State of perpetual self-surveillance
The internet teems with a veritable cottage industry of corrective dressing, offering guides on how to dress for every shape imaginable. Large men, we’re told, shouldn’t wear horizontal stripes because they make you look wider. Short men shouldn’t wear cuffed trousers because they truncate the leg line. These rules are dressed up as practical advice, but they rest on shaky logic and accept the fashion industry’s standards as law.
Follow these too closely and you’ll enter a state of perpetual self-surveillance, forever asking whether a garment diminishes or exaggerates some defect that you see in yourself. The result is self-consciousness and anxiety, pushing you toward clothes that conceal rather than express, ultimately producing the opposite of style.
Instead of leading with body type, start with the cultural language of dress. We no longer live in a world where a single class sets the terms for how men should appear. This has made the task of dressing more complicated, but also more pleasurable.
Read it all: How To Dress Well For Any Body Type