KEY POINTS:
Every day for months in 1951 I travelled to work in Timaru by bus and each day I sat besides this dapper little man, perhaps in his mid 50s. He was immaculately dressed in a three-piece suit, watch chain, conservative tie with matching pocket handkerchief and polished shoes, always with his authentic Gladstone bag.
To all on the bus, my small fashionable, elegant friend from Temuka resembled a bank manager, perhaps a stockbroker.
Then one day I was sent to a state house building site just outside Timaru. There was my friend - a builder's labourer chipping concrete off boxing dressed in a pair of freshly pressed blue overalls.
The impression this infallibly groomed, fastidious gent had on this disorderly dressed 16-year-old was immediate, changing my perception of dress code for ever.
After that I always dressed for whatever the occasion, never compromising my principles, never "down dressing" to the same sloppy level of today's accepted standards.
This decline is now infecting almost every sector of our society. I'm not apologetic for being an old-fashioned traditionalist, but I'm of the belief that this rapid deterioration, this casual sloppy attitude, has become the accepted norm.
We're seeing more and more flop flops, unshaven designer stubble, dress shirts hanging out, back-to-front baseball caps, trainers, track suits, cargo pants and sneakers - not only youths, but gents of my generation.
Restaurants accept anybody. Their clients are abandoning proper dress in droves, while others enforce a watered-down code.
Ramsay scrapped the jacket-and-tie dress code when he relaunched the Savoy Grill in 2003.
The Good Food Guide sparked a debate on dining attire when it dropped all references to dress codes, saying the number of restaurants with one had plunged. Deplorable indeed.
Only 15 or 20 years ago, it was common for high-end restaurants to have strictly enforced dress codes. But those days are gone.
With the fast food outlets, one can understand the casual dress code, but not in the concept of beautiful lounge atmosphere of hotels who have earned a reputation.
In the mid-60s we went out to an upmarket Auckland restaurant with a party of four couples, all dressed semi-formal for the occasion. One of the ladies in our party wore a fashionable pair of slacks with a very short overskirt.
The maitre d' politely informed her that trousers were not allowed. She promptly removed the "offending" item and sauntered into the dining area with an eye-popping entrance in her mini.
When I attended my first Sportsmen of the Year Awards, the invitation read "black tie" - black tie it was. Most men arrived wearing tuxedos, the rest were acceptable with dark lounge suit and black tie.
In recent years the dressing down of this elite event is staggering, the casual dress standards of sports jacket being accepted.
When dining at a restaurant, attending the theatre or any semi-formal occasion, I dress in a dark suit, sports jacket or blazer, slacks, tie with matching pocket handkerchief and cuff links. I love dressing up and for the most part have done so to please myself - and of course my wife as a mark of respect.
I dress appropriately for every situation as it is an indication of respect.
What irritates me is the sight of men attending the theatre or at a restaurant dressed as if they had just come straight from the garden - jeans, shirt hanging out and wearing trainers, and not just the thirtysomethings, but men my age. Have they no respect for their womenfolk?
This point was explicitly illustrated recently when I attended a performance of the Imperial Russian Ballet Company's The Nutcracker. The reason? My two young granddaughters from Sharon Howell School of Ballet were on stage.
I was staggered at the general standard of dress; most could have been attending a rugby game. The sight of middle-aged women wearing jeans and men open-neck shirts to a ballet was not only disrespectful to the company but preposterous at best, to say the least.
The sight of men drinking beer from a bottle at restaurants and functions infuriates me - trendy or just macho, uncouth at best. It is acceptable around the barbecue maybe. Even dress standards on city golf courses have declined over the years.
But nowhere is the deterioration in dress standards more egregious than among our state schools and university teaching staff. They would rise in this writer's estimation, along with many parents, if they smartened their appearance by becoming role models.
Teachers who can't be properly dressed are, quite frankly, often worse than their pupils. Not all primary schools have uniforms, which is a shame. Maybe it is all a matter of interpretation. I wonder ...
Noel Gillespie is a Christchurch businessman, writer and author of a number of history books.
