Award-winning essayist, style columnist, and noted sentimentalist JJ Lee has spent his summer asking Canadians the thought-provoking question, “What is the real meaning behind the clothing that we put on every day?”
For two months, his CBC radio show Head to Toe explored the personal stories, social science, and hidden meanings behind the clothes that Canadians wear, and the full catalogue of shows is now available online at CBC.ca.
“One thing that I’ve been really focused on,” Lee explains, “is how early sportscasters figured out how to convey baseball on the radio. Boxing on the radio is an excellent experience, too. I would love to be considered the person who was able to bring fashion alive on radio.”
“It’s a vain hope,” he adds with a laugh.
Lee grew up on Montreal’s South Shore. He studied fine arts at Concordia University and holds a Masters of Architecture degree from the University of British Columbia.
In 2006, left a job at CBC to apprentice at Vancouver’s legendary Modernize Tailors shop in Chinatown.
He then published the gripping memoir The Measure of a Man: The Story of a Father, a Son, and a Suit, which chronicled his quest to honour and understand his father – a hard-working, hard-drinking restaurateur who passed away in 2001 at the age of 52.
The book was shortlisted for the 2011 Governor-General’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction.
Lee also writes about menswear for The National Post and fashion and personal essays for ELLE Canada from his home in New Westminster, which he shares with his wife and twin boys.
When he arrives for his interview WE Vancouver, Lee is wearing a blue-on-blue seersucker jacket from the Gap and a pink Oxford Tommy Hilfiger button down (of which he shortened the sleeves, removed all the logos, and tailored along the side seams). This is anchored by blue Old Navy chinos and deadstock Dack’s that lie somewhere between a Gucci loafer and a topsider. They’re brown and weathered, which is important.
He was probably wearing something very similar when two Definitely Not The Opera producers called him from their CBC headquarters in Winnipeg to pitch him Head to Toe.
At that point, Lee had been out of broadcasting for a long time. He was still writing, but says a desire to “be out in the real world again” led him to seek employment at New Westminster’s last video store, as well. (He took a leave of absence to shoot the show).
In his time clerking behind the counter, Lee says his penchant for affable jackets and bow ties made a noticeable impression on his customers.
“I’m hyper approachable,” he says, the words sparking off his lips with the electricity of a live wire. “That’s my goal, even when I’m not working in journalism – I’m always leaving bread crumbs for you to find a way to me, and for me to find a way to you. I’m always trying to wear something that makes you want to talk to me.”
JJ Lee is not dressing for everyone else, he’s dressing to meet everyone else.
So when CBC needed a streeter to stop pedestrians and talk fashion, Lee was the ace up their sleeve.
For two months, he confronted the fashion fears and foibles of Canadians along such topics as “what revealing clothing reveals about you”, and whether your work uniform is “actually doing its job”, and married that with hard science from sociologists, psychologists, historians, and culture critics, and studies from think tanks such as Harvard.
By exploring the hidden messages behind Canada’s fashion choices, Lee (who is quick to point out that he isn’t big on fashion, he simply loves clothes) says he was attempting to put the country’s inner self and outer appearance in synch.
With fashion-centric television shows such as Mad Men and Sex in the City drawing in millions of viewers over the last decade, people are more aware than ever about the power of fashion, but not necessarily more equipped to wield it.
“I know a lot of people who dress up with great misery. A lot of self doubt. A lot of voices from the past,” he says quietly. “They dress a certain way to protect themselves against those denigrating voices. So part of what I like to do is to help people and give them the power and the language, verbally and in the expression of their clothing.”
Because sometimes our thoughts, much like a suit, just need a little alteration.
More with JJ Lee
On patina.
"I think we should all be like brown leather. Brown leather marks the past better than black. Black just looks black or worn, whereas brown becomes a patina of experiences. Even when you buff it up, it shows the scratches beneath the buffing and shows so much depth."
On the language of fashion.
"People know more and know how to say more about clothing than ever before. People buy more clothes than ever before. People see more images and discussion online about clothes than ever before. We're swamped in it. Maybe even too much. Men can talk about hemlines and denim yokes, and whether its selvage or not. When that happens it means something has changed in the culture."
On fashion unicorns.
"Those master dressers have what some people call the third eye – the ability to know what they look like without the aid of a mirror. It sounds silly, but the reason why mirrors aren't good reporters of how we're dressed is that you can't capture movement. And we tend to stand too close to them! No one actually sees us the way a mirror sees us, from head to toe. Fantastic dressers understand 'I'm going to have to raise my arm, I'm going to have to turn, twist, I'm always moving…' The clothing is part of that movement."
On sentimentalism.
"When you have a really great garment that makes you think about the past, it lets you become a time traveller. The past and the present come together in a way that's really special."
On choice.
"We're always making choices, but when we choose to reveal parts of our body, what are we saying? What are we expressing? What are we showing off? I discovered there are two types of people who like to show their cleavage, for example. There are people who like to talk about the fact that they are showing their cleavage. And then there are people who really like to show their cleavage, but don't want you to talk about it. Or look at it. Which is kind of a wonderful, interesting thing."
On special occasion suits.
"Get drunk in the suit. Have a party. Sweat in it. Have it cleaned. Because then you won't be wearing it for the first time. Wear it til you forget it, and you're wearing it in an unselfconsciously way. You've hailed a taxi, you've spilled something on it, you've done all these things that are actually great for suits. You lived in it. It's a second skin."
On the nature of clothing.
"A lot of the things that we do in dress and clothing and in the expectation of dressing well, is actually counterintuitive. Clothes have a lot vestigial features on them that you're not supposed to use, you're just supposed to look at it. We have buttons on our sleeves that we don't ever open, there are buttons on suit jackets that don't need to be closed. There are vents for riding on horses that we never ride anymore. Those are good examples of the confusing nature of dress and the practice of dress. The garments themselves are quite simple, but how we treat them an how we view them is quite complicated. On Head to Toe we try to uncover all these anxieties, problems, and conflicts."
