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Coming of age in London during the 2000s, I was always surrounded by suits. You saw them on businessmen hurrying through the financial district. They were worn by dads in the city's great park, kicking footballs in the golden light. At school, a cheap grey suit was our mandatory uniform. Traditionally, the suit has served as a costume of gravitas, projecting power and professionalism—traits I was told to aspire to to become a "adult". However, before recently, my generation appeared to wear them less and less, and they had all but vanished from my consciousness.

Subsequently came the newly elected New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani. He was sworn in at a closed ceremony wearing a sober black overcoat, pristine white shirt, and a distinctive silk tie. Riding high by an innovative campaign, he captured the public's imagination like no other recent mayoral candidate. Yet whether he was celebrating in a hip-hop club or attending a film premiere, one thing was mostly unchanged: he was frequently in a suit. Loosely tailored, modern with soft shoulders, yet conventional, his is a quintessentially middle-class millennial suit—well, as typical as it can be for a cohort that seldom bothers to wear one.

"This garment is in this strange position," notes style commentator Derek Guy. "It's been dying a gradual fade since the end of the second world war," with the significant drop arriving in the 1990s alongside "the rise of business casual."

"Today it is only worn in the most formal settings: marriages, funerals, and sometimes, legal proceedings," Guy states. "It is like the kimono in Japan," in that it "essentially represents a tradition that has long retreated from everyday use." Many politicians "wear a suit to say: 'I represent a politician, you can trust me. You should vote for me. I have legitimacy.'" But while the suit has traditionally signaled this, today it enacts authority in the attempt of gaining public confidence. As Guy clarifies: "Since we're also living in a democratic society, politicians want to seem relatable, because they're trying to get your votes." To a large extent, a suit is just a nuanced form of performance, in that it enacts masculinity, authority and even proximity to power.

Guy's words resonated deeply. On the infrequent times I need a suit—for a ceremony or formal occasion—I retrieve the one I bought from a Tokyo retailer a few years ago. When I first selected it, it made me feel refined and expensive, but its tailored fit now feels outdated. I suspect this feeling will be all too familiar for numerous people in the diaspora whose families originate in somewhere else, particularly global south countries.

It's no surprise, the everyday suit has lost fashion. Similar to a pair of jeans, a suit's silhouette goes through trends; a specific cut can thus characterize an era—and feel rapidly outdated. Consider the present: more relaxed suits, echoing a famous cinematic Armani in *American Gigolo*, might be trendy, but given the price, it can feel like a significant investment for something destined to be out of fashion within five years. Yet the attraction, at least in certain circles, endures: recently, major retailers report suit sales rising more than 20% as customers "move away from the suit being daily attire towards an desire to invest in something special."

The Politics of a Accessible Suit

Mamdani's preferred suit is from Suitsupply, a Dutch label that retails in a mid-market price bracket. "He is precisely a reflection of his background," says Guy. "A relatively young person, he's neither poor nor exceptionally wealthy." Therefore, his mid-level suit will appeal to the demographic most inclined to support him: people in their 30s and 40s, university-educated earning middle-class incomes, often discontented by the expense of housing. It's exactly the kind of suit they might wear themselves. Not cheap but not lavish, Mamdani's suits arguably don't contradict his stated policies—which include a rent freeze, building affordable homes, and free public buses.

"It's impossible to imagine Donald Trump wearing Suitsupply; he's a luxury Italian suit person," says Guy. "He's extremely wealthy and was raised in that New York real-estate world. A power suit fits seamlessly with that tycoon class, just as more accessible brands fit naturally with Mamdani's cohort."

The legacy of suits in politics is extensive and rich: from a well-known leader's "controversial" beige attire to other national figures and their suspiciously impeccable, custom-fit appearance. As one British politician discovered, the suit doesn't just clothe the politician; it has the potential to define them.

Performance of Banality and Protective Armor

Perhaps the point is what one academic refers to the "enactment of banality", summoning the suit's historical role as a standard attire of political power. Mamdani's specific selection leverages a deliberate modesty, not too casual nor too flashy—"respectability politics" in an inconspicuous suit—to help him appeal to as many voters as possible. But, some think Mamdani would be cognizant of the suit's military and colonial legacy: "The suit isn't apolitical; historians have long noted that its modern roots lie in imperial administration." Some also view it as a form of defensive shield: "It is argued that if you're a person of color, you might not get taken as seriously in these traditional institutions." The suit becomes a way of asserting legitimacy, perhaps especially to those who might question it.

This kind of sartorial "code-switching" is not a recent phenomenon. Indeed iconic figures previously wore formal Western attire during their formative years. These days, certain world leaders have started swapping their usual fatigues for a black suit, albeit one without the tie.

"Throughout the fabric of Mamdani's image, the tension between insider and outsider is apparent."

The attire Mamdani selects is deeply symbolic. "As a Muslim child of immigrants of Indian descent and a democratic socialist, he is under scrutiny to conform to what many American voters look for as a sign of leadership," says one author, while simultaneously needing to walk a tightrope by "not looking like an establishment figure betraying his distinctive roots and values."

Yet there is an acute awareness of the different rules applied to who wears suits and what is read into it. "That may come in part from Mamdani being a millennial, able to adopt different identities to fit the situation, but it may also be part of his multicultural background, where adapting between cultures, customs and attire is common," it is said. "White males can remain unremarked," but when others "seek to gain the authority that suits represent," they must meticulously negotiate the expectations associated with them.

Throughout the presentation of Mamdani's official image, the tension between somewhere and nowhere, inclusion and exclusion, is evident. I know well the awkwardness of trying to fit into something not designed with me in mind, be it an cultural expectation, the culture I was born into, or even a suit. What Mamdani's sartorial choices make clear, however, is that in public life, appearance is never neutral.