By Jeremy Langmead (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-02-13 10:15

LONDON: For the last few years, I have had to witness a parade of skinny, clear-skinned boys, voices freshly broken, modeling clothes I would have had trouble squeezing into as a student 20 years ago, let alone now as a 42-year-old father of two. Now there was change afoot at the frontline of fashion - the menswear shows - and, as is often the way, these changes will eventually reach the furthest corners of our nation.

Men are dressing like grownups again at fashion shows. Photos courtesy of New York Times Syndicate

The kidult look that has, for the past three or four years, monopolized the catwalks and therefore the high streets - cue hordes of metropolitan men dressing like their children, a sad sight in every sense - may finally be on the way out. There are early signs that fashion-conscious men may start dressing like grownups again. Instead of baggy, low-slung jeans or skintight trousers, the designers are sending models down the catwalk looking like adults: Three-piece suits, loose trousers and coats that actually keep the cold out. Gone are beanie hats and manbags; in are briefcases and spectacles.

Someone in Milan and Paris, the world's two most influential fashion hubs, has recognized that style-conscious metropolitan men with money, usually those from their 30s up, may be wearying of being forced to look as if they want nothing more than to get down with the kids.

Who wants to look like the work experience guy unless they are the work experience guy? More fun surely to look like the boss with the bonus, comfortable in your middle-aged skin, rather than tragically aping the low-slung, hip-hop style of the mail boy?

Despite the numerous ad campaigns pushing cut-price Botox treatments and liposuction, the Austrian spas which charge body-conscious blokes a fortune to eat lentils and examine their poo and the mutterings of "peachfuzz" billionaires such as Facebook's 23-year-old Mark Zuckerberg, who claimed that "younger people are just smarter", grownup men at the cutting edge have finally regained their confidence.

It's not quite a return to the Neanderthal look. Increasing numbers of men moisturize fearlessly, go to the gym, watch what they eat and, as a result, look younger than their fathers did at 40. But, and this is the point, if Milan and Paris have anything to do with it, they can stop trying to dress as if they're about to go on a date with Kate Moss.

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