Before Mark Zuckerberg’s glow-up, you’d only ever imagine seeing the Facebook founder in ill-fitting jeans and tees. Zuck’s nonchalance for getting dressed helped to usher in the era of the Tech Bro Fit: hoodies worn to C-suite meetings; too-tight athleisure while sitting around a ping-pong table in the cafeteria—you know the look. But now that Zuck’s taken a liking to cooler clothes (capital-F fashion, even), are other techies ready to ditch their stretchy Lululemon pants for something more fitting for someone with multiple zeroes in their back account? If the Lululemon suit catches on, we’re thinking no.
But wait: Lululemon makes suits? You mean the brand with the flagship ABC pants? (Please don’t make us remind you what “ABC” stands for.) Yes, we were just as amused by the athleisure brand’s foray into formalwear, until we realized this is exactly what the archetypal Lululemon man wants from their clothes: Something stretchy that, from afar, can pass off as workwear (no, not that workwear). And, since we’re big on suits here at GQ, we needed to see if Lululemon could produce a Big Fit™.
Lululemon excels at producing a handful of fabrics—moisture-wicking Warpstreme, durable Utilitech, breezy WovenAir—and fashioning them into any number of silhouettes. For its suit, Lululemon opted for New Venture, a lightweight, water-repelling, and almost-wrinkle-free fabric that actually lends itself quite well to suiting. This is quite literally the ideal fabric for the guy who’s constantly finding himself at the airport thanks to the material’s ability to avoid getting too wrinkly, and it folds down to fit in a carry-on or duffel bag. Some aspects of the suiting feel a little lax: The blazer has exterior slant pockets, a zippered interior pocket, and even mesh paneling—all of which contribute to the idea that this is a “casual blazer.” (Not to be confused with a blazer that can be worn casually.)
Tyler Chin
