Comments on: Dapper or Crapper: Bill’s Interview Suit

By: Joe

Joe — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 22:53:03 +0000

Jai–It’s almost universally accepted that you can wear chestnut brown shoes with a charcoal suit. Think almost oxblood; very dark brown with a hint of red creeping in.

Alternatively, if the suit is a lighter charcoal, it’s not a strictly formal event, you’re young-ish, and you’re confident enough to pull it off, it’s my personal belief that you can wear lighter, saddle-toned shoes with your charcoal/dark grey suit as long as you match the belt. Others may not share this opinion, though; it’s kind of like the whole stripes-and-patterns together debate.

As far as the flash goes, I once received a bit of very prescient interview fashion advice from a quite-well-dressed contemporary: If your interviewer can remember what you wore, you f’d up.

By: Brian

Brian — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 17:59:42 +0000

I’m not down with that tie, my friend. Drop it for something simpler, like a non-shiny one-stripe regimental. Unless you’re interviewing at a movie studio, flash isn’t generally an interview objective.

By: Jai

Jai — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 16:43:06 +0000

I have to say that nice (really nice) shoes will be noticed, whether or not they will “make” the interview I don’t know.

But what about the brown shoes with a charcoal suit? I don’t think I’ve heard of that.

By: Christopher

Christopher — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 03:24:25 +0000

I’m with them. I would have killed for the green shirt at the business casual happy hour pre-interview I did, but when the interview rolled around, you go with a white or blue shirt, and a tie to complement. I have one yellow/blue/white tie that works great with most of my shirts. As a CS major trying to hack the business IT world, you gotta play the conservative rules of the land. But if you’re going for a more creative or lib. arts job, then I think you’re fine.

It matters a lot more what comes out of your mouth, than what you wear. Just don’t make your outfit your first mistake, and you’ll be fine.

By: sarcasmic

sarcasmic — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 20:24:52 +0000

nice tie, Caesar.

By: Nova

Nova — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 19:47:13 +0000

yeah I’m not feeling that shirt and tie combo with the suit. I don’t think you can go wrong with a more conservative color combo. I think the green shirt should be shaved for when you go business casual. If the tie really is that shiny then it is too loud.

By: Adam

Adam — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 19:37:19 +0000

i HATE the tie. shiny? yuck.

By: A_B

A_B — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 16:30:08 +0000

“What’s going to make or break that outfit, as per usual with a suit, is going to be the shoes.”

I disagree with that. In most cases, the shoes will only serve to “break” the outfit, and generally don’t ever “make” it. If you throw on some terrible footwear, you’re going to look like a jackass, but if you wear something acceptable, then most people won’t even notice them.

What makes or breaks the outfit is always the suit-shirt-tie combo since that’s what people are staring at most of the time.

Overall, without knowing what job he’s interviewing for, it’s hard to say whether or not he’s in the clear. If he’s interviewing to be a cashier at the local supermarket, they’ll be impressed that he decided to wear a suit to the interview. If he’s going into a corporate interview, where things tend to be conservative, that tie and shirt combo is going to come off like he’s a big flake. Maybe a job for a “creative” industry like marketing the green-on-green combo won’t be out of line.

I’ve interviewed a lot of people and if that outfit came into my office, I’d be concerned that he was “unserious” and too worried about matching his clothes. That might be unfair, but it’s not an uncommon reaction as far as I’ve discussed with others.

By: senseigmg

senseigmg — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 15:09:49 +0000

I prefer 3 button suits. Maybe go with a more simple designed tie, like with once kind of stripe. I don’t know, I haven’t had a lot of job interviews.