Whereas for years we've been in a dress-code limbo forcing us to balance "professional" with "creative" with "young" with "mature" now - except in the most creative of industries - a suit no longer feels stuffy. Says one headhunter, in these competitive times, “We are back to a time when every company expected both women and men to wear suits and we didn’t have a Casual Friday..They are looking for a sharper style. I recommend a strong suit that says you are collected and ready to work.” (Here's hoping Mad Men's smart suits are a contributing factor.) Sure there are those stalwarts who bought a suit straight out of high school and dutifully dressed up like a mini exec whenever they wanted to be taken seriously, some of us - especially those who are prone to looking young anyhow - always felt uncomfortably like we were dressed in business costumes.

I remember the agony of dressing for interviews, and the discomfort of feeling overdressed in a room full of jeans, like I had "Interview" written across my forehead. As such, any dictate like this, however arbitrary, is a boon. Of course, there's still the issue of skirt or trouser; color; underpinning (in fact in my opinion the article goes on to list so many variables that it's more confusing than ever) - but really the expectation of conformity is comforting. For my own part, I can't wear a suit and not look like an ass, and so swear by a good jacket and an A-line (I do have a couple of vintage suits, suitable for church etc.) And whatever you wear, remember, this is key:
T-tailored to fit you
L-lint-free
C-clean.

The rest is all gravy. And yes I just invented that. Believe me, we're going to be covering all this in my Arbitrary Guide to Style Mostly Inspired by Vintage Career Romances, coming soon. "Shrimp-colored knits" figure prominently, I do assure you.

The Return Of The Interview Suit [New York Times]

Whereas, Czyzselska says, there are an increasing number of openly gay male role models in various walks of life, the comparable women can be listed on one hand — and a few of those are probably assumed to be gay, but haven't actually come out publicly. As a result, she says, lesbians face a very different set of prejudices and a more difficult coming-out process. As she says, "an established community of other gay men at work helps gay men to come out, because there's often a formal or informal club for them to join." Well, I'm sure plenty of young gay men would be delighted by this blithe assessment of their circumstances! But no one can argue that the challenges for a lesbian coming out at work aren't unique: "Think about it — as a woman, you've already got one strike against you in terms of a diversity box to check. As a lesbian there's the second one as well." She points out the hidden minefields of discussing one's personal life, the elaborate deceptions that can fill a workday with a hundred small stresses and undermine the trust of a work dynamic.

What she says next seems in some ways to confuse her argument:

Happily, those who were confident about their sexual orientation generally felt being a gay woman gave them a distinct advantage in the workplace. Some participants who had been open about being gay found the experience empowering, because it had raised their profile, facilitated networking opportunities and helped them to feel more equal with men in their place of work.

While these results are certainly encouraging, this does feel in some wise reductive; doesn't it stand to reason that those women so "confident about their sexual orientation" are already more prone to healthy work relationships — or that perhaps they're already in more supportive work environments? "People can't be confident enough to come out in this environment but if they come out they'll be confident which will improve the environment" for others, this seems to say — and glosses over a lot of potentially painful variables. That said, at the end of the day, change probably does need to come on the heels of just such simplistic change — a giant step for woman, a small step for womankind. Sometimes we need someone to coin the cliches for us before we can use them.

The Invisible Women [The Guardian]