Types of Suits

A suit is a two or three piece outfit consisting of jacket or trouser of the same fabric sometimes accompanied by a waistcoat. Actually, a wardrobe of a man cannot be complete without a suit. Globally, the most accepted piece of attire. Is a mark of one’s reputation, character and style.

Varieties :-  Single breast suits  Double breast suits  Tuxedo  Dinner suits  Zoot suits  Lounge suits  Bussiness suits  Wedding suits

Zoot Suits are the zoot suits or the Jazz age suits. Originated by the African Americans – long coats, high waisted, big lapels, should think before trying it out. Not everyone can fit this bill.

A zoot suit (occasionally spelled zuit suit) is a men's suit with high- waisted, wide-legged, tight-cuffed, pegged trousers, and a long coat with wide lapels and wide padded shoulders.

This style of clothing became popular among the African American, Chicano, Filipino American, and Italian American communities during the 1940s. [1][2] In Britain the bright-coloured suits with velvet lapels worn by Teddy Boys bore a slight resemblance to zoot suits in the length of the jacket.

The style originated in the Jazz Age of the 40s in Harlem and spread through ethnic communities across the country, primarily worn by Mexican- and African- Americans.

An all American suit that changed history With jacket arms that reached the fingertips and pants worn tight at the waist, bulging at the knees and choked at the ankles, it was nearly impossible to ignore a man wearing a zoot suit.

Accessorized with a key chain that extended to the knees and a fedora- like hat with a feather attached.

The creation of the zoot suit to Harlem in the mid to late 1930s, when tailors began making them out of wool or colorful varieties of rayon. Although its exact origin is unknown, the term “zoot suit” appears to have come from the rhyming slang, or jive, spoken in the African-American community at the time, HISTORY The origin is not very well known but it had many different meanings, including the pleasure of looking sharp and being part of a group of young people in the war years. The zoot suit should not be looked at solely as a costume that conveys political resistance.

They were generally worn by young men of African-American descent, initially Mexican-American and white working-class men also would wear them. Typically they would buy them at local clothing shops and have them tailored to this oversized style.

One of the busiest boutiques to get orders of zoot suits from all over the world.

Pachuco refers to a particular old school subculture of Mexican-American and Latino Americans associated with zoot suits, street gangs, nightlife, and flamboyant public behavior in an attempt to look and feel like mafia bosses of the Chicago gangster era

The suit’s rise in popularity coincided with the emergence of the jitterbug and other forms of swing dance music. The flowing look of the suit was particularly flashy on the dance floor, and young people took note

At the dawn of World War II, the zoot suit was condemned by the U.S. government as wasteful. Not surprisingly, the criticism did little to dissuade its fans from wearing it, and in fact may have even attracted more people to the look. In the early 1940s, working-class youth, entertainers and dancers continued to wear zoot suits, and the look spread to Italian Americans, Jews, and even some teenage girls.

In the midst of the war it is associated with men who are criminals or members of gangs. Around 1943, there is a riot that breaks out in Los Angeles. White servicemen and civilians begin to attack young men, especially Mexican-American men. They rip the clothing off their bodies, and the zoot suit takes on this sense of being a danger.

A band of 50 sailors armed themselves with makeshift weapons, left their naval base and coursed into downtown Los Angeles in search of young Mexican Americans in zoot suits. The sailors viciously beat the zoot suiters, and the next day even more servicemen hired a convoy of taxicabs to go into to East Los Angeles, where they accosted pachucos [Mexican Americans] on the street and even pushed their way into private homes.

Though the zoot suit is largely gone, it is not forgotten. It reemerged in the late 1960s with the rise of the Chicano Rights Movement, and as a sort of retro fashion in the early 1990s with the revival of swing music and dance. In 2001, the swing band Cherry Poppin’ Daddies released an album called “Zoot Suit Riot.”

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