t-shirts and pants.
Seconding uniqlo, especially if you're on the thinner side. Indochino is great too, but can lean a little flashy.
Most people only think of military surplus and maybe don't want that sort of gear. But if you want super quality, plain "grey-man" gear like top-quality cotton polo shirts, very hard-wearing smart trousers there's a whole world of surplus brokers who take government contract overspill and whatnot.
Easy, https://loropiana.com/
If you want me to wear cloths with your logo on them, YOU must pay ME. I'm not going to pay you to wear your advertising.
This perhaps that comes from my days in top-level but obscure amateur/pro sports, but if I'm wearing a logo, it's from one of my sponsors, certainly not some competing brand, and I see no reason this shouldn't also apply to regular life.
I'll buy your stuff it it is good, but for me to advertise it by wearing a blatant logo you must pay me (the amount is up for discussion, but not the principle).
They were doing the same with car wraps, and again, if I support the produce and the pay is enough I'll wrap my car, but I'm sure AF not paying you to do it. Same with clothes.
I’m also from camp „not your free advertising estate“, and it’s difficult to find plain or ad-free clothes at times. Unless you’re strictly into suits, that is.
All of the sports people do it. Nike swoosh. Adidas symbol. Kappa's posed back-to-back figures, etc. Abecrombie & Fitch's giant A&F on every thing. Ball caps with logos. None of this sounds vaguely familiar?
Suits can be luxury goods, but the study didn't explore that. It's unclear at a glance if this was actually about status given the methods. There could be other reasons people don't favor corporate-branded clothing, considering that wealthy people don't just wear polos with big corporate logos on them. Maybe it telegraphs poor taste, or that boosting luxury companies makes it seem like you're trying too hard to show that you have money (I make a distinction between this and someone who plainly looks high-status owing to their choice of wear). The obvious thing to include would have been avatars with non-luxury brands, it's possible that would have repelled as well.
On the other hand, every piece of heavily-branded clothing could be considered "luxury" in its own way and the only difference is social class, demographics. In low-culture you'll see Crooks and Castles, Fox Racing, Adidas, etc
It sent a pretty strong signal to us that their margins and commissions had a lot of room to negotiate down. I suspect we negotiated harder with this organization than we would have otherwise, looked for opportunities to reduce usage, and so on. Not solely because of the wealthy display, but I'm sure it played some part.
The most prized t-shirt category is vintage. As shown earlier, white people need authenticity like they need oxygen and to have an original vintage t-shirt from the 1970s or 1980s is a very powerful social status symbol. The ideal shirt will have a funny logo, a year attached to it, and will be as thin as rice paper. In the event that two white people have shirts that meet this criteria, the superior ranking is given to the person who paid the least for the shirt. Acquiring a shirt at a vintage clothing store is seen as less respectable than sorting through racks at the Goodwill.
The second category of t-shirt is new and there really are only two options. The first is American Apparel, a company that constantly reminds you it is based in downtown Los Angeles. They are considered an acceptable white company since they produce things that are very simple, but also very expensive. The second acceptable new shirt is Threadless. This Chicago-based company produces artistic and funny t-shirts that are acceptable for concerts, Whole Foods and 80s night. White people like these shirts so much because they are designed by white people, for white people. Sort of like a white FUBU.
Finally, and perhaps the most important to be aware of, is the unacceptable category of t-shirts. There are a few simple rules to follow in order to avoid wearing the wrong t-shirt. First, if it’s made of a stiff, thick cotton, throw it in the garbage immediately. White people t-shirts must be made of the softest, finest organic cotton. This is law. Unless it is vintage, the shirt cannot be made in a foreign country (unless you can certify its labor conditions). The shirt cannot contain a current sports logo. Shirts with sports logos are acceptable, but they must contain a logo that hasn’t been used in 15 years. Last and not least, it cannot be baggy. Your t-shirt must be tight-fitting for both style and mating purposes.
