Navy blue suit - okay for a family funeral?

[Shit Good Nose]

Going to an uncle's funeral next week and went to dig out my black suit earlier but couldn't find it.  Have since spent the last few hours searching the house for it and can't find it anywhere.  I don't have the time (or money) to go out and get a new suit beforehand, which just leaves my navy blue suit which I normally wear for weddings and job interviews.

It's a plain unpatterned matte blue, and I have a dark blue tie to go with it.

Okay, or inappropriate?

Serious and funny answers welcome.

[thenoise]

Anything goes nowadays, some people refuse to wear black. Have you been given a dress code? So long as you wear the black long tie it's acceptable funeral wear. Other than than - smart trousers and overcoat, dark v-neck jumper, your school blazer cos your parents won't buy you a proper suit. Whatever.

[Shit Good Nose]

Sooooo...black pvc catsuit and thigh boots okay then?

Ballgag as well, natch.

[pancreas]

[tag] mumsnet guest thread no. 680 [/tag]

[Voltan (Man of Steel)]

I wore a dark grey suit, a white shirt and a black tie to my mother's funeral (but I'm as common as shit so nobody would expect better). But seriously, nobody is going to be sitting in judgment of your suit at a family funeral unless they're a twat: a navy suit sounds perfectly acceptable.

[Rev+]

Unless you've been told it's ultra-traditional I'd say a suit is a bit too formal.  All of the ones I've been to in recent years have been business casual.

[Shit Good Nose]

Unless you've been told it's ultra-traditional I'd say a suit is a bit too formal.  All of the ones I've been to in recent years have been business casual.

There's no dress code, but a suit is a matter of personal principle for me at funerals, whether it's family, friend or work colleague.

[undeliberated]

Might be a bit drab: zhuzh things up with a picture tie.

[Lemming]

Went to one recently for some randomly generated Great Aunt I'd never heard of or met and insisted on going in my dress, wig, what-have-you. I've always been horrifically averse to suits, so funeral dress codes have been a problem for me before, but never like this.

The looks of hate from people allegedly related to me who I'd never met were unreal. Most awkward was a great aunt/uncle I'd last seen years ago who had a real "what the fuck" moment when they caught sight of me.

I would suggest from this that you don't crossdress for the funeral, if that was ever on the cards to start with.

Maybe get geared up with some black - and I mean SERIOUSLY dark black - trousers. The formal aura of them should distract everyone from the crazy, wacky, what-the-holy-fuck-are-you-thinking, are-you-trying-to-mock-the-dead navy blue suit you'll be showing up in.

[Shit Good Nose]

Might be a bit drab: zhuzh things up with a picture tie.

I was thinking one of those spinning bow ties.

[Pranet]

One of the only instructions my dad gave about his funeral was that he didn't care what people wore to it. Well done dad I thought. I've never really got dress codes at all, so this is obviously something lacking in me. But the thought that wearing a suit that is not quite dark enough is some sort of unforgivable mark of disrespect to someone's memory I don't understand. But please don't listen to me on this.

[pancreas]

I was thinking one of those spinning bow ties.

can you not get a tie made printed with a photo of the deceased

[thraxx]

Ask Peter Sissons if you can borrow his tie.

[ziggy starbucks]

never wear a skinny tie to a funeral or indeed any occasion.

[greencalx]

Like you I have a single, dark blue, suit which is my all purpose weddings, graduations, disciplinary hearings and, indeed, funeral suit. I wore it to my dad's funeral, and it was fine. Did get a new tie though, on my wife's instructions.

[Urinal Cake]

With black shoes it should be fine. Though it depends on how traditional your family is- basically will they bitch to you in your face or will they whisper behind your back?

Brown shoes and blue suits are for cunts who should be dead.

[Dr Trouser]

Fine as long as you don't wear brown shoes with it.

Edit: what they said above

[jobotic]

How do you lose a suit?

I don't think the dead expect anyone to buy a new suit just to pay their respects. No disrespect.

