Hillary Clinton’s wardrobe matters – but not from a fashion perspective

On the Today programme on Radio 4 on Wednesday, Mishal Husain called out ex-Vanity Fair editor Tina Brown for suggesting Hillary Clinton should ditch the “Sgt Pepper trouser suits” and “own her inner bitch … [be] the fierce-faced Hillary with the black shades and the BlackBerry”.

“It’s interesting that you say the clothes matter,” interjected Husain, using the word “interesting” in the double-edged sense that also means “clearly preposterous”. “In the 21st century, to a young feminist … [does] her appearance, the actual clothes she wears, matter?”

Of course the clothes themselves don’t matter. But Brown’s point was that the shades-on, back-of-a-motorcade Hillary is the persona that young female voters “find cool”, and are therefore more likely to vote for. In the era of personality politics, critiquing a politician’s wardrobe is just another way of asking: who would you rather have a pint with? When we discuss what politicians wear, we are talking about the same fundamental issues – what are they really like, what would they be like to hang out with – as when we debate which leader we’d go to the pub with.

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It might be a self-evidently nonsensical way to talk about political allegiance, but there is no denying that modern voters care about what politicians are like as people. What they wear – along with the pint issue, and family photos on holiday, and Gordon Brown’s favourite biscuit – is part of that conversation. And however irrelevant it may seem, it’s a conversation that won’t go away any time soon. Yes, it is sexist that we tend to talk about women in terms of what they wear and men in terms of whether they would get their round in, but both questions are pretty idiotic, so it’s not exactly an inequality battle worth picking.

Brown advised that Hillary should adopt a neutral uniform to starve debate about her outfits of oxygen. The irony is that it is exactly this attempt at a uniform that backfires on female politicians. The “Sgt Pepper trouser suits” that Brown pokes fun at are the look most associated with Clinton, from her days as New York senator and secretary of state, when cheery block colours with a mandarin collar were her trademark look. Defaulting to a signature shape of suit, and varying only the colour, is a sartorial tactic that female politicians such as Clinton and Angela Merkel have borrowed – logically – from the men around them.

What is illogical is the way in which we hold women to a higher standard of style than we do men. Looking presentable and appropriate will pass muster for a man, but we expect more of women. To paraphrase Ginger Rogers, women in politics have to do what the men do, but backwards in high heels and while wearing on-trend yet age-appropriate clothes, patriotically flying the flag for their country’s top design talent and without spending extravagantly. We want them to have the Michelle Obama knack of dressing in a way that is simultaneously formidable and warm. The likability problem is real for Clinton, and clothes are part of it. As Andrew Sullivan wrote in New York magazine two months ago, “the idea of welcoming [Hillary] into your living room for the next four years can seem, at times, positively masochistic”.

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That fashion is a battle Clinton can’t win is illustrated by how often even a strategist of her experience changes tactics. A year ago, when she joined Instagram, posting a rail of clothes in red, white and blue, captioned “Hard choices”, it seemed a sign that she was ready to engage with style and visual messaging. (She has a strong support base within the US fashion industry. Anna Wintour is a formidable fundraiser on her behalf; Marc Jacobs wore a Vote Hillary T-shirt at his most recent New York fashion week show.) Within six months, however, she had battened down the sartorial hatches, sticking to plain, muted colours and banishing her once-signature pearls.

Recently, her wardrobe has stepped back up a gear – the high sophistication (and accompanying $12,000 price tag) of a Giorgio Armani jacket she wore in April raised some eyebrows, while a newly acquired taste for white jackets has led to comparisons to Olivia Pope, Kerry Washington’s political fixer character in the TV drama Scandal, and speculation that Clinton was hoping to project a “new beginnings” message with the colour of purity. Clothes are never just about clothes. But more to the point is that politics, these days, is rarely just about politics.