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I Wore a Men’s Jumpsuit, So You Don’t Have To
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Paul Newman wore one, so has Brad Pitt, so why exactly is the male jumpsuit polarizing? Our men’s fashion columnist investigates.
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Paul Newman and his jumpsuit with Clint Eastwood in 1972.
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES
By Jacob Gallagher
Feb. 12, 2018 12:28 pm ET
PRINT TEXT 72
I wore a jumpsuit in public exactly once. It was a vintage army mechanic’s uniform that I’d
purchased late one night from eBay, inspired or perhaps led astray by a 1972 photo of Paul
Newman hanging out with Clint Eastwood. Mr. Newman rests him arm on Mr. Eastwood’s
shoulder, clad in a trim navy jumpsuit with batik-patterned cuffs. To me, he seemed the
very definition of confidence.
In my jumpsuit, I seemed the very definition of a schmuck.
Walking to the grocery store, I caught sight of my reflection in a window and realized I
looked like I’d flown the Cuckoo’s Nest, the one immortalized in the 1975 Jack Nicholson
film. Passersby must have thought so too. They stared in my direction just a few seconds
too long, a seering New York judgment. What’s more, my jumpsuit didn’t fit correctly: too
tight in the crotch, too saggy at the hems. I went home, defeated, and immediately changed
into jeans and a sweatshirt.
A man and his jumpsuit during Paris Fashion Week last year.
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES
This cringe-inducing memory resurfaced last year, when the male jumpsuit started having
an unlikely moment. On “The Jimmy Kimmel Show” in May, the host pranced about in a
short-sleeved one-piece from Romphim, a brand marketing a male version of the female
romper (Get it? Romp him!). Mr. Kimmel royally mocked the company—dismissing the
garment as “adult-sized baby clothes”—but Romphim has succeeded, raising over
$350,000 on the crowd-funding site Kickstarter and now selling its clothes worldwide. The
male jumpsuit crossed over into high fashion, too: Brad Pitt got into the game, wearing an
Issey Miyake onesie in the pages of GQ Style’s Summer 2017 issue, and other brands, such
as Marni and Lanvin, showed their own versions for the fall 2018 collections. In real life, I
see the occasional guy walking around my neighborhood in a smudged-up vintage
jumpsuit. Hey, I live in Brooklyn. It happens.
Though my own field test left me scarred, lately, I’ve begun to second-guess myself: Have I
cheated myself by relegating my jumpsuit to the back of my closet? I asked a few members
of the small but mighty club of adult male jumpsuit wearers to find out what I might be
missing.
Simone Monguzzi wearing a bomber jacket over a blue jumpsuit during Paris Fashion Week last June.
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES
I started with Daiki Suzuki, the designer behind Engineered Garments, a New York label
that has produced a guy’s jumpsuit for about five years now. A jumpsuit, he explained, is a
single piece that slips on in seconds and makes for an all-in-one outfit, the closest a man
can come to the ease of women’s fashion: “It’s just like a girl wearing a dress.” Still, he
acknowledges that the two styles of jumpsuit that Engineered Garments produces each
year are a hard sell. “I know that it’s not for everyone,” said Mr. Suzuki of the look. “It’s for
certain crazy people who love it.” His jumpsuits were inspired by old workwear uniforms,
the kind that soot-stained coal-shovelers and house painters wear. Today, his versions
attract artists, designers, brewers and other make-their-own-hours types: guys who don’t
risk getting called down to H.R. for an outfit transgression.
James Hartley counts himself among that artistic class. A few years ago, a friend gave the
32-year-old photographer a Marc Jacobs jumpsuit he had tired of. Mr. Hartley described
putting it on as “pretty miraculous.” At 6’4’’, Mr. Hartley could fill out the sail-like
jumpsuit, but beyond that, he found the jumpsuit “fun.” He went on to expand his jumpsuit
wardrobe and now has seven in rotation. His Instagram feed includes a shot of himself,
happily posing in a playfully palm-leaf patterned jumpsuit that he had custom made in
Indonesia. The hashtag: #onesizefitsme. Strangers are not particularly supportive: Mr.
Hartley regularly gets asked, “What the f**k are you wearing?” but he brushes those
comments aside. “I don’t like being told I can’t wear certain things,” he said. Instead, he’s
used the scarcity of committed jumpsuit wearers to his advantage, making the look part of
his signature style. “Any time an article about jumpsuits or something comes up, I’m
always getting linked and friends are always keeping an eye out and texting me about
them,” said Mr. Hartley.
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Out here working on my custom jumpsuit game. #onesizefitsme
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Mario Abad, 24, a freelance writer in Dallas, has similarly made his black Zara jumpsuit an
arrow in his style quiver. “I definitely wear it when I want to stand out,” he said. He prefers
to break it out when meeting someone new or for special occasions because people will
take notice of it right away. “It’s not a silhouette that people are normally accustomed to
and I like that attention” said Mr. Abad confidently. “It’s definitely a conversation starter.”
Perhaps jumpsuit success has less to do with fit or context than it does with confidence.
Maybe those jumpsuit devotees were just blessed with more bravado than the rest of us.
Paul Newman, the man who put the onesie bug in my brain, could have made a trash bag
look cool with his patented brand of insouciance. And who has more confidence than People
Magazine’s two-time “Sexiest Man Alive” winner, Mr. Brad Pitt? The artists and designers I
occasionally see in paint-splattered jumpsuits around my neighborhood use theirs to
achieve maximum eccentricity. There’s just a certain swagger that comes from assertively
sporting a garment that others wouldn’t dare to wear. That is, if you can get past all the
raised eyebrows that will follow in your wake. If you can, you’re a better man than I.
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