Dressing for the office: Investment pieces starting at $80

How can I nail office-dressing this spring?

Ping-pong tables, fancy-dress days and coaxing emails from HR are struggling to bring workers back to the office willingly. It’s hard to counteract the joy of working from home (and unpacking your dishwasher between Zoom meetings) with free Tim Tams in the coffee area and monthly sausage sizzles. A more successful approach might be to distribute images of Hailey Bieber in sleek office attire through the company group chat – in particular, the model and wife of pop star Justin Bieber dressed for success at a Wall Street function celebrating the successful billion-dollar sale of her beauty brand, Rhode. The sharp skirt suit, worn with black heels, harkened back to a time when working women could rely on a uniform from 9 to 5, borrowing the best aspects of men’s tailoring and reinterpreting them for the female form.

Since the ’90s, luxury labels and fast fashion have tried to persuade us that you need to weigh up countless blouse, skirt, trousers and blazer options every morning and make the morning train commute your personal runway. No wonder wearing tracksuit pants and working from your sofa is more appealing. A working uniform of a skirt suit, with matching tailored trousers as an option, takes the stress out of morning dressing and helps you gather the confidence to ask for a pay rise, speak up in meetings and ask for more Tim Tams. It’s an opportunity to invest in pieces that will go the distance while making it clear to onlookers that you mean business.

Got a style conundrum? Email damien.woolnough@nine.com.au

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