Doesn't that bring more attention to your computer?
With the MacBook, it really depends on how the blocking is done. If I put more effort into it and cover the entire lid very carefully I could make it look very unassuming. I'm content to just slap a piece of tape over the logo and be done. It's a game to me. I get pleasure out of blocking or fighting even the tiniest examples of corporate persuasion in my life.
It's not for everyone. You do you.
X2
I live in Kendall and am always on the lookout for decent ones that aren't the WeWork's.
That's pretty unnecessarily negative/uncharitable. I know people (usually older) who are perfectly un-self-interested and unconditionally sympathetic to all people who use "virtue emojis" very innocently/sincerely on their social media. All you have is the word of my anecdote, but these individuals are not engaging in self-promotion (unless one expansively defines it to include all unprovoked expressions of thought/opinion). These same people wouldn't be caught dead wearing flashy, "fashionable" clothing, or otherwise self-promoting in the spirit of competition.
i liked the free hemming on their jeans. and overall one-stop-shop for basics.
but jeans and shorts wouldn't last for a year in the seams. Even their pockets and buttons above the zippers would fail.
i haven't had that happen with other brands.
without making it a conscious choice, i just drifted towards other similar brands after consistently experiencing the quality of their materials.
I really wish there were affordable clothes in Asket spirit but with fabrics Italian premium brand would choose.
Asker’s chinos are the comfiest trousers I’ve ever worn. The Egyptian cotton tees are also great.
Above that, you're wearing a dress shirt, which never ever has a logo. Adidas and the like is strictly worn only by people who have lost control of their lives.
That is expensive trash, not fashion. If I go to a nice restaurant in a big city, people aren't wearing that crap.
But as a recruiter or boss, the onus is on me to suss out the data I need. Given that introverted people have always existed and will always exist, it would be ignorant and lazy of me to only pick from the crop that puts themselves in the spotlight for me. Not to mention the very obvious fact that a lot of people are very good at selling themselves, even when they have nothing to offer.
[1] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-support-the-current-thing
It makes plenty of sense to spend money to look good when aesthetics aren't your strong suit, but are important to you. People hire landscapers to make their houses look nice and appealing. This is the same thing, but for your body.
With that said, not all wealthy people do it.
I think it may be the case that they're just trying to emulate different people than you.
That's a must for getting a decent fit for off-the-rack clothes. Even t-shirts.
Plus, they don't even put logos on their polos, which is the one place that actually-nice clothes can get away with a logo. They're not the best-constructed, but they're not terrible, and no logo. BB's polos are better-made and use nicer material but when I wear them I feel like a douche because of the stupid embroidered sheep logo. I think both favor tennis-tail though, which sucks if you like to wear them untucked.
My experience more recently is that people seem to be aware that an American traveling abroad probably agrees with most of their criticisms and they're just curious about what it's really like here.
I stopped wearing clothing with logos when I was 19, because I didn't want to impose on people. Still love my Red Sox hat though.
This reads very clueless to me. Most brands put logos on their clothes, even cheap mall brands put logos on their clothing.
For those unfamiliar, it's the top part of this post: (note the year in the url if you choose to continue to part where it actually discusses politics)
https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/04/22/right-is-the-new-left/
I was also thinking about Scott's review of Fussell On Class, which is similarly insightful
https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/book-review-fussell-on...
We did eventually get a much-newer sequel to The Official Preppy Handbook, at least—but it's entirely horrible.
Lots of folking out there going into major debt just to own designer goods. They definitely seem to believe in the "dress for the job you want, not the job you have" thing, but usually work in dead-end jobs without any chance of career progression.
Judging by the interest in 'fashion reps', I would say it's very much a peer pressure issue, but one that extends far into adulthood for some folks.
I'm one of those $30 jeans people. An old girlfriend once convinced me to try on a pair of $200 jeans ("you don't have to buy them, just try them on"). I did it just to shut her up and looked at myself wearing $200 jeans in the mirror. Fit exactly the same, material seemed better quality, stitching was the same, etc. Yes, better. But definitely not $170 better.
