As a long time image consultant, who mostly works with Silicon Valley based entrepreneurs and executives, I’ve pondered the brouhaha that erupted this past week everywhere in the media, even in Paris where I’ve been visiting, when Facebook C.E.O. Mark Zuckerberg showed up wearing a hoodie to meet with Wall Street investment brokers.
Behold, those company sweatshirts, those logoed tops that your company issues to you at the annual picnic or outing that seem to somehow multiply in your closet over the years.
Silicon Valley sure is the target of some interesting bull crap, even in my realm of style!
Though I have basically given up on posting comments to information sharing websites like Quora, I’ll occasionally drop by to see what topics people are asking about, and how people are answering those questions.
For most techies in Silicon Valley, if your laptop computers and mobile devices are as badly synched as your clothing is with your lifestyle, you’re in big trouble!
What happens when one of the world’s most handsome, famous, and well-respected violinists dresses like a street person in a Washington, DC subway station? It’s a lesson in image, style, and context.
In planning and preparing for our recently completed mega-trip, I conducted so much research to be sure that our experience would be memorable, just in case we never did it again! I wanted to live every day of this trip like they could be our last ones so there could be no regrets, and that meant doing it up big time.
Before getting on with part two of my take on GQ‘s list of Silicon Valley’s worst dressed men, I must give them a shout out for having created it in the first place. It’s the gift that keeps on giving. If you thought my opinions from last week’s part one were strong, you’ll have to continue the journey as we keep going through the rest of the list here.
Last week, GQ Magazine published its list of the Silicon Valley’s 15 worst dressed men. You go GQ! To be fair, several of the techies listed do not even physically reside in SV. Just the fact that GQ singles out SV as a style influencer proves a point I made in an earlier post rebutting Marc Andreessen’s attitude about the way tech company founders dress. In it, I said, “the world looks to Silicon Valley, not just to see what the next innovation will be, but to see what will become of our apparent lack of style.”
So, let’s zoom in on the Silicon Valley “Style Sinners” who GQ feels could use some polishing in the image department.
A recent Wall Street Journal article questioning how jeans can cost $300 and up caused some Facebook fodder between two colleagues that caught my eye. I didn’t delve into their conversation, but I had previously read the article and thought it was interesting how people lament over the notion of premium denim jeans.
I had to take special notice when Marc Andreessen, co-founder of technology companies such as Netscape and Ning, and co-founder of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, opined to the New York Times Magazine on why tech founders can’t be bothered to appear businesslike.
