Men's Professional Wardrobe Essentials

There exists an unwritten rule in the world of professional dress that says we need to impress one another each day we walk in the office door.It may not be stated as strongly at your place of business, but you must know that daily you are being given the once over by your co-workers.

With that said, here are a few essentials for every businessman that I have found I cannot be without.For starters, four quality suits.One in black, one in blue, one in tan and one in dark brown.You need these four suits to change with the seasons.Wear the black one to funerals and higher-powered meetings.Any color is fine for the important meetings but if you only have those type of meetings once and a while, wear the black one.The blue suit can be worn to any business setting and I would get this suit in pin stripes.Actually, I would get at least two in pin stripes, but if you're doing just one, make it the blue suit because it will be the most classy.The dark brown can be worn in most settings just as the blue suit.The tan suit is for spring, summer and early fall, never wear it in the winter-especially if you live in colder climates.My last comment about suits is that one should also have suspenders.Not the clip on suspenders but the real ones that need to have buttons sewn into the trousers.Most tailors will put these in at no charge when they are hemming the suit.

Other essentials for businessmen are three colors of belts and matching shoes in brown, black and burgundy.You will wear the brown or burgundy belts and shoes with blue and khaki outfits and the black with black outfits.Here's the catch.With the blue and black suits you need to wear the black belt/shoes and with the brown and tan suits, wear the brown or burgundy belt/shoes.Not wearing a belt with suspenders should be obvious but I've seen men wear both.

Purchase every color shirt you can afford.Yes guys, even pink.Have at least five quality white shirts so you will always have a shirt to fall back on if you're not in the mood for a colored shirt one day.You can generally wear blue, white, tan, and burgundy shirts with your tan or brown suit and white goes best under black suits.The blue suit can have white, yellow, tan or that illustrious pink shirt.Your tie must, must, must have a hint of the shirt color in it in order to match.Even if the tie only has a border around the flowers in white that is enough to wear it with a white shirt.Have a lot of ties too.Try to rotate your ties, literally on your tie rack so you do not habitually wear the same tie on Tuesday's.You can get quality ties very low cost at discount stores that sell last season's styles, but you will keep them for years, so being a few months late is fine.

A few other essentials include a pair of cufflinks, a neutral color trench coat, goulashes for your nice new shoes, a shoe shine kit to shine those shoes once a week, a shoe buffing cloth for midweek touch-ups (I take them from hotels because they're great), a comb and mirror in your desk, and tissues in each pocket of your suit pants if your hands get sweaty in intimidating situations like mine do.A couple of last tips are to never ever wear black socks with blue slacks and vice versa and always be sure to use the full length mirror to ensure you are professionally dressed from head to toe.