Product Code Database
Western dress codes are a set of dress codes detailing what clothes are worn for what occasion that originated in Western Europe and the United States in the 19th century. Conversely, since most cultures have intuitively applied some level equivalent to the more formal Western dress code traditions, these dress codes are simply a versatile framework, open to amalgamation of international and local customs. This versatility has made this scale of formality a practical international formality scale.
| Formal wear i.e. "Full dress" | Morning dress | White tie | Trouser suit or skirt with blazer | Ball gown | Full dress uniform | Ceremonial dress, religious clothing, , orders and , etc. |
| Semi-formal wear i.e. "Half dress" | Black lounge suit | Black tie | Evening gown | Mess dress uniform | ||
| Informal wear i.e. "Undress" | Suit | Cocktail dress | Service dress uniform | |||
| Casual wear | Anything considered inappropriate for more formal occasions | |||||
Classifications are divided into formal wear ( full dress), semi-formal wear ( half dress), and informal wear ( undress). Anything below this level is referred to as casual wear, although sometimes in combinations such as "smart casual" or "business casual" in order to indicate higher expectation than none at all.
Ceremonial dress, military uniform, religious clothing, academic dress, and folk costume appropriate to the formality level are encouraged, but face-covering garments (niqab, hijab) are not always accepted. France outlawed the public use of Burqa in 2010 and the European court of law seconded the law because "uncovered faces encourage citizens to live together" (see also burqa by country).
Before the modern system of formal, semi-formal, and informal was consolidated in the 20th century, the terms were looser. In the 19th century, during the Victorian period and , the principal classifications of clothing were full dress and undress, and, less commonly the intermediate half dress. Full dress covered the most formal option: frock coat for Morning dress, and dress coat (white tie) for evening wear (sometimes with supplementary alternative being a full dress uniform independent of what time of the day). As such, full dress may still appear in use designating formal wear.
When morning dress became common (in the modern sense, using a morning tailcoat rather than a frock coat), it was considered less formal than a frock coat, and even when the frock coat was increasingly phased out, morning dress never achieved full dress status. Therefore, in the 21st century, full dress often refers to white tie only.
Today's semi-formal evening black tie (originally dinner clothes) was initially described as informal wear, while the "lounge suit," now standard business wear, was originally considered (as its name suggests) casual wear. Half dress, when used, was variously applied at different times, but was used to cover modern morning dress (the term morning dress is fairly undescriptive and has not always meant modern morning dress). Undress (not to be confused with nudity) in turn was similarly loose in meaning, corresponding to anything from a dressing gown to a lounge suit or its evening equivalent of dinner clothes (now one of the more formal dress codes seen in many Western regions).
|
|
