Formal Events & Balls

When the tuxedo jacket ("dinner jacket" in British English) was first introduced in the Victorian era it was intended as an informal replacement for the Top Hat and Tails which men of the upper classes wore every evening.

It was worn with the standard accompaniments for the evening tailcoat at the time such as matching trousers, white or black waistcoat, white bow tie, white wing-collar formal shirt and formal shoes.

During the Edwardian era the practice of wearing a black waistcoat and black bow tie with a tuxedo became standard, establishing the basis of the current black tie and white tie dress codes. The tuxedo was also increasingly accepted at informal evening occasions such as warm-weather gatherings or intimate dinners with friends.

After World War I the tuxedo became de facto evening wear, taking on the status of "semi-formal" in the United States by the 1940s, while the evening tailcoat was limited to extremely formal or ceremonial occasions.

During this interwar period double-breasted jackets, turndown-collar shirts and cummerbunds became acceptable for warm-weather black-tie evenings as did white jackets. Formal and semi-formal attire became widely available to the middle class due to the rising popularity of rented clothing and increased quality of ready-to-wear clothing.

Following World War II black tie became special occasion attire rather than standard evening wear and was increasingly categorized as “formal”. In the 1950s coloured and patterned jackets, cummerbunds and bow ties became very popular but were generally rejected by etiquette authorities.

By the 1960s "black tie" was no longer synonymous with “tuxedo” or “formal wear” as the former upheld the traditional standards of tuxedo-based evening wear while the latter were becoming a matter of personal interpretation. The introduction of ruffled shirts and then colored tuxedo suits in the 1970s further separated the two concepts of formality.