Have you found yourself shunning tight-fitting clothing since the pandemic? Are you spending your entire working life in ‘athleisure’ wear? For many people, particularly remote workers, the pandemic was a time when the home became a place of online work, virtual education, and tech-mediated socialisation. And our wardrobes adapted to the lockdown era with comfort favouring formality. In this episode, we explore the complexities of fashion and grooming during the pandemic and into COVID normal. With my guests, we discuss the legacy effects of the pandemic on workwear and the increasing trend toward casualisation. We also do a deep dive into the gendered dimension of virtual work and question the extent to which the workwear casualisation movement has had an emancipatory effect for women. 

Host: Dr Peter Ghin

Guests

Dr Briony Lipton: Visiting Research Fellow, ANZSOG (ANU Crawford School); Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Sydney Business School

Sulagna Basu: PhD Candidate, University of Sydney

Dr Sophie Lea: Lecturer in Counselling, Monash University, Co-Founder/Director of Kind Schools

Dr Harriette Richards: Lecturer Fashion Enterprise, RMIT. 

Mentioned:

Covid Casual: Refashioning professional attire in the age of remote working:

The Beauty Salon Project

Fashioning founders: Dress and gender in the entrepreneurial ecosystem

Critical Fashion Studies Podcast

Subscribe to Work.Work.Work.

Work Futures Hallmark Research Initiative

If you would like to suggest ideas for future episodes or reach out to us, please email work-futures@unimelb.edu.au