Then again, I think Levi's are overpriced these days.
...I assume you weren't surprised when she decided to change her status to your "old" girlfriend.
I simply stated what I had been told that if you're going to make a fashion faux pas it is better to be overdressed than under. What is confusing?
EDIT: I would agree with the post you were referring to, if someone were to judge me based on my boasting I'd rather not work with them because I'd have to put much effort into working around them misjudging me.
Please don't judge me on my absence of boasting.
This might have been true for the Defender but not any more.
Then people a notch down from even that level of cluefulness caught on. Land Rover started making cars to cater to that market, which only cared about Land Rover because "it's a rich-people brand" but had no idea how they'd gotten that way, and just wanted a suburban SUV with Land Rover branding. I assume Land Rovers, at least newer ones, are now considered a bit embarrassing for at least the second group (the first wave of imitators).
The relationship is that actual status clothes won't make people less likely to cooperate with you, it's just these ridiculous wannabe ones that will and for other reasons than implied.
You have to pay hundreds for genuine denim Levis which puts them in the fashion pretentious class imo.
Anecdata from just last week...
My partner wanted some new running trainers. She went to a popular high-street store here in the UK called JD Sports and said to the assistant "I'm looking for some new running shoes". In a bizarre fit of honesty the lady said:
"Sorry we don't really do running gear here, we sell more fashion items."
I'm sure her manager would have been appalled to overhear it, though perhaps the assistant is into sports herself and made an honest distinction between quality sports gear and the logo-heavy branded items in the store.
but the thesis was basically: sports wear has often influenced mainstream fashion since even like 100 years ago.
but in each generation, people find it initially shocking to see so many people wearing what is marketed and made for sportswear for leisure, or even seeing it spill into the workplace. i think the article was focusing on leggings when they started creeping into non-sports-related settings.
one of the craziest counter-examples i've seen, from the anecdote you share about your partner, was when i saw a man dressed to the nines in a really sharp/ smart business suit, looking like he had a great haircut. but for his kicks, he was rocking Nike Vaporfly 2's, which are known to only have so much life in their foam specialized for distance racing. i personally didn't think it looked at all aesthetically pleasing, but because they were relatively expensive for running shoes, i'm guessing that the man decided to pair them with his high fashion look.
Hopefully you are young enough to have been spared the indignity of witnessing a plague of fluorescent legwarmers and sweatbands escape the aerobics gyms of the 1980s. :)
A lot of modern casual and even business-casual fashion is (or was) sports wear.
Polo shirts? Explicitly designed for tennis—it's the reason the design exists. Pure sportswear.
Oxford-cloth button-downs? Sports wear. That's why it's got the buttons to keep the collar down, and why the cloth is so heavy-weight and rugged.
Rugby shirts? Jerseys? Of course.
Sneakers, of course. Also, many other shoe designs, from equestrian and hunting sports.
What's not sports wear is often former underwear. T-shirts and A-shirts (thought the latter remain very informal, at least) were/are underwear. Arguably leggings are underwear that (somehow—this trend remains baffling to me, but on the other hand, I mean, thank god for it, obviously) became sports wear and then became everyday casual wear.
I'll sometimes do this sort of thing when I travel. Lot easier to travel light when you don't need a separate pair of running shoes.
Even their “description” meta-tag makes it clear that they focus on fashion items.
> JD Sports is the leading sneaker and sport fashion retailer. With many limited edition and exclusive design from adidas Originals and Nike.
All these vehicles cost in the same ballpark (or at least have large overlapping ranges) so roughly all the same people have access to them. It's not about status. It's about tribe signaling.
My point still stands. Expensive Toyota SUV buying people like to shit on expensive European SUV buying people not because they are of substantially different means but because they are of substantially different tribes.