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Formal dinner in college


Emery.

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There will be a formal dinner in my new college. Later, there will be more of them. The dress code is suits and smart dresses.

And I'm really stressed about it. I get really nervous every time I start to think about it.

The LGBT on campus ensures everyone can dress according to their gender identity, but I don't want to come out publicly, I don't want to explain, because my gender identity has nothing to do with anything, it's very complicated, and I'm not worried about being perceived as female on its own. I want to live as a (cis) woman. An androgynous woman, nevertheless, be as a she, a madam etc.

And I would prefer to go in a suit. I pretty much like smart dresses too, but since I have worn the suit once, it's never the same. Dresses are tolerable for me, but a suit - just awsome :rolleyes: ! Nothing bad will happen if I go in a dress, but my level of comfort and self-confidence would be lower.

I would mix gender codes anyway by wearing the suit with a blouse, high heels and a nice necklace probably. And with evening makeup. But I don't know if it is formal enough to wear a blouse instead of a shirt, too.

But dressing 100% like a guy would feel as wrong as a frilly dress (I don't identify with either gender very much, only in fragments) + it would add being afraid that others are going to find out what is going on in my highly genderfluid brain, and how they are going to react.

And there will be my mom too, and I don't want to come out to her. I don't want to come out to my parents until I have my own flat and a good job, so that I wouldn't have to deal with them criticising me. (They would criticise me for sure) But they agree that I can wear a suit, at least, and accept that I don't like wearing feminine clothing for the most part.

So I'm very uncertain about the whole business.

What do you think about it?

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It all sounds very stressful. But on a positive note, your parents are cool with you wearing a suit type outfit and there are plenty of women who hate wearing dresses, so I don't think it would out you if you didn't wear one. And it's far more acceptable for women to wear suits than men to wear dresses.

I think a blouse would be fine!! Look at these examples of smart ladies outfits I found on google:

e49f126a73267372d8852839b4da4c77.jpg7a11693d5e751bfd7566f28e590c4c9e.jpgd008aed59fa37fb09a7224b25fa6ab6e.jpg

popular_suits_formal_pant_suits_for_wome

I don't know if these are too feminine for you? Are you thinking more of a mens suit?

What about these?

men-office-suits.jpgclothing-garcon-style-women-in-mens-suit

1b31940e_1130-leighton-meester-suit-02-4

Either way, you can rock a suit if it's mens or womens!!!

It's probably more of a worry for you than it actually has to be, cos that's how our brains work. THANKS BRAINS!

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I want to wear suits too, but I've never found one that's suited me. As the above poster said, suits are more acceptable for females than dresses are for men. Also, a blouse (to me, and I've looked it up although my only fashion intuition is on actual looks) is the most formal shirt you can wear as a female, just for an event like this do a button down one with a collar, and if you wear a blouse and dress pants (patterns on those are awesome) you pretty much need to dress it up with a suit jacket anyway, so no worries. Also, a necklace would be a nice accesory to really keep it formal if the jacket needs to come off for whatever reason.

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Dodecahedron314

Nice pants and a blousey type thing or button-down collared shirt have been my formalwear mainstays since way before I started identifying as something other than female, because even before that I always detested dresses. Like Ficulnean said, a suit jacket would also probably be a good idea, but a vest might also work too, especially in combination with a jacket (maybe not so much with the blouse as with a collared shirt though...I've tried it and it's always looked kind of awkward, but then again maybe I just have awkward vests). If you want to steer clear of absolute masculinity, probably avoid ties, although there are a couple of pictures that The_Verse posted that suggest otherwise so really it would depend on the specific outfit.

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I've seen plenty of cis women pull of suites, so I don't think you have to worry about necessarily outing yourself if you wear a women's suite. Some super conservative people might think you're a bit odd, but they'll probably just assume you're a lesbian or super feminist before they assume you're genderqueer. Just my two cents.

Also, I love that white suite. If I wasn't terrified of stains, I'd totally want that!

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If it eases your mind, I wore slacks, shirt, blazer, and oxfords to every single formal campus event my school had, and nobody even looked at me funny. I know plenty of my female classmates did the same for various reasons, from "I am masculine-of-center and don't like dresses" to "pockets dammit" to "it's cold and I want pants". There are lots of explanations you can give if anyone asks you why you're in a suit instead of a dress, the simplest being "I didn't feel like it". No arguing with that, right? :)

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I'd wear whatever I want and if people ask, tell them "I'm wearing X because I like it better that Y". Not everything has to be made into a gender statement.

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I'm sorry it has taken me so long to reply, especially as I've written in other topics...

To go chronologically (more or less):

I have 2 suits, one with trousers and one with a skirt. One of them actually looks similar to the one in the black-and-white photo.

Ooofff, so a blouse is formal enough (reading, looking at pictures)... And cis women do pull off suits. Right. Now I'm calm about it.

My mom just gets mad at me a lot lately, I want to be sure I'm not going to add any more material for quarrels.

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:cake:

I hope it goes well Emery. You have all my moral support!

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