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Growing up in London during the noughties, I was always surrounded by suits. You saw them on City financiers rushing through the financial district. You could spot them on dads in the city's great park, playing with footballs in the evening light. Even school, a inexpensive grey suit was our mandatory uniform. Traditionally, the suit has functioned as a costume of seriousness, projecting authority and professionalism—traits I was expected to embrace to become a "adult". Yet, before recently, people my age appeared to wear them less and less, and they had all but vanished from my mind.

Then came the incoming New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani. Taking his oath of office at a closed ceremony wearing a sober black overcoat, crisp white shirt, and a distinctive silk tie. Riding high by an ingenious campaign, he captured the world's imagination unlike any recent mayoral candidate. Yet whether he was cheering in a hip-hop club or appearing at a film premiere, one thing remained largely constant: he was almost always in a suit. Relaxed in fit, modern with soft shoulders, yet traditional, his is a typically professional millennial suit—well, as typical as it can be for a generation that rarely chooses to wear one.

"The suit is in this strange position," says men's fashion writer 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 advent of business casual."

"Today it is only worn in the most formal settings: weddings, funerals, and sometimes, legal proceedings," Guy states. "It's sort of like the kimono in Japan," in that it "essentially represents a tradition that has long retreated from daily life." Numerous politicians "don this attire to say: 'I am a politician, you can trust me. You should support me. I have legitimacy.'" But while the suit has historically conveyed this, today it performs authority in the attempt of gaining public confidence. As Guy clarifies: "Since we're also living in a democratic society, politicians want to seem approachable, because they're trying to get your votes." To a large extent, a suit is just a nuanced form of performance, in that it performs masculinity, authority and even proximity to power.

Guy's words stayed with me. On the rare occasions I require a suit—for a ceremony or black-tie event—I dust off the one I bought from a Tokyo retailer several years ago. When I first picked it up, it made me feel refined and high-end, but its tailored fit now feels passé. I imagine this feeling will be only too recognizable for numerous people in the global community whose families originate in somewhere else, particularly global south countries.

It's no surprise, the everyday suit has fallen out of fashion. Like a pair of jeans, a suit's shape goes through trends; a specific cut can thus define an era—and feel quickly outdated. Consider the present: looser-fitting suits, echoing a famous cinematic Armani in *American Gigolo*, might be trendy, but given the cost, it can feel like a considerable investment for something likely to be out of fashion within a few seasons. But the appeal, at least in some quarters, endures: in the past year, major retailers report tailoring sales increasing more than 20% as customers "move away from the suit being everyday wear towards an appetite to invest in something exceptional."

The Politics of a Accessible Suit

Mamdani's preferred suit is from Suitsupply, a Dutch label that sells in a mid-market price bracket. "Mamdani is very much a product of his upbringing," says Guy. "A relatively young person, he's not poor but not extremely wealthy." To that end, his mid-level suit will resonate with the demographic most likely to support him: people in their 30s and 40s, college graduates earning professional incomes, often frustrated by the cost of housing. It's precisely the kind of suit they might wear themselves. Affordable but not extravagant, Mamdani's suits arguably don't contradict his proposed policies—which include a rent freeze, building affordable homes, and fare-free public buses.

"It's impossible to imagine Donald Trump wearing this brand; he's a luxury Italian suit person," says Guy. "As an immensely wealthy and grew up in that New York real-estate world. A power suit fits naturally with that elite, just as more accessible brands fit naturally with Mamdani's cohort."

The history of suits in politics is extensive and rich: from a well-known leader's "controversial" beige attire to other world leaders and their notably impeccable, custom-fit appearance. Like a certain UK leader learned, the suit doesn't just dress the politician; it has the power to characterize them.

The Act of Normality and A Shield

Perhaps the key is what one scholar calls the "enactment of banality", invoking the suit's long career as a standard attire of political power. Mamdani's particular choice leverages a deliberate modesty, neither shabby nor showy—"respectability politics" in an inconspicuous suit—to help him appeal to as many voters as possible. However, experts think Mamdani would be aware of the suit's military and colonial legacy: "The suit isn't neutral; scholars have long noted that its modern roots lie in imperial administration." It is also seen as a form of protective armor: "I think if you're from a minority background, you might not get taken as seriously in these white spaces." The suit becomes a way of asserting legitimacy, perhaps especially to those who might question it.

Such sartorial "code-switching" is hardly a recent phenomenon. Even iconic figures previously donned formal Western attire during their formative years. These days, certain world leaders have started exchanging their usual fatigues for a dark formal outfit, albeit one lacking the tie.

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

The suit Mamdani selects is highly significant. "Being the son of immigrants of South Asian heritage and a democratic socialist, he is under pressure to meet what many American voters look for as a marker of leadership," notes one expert, while simultaneously needing to navigate carefully by "avoiding the appearance of an establishment figure betraying his non-mainstream roots and values."

Yet there is an acute awareness of the double standards applied to suit-wearers and what is read into it. "That may come in part from Mamdani being a younger leader, skilled 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 unnoticed," but when women and ethnic minorities "attempt to gain the authority that suits represent," they must carefully negotiate the codes associated with them.

In every seam of Mamdani's public persona, the dynamic between belonging and displacement, inclusion and exclusion, is evident. I know well the discomfort of trying to fit into something not built for me, be it an cultural expectation, the culture I was born into, or even a suit. What Mamdani's sartorial choices make evident, however, is that in politics, appearance is never without meaning.