Chinese idol and actor Zhu Zhengting attends the Beijing Film Festival in a double breasted jacket and black denim jeans from Saint Laurent.
One will usually go about dressing for a black tie event with the standard notch lapel jacket and dress pants, without too much of a thought. It’s readily in your wardrobe for all formal occasions, a uniform of sorts especially if you don’t have a reason to wear suits on a daily basis.
While it’s great to have as a go-to, it can understandably feel old and out of place really fast with repetition. So here’s a proposal to change things up, as worn by the angel-faced Zhu Zhengting, or Theo. The Chinese idol went to the recent Beijing Film Festival in head-to-toe Saint Laurent, wearing a black double breasted jacket in recycled camel hair and with a peaked lapel, pairing the jacket with black denim jeans to share his personality and presence in a more subtle yet poignant manner.
To be specific, Zhu was also dressed in a striped lavalliere tie with a black shirt, but the main point of attention here has to be the choice of jacket and bottom.
Double breasted jackets were first made for sailors, the overlapping jackets in the 17th century designed to give them extra protection against the wind. It has since become a businesswear staple, but has ebbed in and out of trends because the double row of buttons can look a tad bit more formal than usual; Anthony Vaccarello’s Saint Laurent is especially fond of mixing fashion genres, however that may be interpreted.
But that doesn’t mean this style is inappropriate for the layman of the everyday. As the buttons are more equally spread out near the lower abdomen, the corset-look of the fasted bottom gives the illusion of a slimmer silhouette and broader chest — a flattering effect for most. And since this leans to the elevated side of such attires, the pairing of denim (like Zhu has) is a good way to off-set the otherwise stern atmosphere with some laid-back cool. In this case, he slimly avoids looking vampiric with his jeans and tousled ‘do.
Whether your formal occasion allows such a look is up to your discretion, but at least here is an option for you to try if you are bored of the classic black-on-black that everyone else owns.
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