[Urinal Cake]

Well funerals are expensive with family squabbling about who pays what and how much to pay. It takes one pissed off relative to think- I paid several hundred pounds to see X off and this motherfucker can't even make the effort to buy a cheap black suit.

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Apologies if I sound narrow minded or anything, but cross dressing to a funeral, especially to a funeral where very few of the attendees know who you are, just seems a bit mad to me.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Simply just keep on insisting it's black. You know, like Rachael Dolezal.

[Pijlstaart]

I wore a short-sleeved check shirt to grandpappy's funeral as it was the most formal thing I had. I did the buttons up though, which is proper, and I did them up in a very sombre way, to keep the tone. Uncle wore a suit and thought he was better than me, but he wasn't, as he'd been staying in grandpappy's living room on a camp bed in boxer shorts with no elastic, and we'd all seen the entirety of his bum and upper legs through the top of his sagging underwear as he sprawled on the camp bed. Luckily Grandpappy was a renowned back garden nudist, because when he wore a suit you couldn't take your eyes off the cartoonish quantities of dandruff that coated him like a powdered doughnut, and indeed if grandpappy the funny corpse had been wearing a suit in his little coffin home (#tinyhome #cozy #simpleliving), it would've needed a spillway built in to run off the excess dandruff.

[Spoon of Ploff]

I've got a black suit you can borrow.... H-he won't be needing it anymore.....


.... Why Lord WHY!!?

[Replies From View]

Can't you dip the navy blue suit into a vat of black ink?

Of course you can but you are sooooo lazy.

[shiftwork2]

It's fine, mandatory black went away ten or twenty years ago.  It is about wearing something comfortable and respectful.  You've got enough to worry about already.

Another funereal improvement is that the little motorised curtains don't always close after the ceremony depending on the organiser's wishes.  For a long time this macabre 'Th-th-th that's All Folks!' ritual signalled the end of a cremation service, leaving the unpleasant impression of a box with your dad in trundling off along rollers towards a furnace.  Seems to have gone now, thankfully.

[Replies From View]

Another funereal improvement is that the little motorised curtains don't always close after the ceremony depending on the organiser's wishes.  For a long time this macabre 'Th-th-th that's All Folks!' ritual signalled the end of a cremation service, leaving the unpleasant impression of a box with your dad in trundling off along rollers towards a furnace.  Seems to have gone now, thankfully.

I tend to agree, but it feels equally bad to just walk out of the chapel, leaving the coffin on its own.  Almost a kind of abandonment and an unpleasant lack of closure.

There needs to be a middle ground, really.  Curtains silently closing would be nice without all the mechanical ratcheting sounds that follow (which induce a horrible sense of the physical body being 'processed').


I have heard that it can all be made silent and pleasant, but only if the mourners bother to dress properly for the occasion.

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

I went to one funeral in a suit without the jacket, as it no longer fit me, which didn't seem to upset anyone. It wasn't a family funeral, though and I was sitting near the back of the church.

I wore my grey suit to my best friend's funeral. His wife had said that black wasn't mandatory,  but I was the only pallbearer not wearing it.

Ultimately it's down to your family. Do you have any particularly uptight relatives?

Condolences.

[Thomas]

Do you have any particularly uptight relatives?

Not any more.

[Shit Good Nose]

Not any more.

Heh.


Nah, I'm sure it'll be fine.  I've just never not had a black suit for a funeral, and I've never paid much attention to what colour the other blokes were wearing, so it's a bit unknown territory for me.

As for how I managed to lose a suit - we've had several major spring cleans since I last wore it, so it could have easily gone down a charity shop or the tip by accident when I put it to one side in a box and then forgot to take it out.

[Replies From View]

Take your pick from this range.  Buy enough to fill a bathtub.



And remember the old saying:  The amount of money you don't spend on black ink to stain your navy blue suit is only equal to the lack of any love you have for the person who has died.

(The old saying doesn't specify "uncle" because it is meant to be applicable to many people in the same boat.)