Tie wearer as rebel! Now there’s a thought

What exactly is a man’s tie for? I ask just as the threatened species seems to be vanishing completely, as seen at the recent G7 meeting in the Bavarian Alps when all the leader-bro types appeared determinedly tieless with casually open-necked shirts in suspicious-looking, co-ordinated photo ops. Ties off, gentlemen! Now these are extremely serious times. War in Europe, America falling apart, China shirtfronting the world. Yet the man of the hour is someone who’s appeared more often than not in a T-shirt this year. One Volodymyr Zelensky.

It’s a brazen new way of masculinity – men at work without the ostentatious formality of besuited men at work. And the shock of the open-necked shirt on a man in power feels like an unexpected smile. Yet there are rules for this new tieless shirt phenomenon. Quite possibly the sexiest older man alive (apart from my Chap, of course), one Bill Nighy, declared that one must never leave more than one button undone. Boris Johnson, of course, goes for two. Three and we’re heading for Burt Reynolds (circa 1970s) territory. Four, possibly Elvis, in the years of decline.

“Show me a man’s ties and I’ll tell you who he is or who he’s trying to be,” US author John T. Molloy declared in his sartorial book from the ’70s, Dress for Success. Molloy conducted experiments which demonstrated that expensive ties made bigger impressions in job interviews and got men better tables at restaurants. But now we’ve arrived at the point where Sydney restaurants are banning tattoos, visible designer labels and ostentatious bling – and there’s not a tie in sight.

So what exactly is the purpose of that useless strip of cloth hanging from a man’s neck? Apart from being a form of display, ties have been seen, traditionally, as an expression of individuality. The most obvious one amid the dull conformity of the suit. Yet today men have glorious choice in terms of individual expression, with their haircuts, earrings, piercings, facial hair, tattoos, even proclivity for dresses (take a bow Harry Styles, poster boy of the straight guy Fem-men movement).

For the last word on the tie I turn to Gustav Temple, editor of Britain’s The Chap magazine, a publication that venerates all things Chap and is of course a favourite of my very own Chap. “It isn’t so much that we’re approaching the death of the tie,” Temple explains, “but that the role of the tie is changing. No longer an obligatory item to signify a business setting, the tie is becoming a specialist item mainly worn by men who tend towards dandyism, or who merely prefer to cover their naked throats with a splash of colour. Without the tie, the wearer of a business suit has no place to express their personality (unless they wear a pocket square, which is even more esoteric these days). So the tie, instead of being an adherence to sartorial rules and codes, now comes to represent a bit of a rebel.”

Tie wearer as rebel! Now there’s a thought. How deliciously raffish. But its demise seems to have been accelerated by the pandemic, especially in this fair nation. Temple actually welcomes the Death of the Tie: “I think it is [a good thing], because now those chaps who choose to wear ties are clearly marking themselves out from the crowd...”

Oscar Wilde once declared, “A well-tied tie is the first serious step in life.” Is that still the case in Australia, I wonder? I don’t think so. Barry Humphries certainly knows the purpose of a tie. There is the sartorial splendour of Barry the man, in contrast with the sartorial horror of Sir Les Patterson, whose tie is used for the express purpose of mopping up food and spittle. So are Australian men ready to give up on their ties? The young men in my life do not own one – they borrow dad’s if required. I rest my case.