Rules for Modern Life: A Connoisseur's Survival Guide - Softcover

Mind you, some people end up with too much confidence. I
am thinking of Liberace and Karl Lagerfeld and Kim Jong-un
and Fidel Castro, for example, and their signature attires. The
dress sense of these extraordinary people is immediately recognizable.
I only wish someone had had the guts to tell them that
what they were wearing was a bit over the top. I once had lunch
in a tent in the Sahara with Colonel Gaddafi. He was in full
uniform, with enough medals to decorate the Spartans at Thermopylae.
The tassels from his epaulettes would not have looked
out of place on Barbara Cartland’s drawing-room curtains, and I
certainly didn’t dare ask who his barber was, as his hair dangled
down like a tangle of seaweed, still less his facial beautician, as
his cheeks looked like the surface of the moon. Another dictator,
Robert Mugabe, once came to my house for lunch in the height
of summer in Hong Kong. It was 33 degrees C with 98 per cent
humidity. He arrived in a tie and a three-piece suit. I implored
him to disrobe, perhaps not so much because we were going to
be eating in the garden, which was very hot and humid, but
because his tailor must have been blind, and I didn’t want the
president lunching as a scarecrow.
There are, however, those who care a great deal about how
they look. I was once on a boat anchored adjacent to another one
belonging to a very good friend of mine who had P. Diddy, or
Puff Daddy, staying on board. We all went ashore for dinner,
and afterwards were about to troop off to a club for a nightcap
when P. Diddy said he wanted to return to the boat first. I was
rather curious why the rap star wanted to do that, as it involved
getting into a tender and going out to the anchor before coming
back again. His host was able to enlighten me that P. Diddy
always wanted a change of clothes upon a change of venue. Not
only that, he was given an extra cabin on the boat in which an
ironing board with a valet was on permanent standby to facilitate
these changes. P. Diddy, incidentally, was already dressed
meticulously in an immaculate white suit with a silk cravat and
his signature dark shades. Anyway, he came to the nightclub
after about an hour, in a gleaming black suit and another silk
scarf, which had obviously been pressed very shortly before.
In any case, the internet age has led to the traditional manifestation
of wealth through clothes being superseded by ‘geek chic’.
Steve Jobs was one of the most visible proponents of this form of
attire, in his jeans and pumps. So too were Bill Gates and other
cyber billionaires such as Mark Zuckerberg, with the result that
formal wear is no longer de rigueur among those for whom the
internet has brought fame and fortune. But I am not sure I like
this trend of dressing down. A dress code shows respect to others.
I also believe strongly that society as a whole looks so much
better when people take the trouble to dress properly. It’s a rite
that has done well for mankind. Confucius, who wrote his Book
of Rites 2,500 years ago, encouraged people to respect formality
as a good way of living. So I hope the pendulum might swing
back the other way, and that those who can afford it take trouble
over sartorial guidelines. Just remember Cary Grant or Stewart
Granger, or even Edward G. Robinson in his roles as a gangster:
they all wore beautifully tailored suits and they looked incredibly
smart. The same with Sophia Loren or Ingrid Bergman: they
always looked resplendent in their dresses. And that is the joy of
fashion: though it might sometimes be regarded as superficial, it
has nonetheless been very effective in creating an endless kaleidoscope
of visual feasts, not only on celluloid, but also in reality,
which is living art.