A point that I may not have stressed in past blogs in this series about business casual is that there is good business casual and there is bad business casual – but then there is GQ business casual that may not work for everyone. One thing for sure is that good business casual still means “dressing for success in relaxed business attire” and bad business casual means “going out of business soon.” Those are comments I overheard one of Telsec’s office space Toronto clients say in the kitchen to another Toronto office space client after reading this blog series. Neither office space for rent Toronto tenant knew that the third person in the kitchen was the person who wrote the blogs. I guess I just outed myself and my cover is busted.

The point of this blog is to demonstrate what is bad business casual and how you can improve your casual business attire game. So here are some basic ways you can dress business casual and still be dressing for success:

  • Keep it crisp.
  • Keep your business casual attire separate from the streetwear clothes you would generally wear for a casual date or for meeting friends.
  • As your business casual clothes lose their lustre, move them to being your street wear and buy new business attire.
  • Make sure the collars on your shirts are crisp and not limply or wrinkled.
  • Your shirt should always be pressed, including the sleeves and cuffs.
  • Your trousers should be pressed and crisp looking and the crease should be sharp.
  • The hem of your trousers should be clean and not stained or tattered.
  • Your shoes should be clean and polished, but never try to pass off the latest style of designer shoes that you would wear to a club, because they are not intended for the office.

While business casual is meant to look dressed down for business, it is still all about business and putting your best foot forward. From reading popular style magazines, an office space Toronto client of ours pointed out that even fashion magazine writers warn readers that their choices of business casual wear should be stylish and professional – but not too stylish in terms of new trends otherwise your customers and clients will not interpret it as business wear. This brings me back to the number one rule of business casual: If you would wear it going out to a nightclub, never try to pass it off as business casual.

Again, I have to mention the importance of keeping a dressy sports coat that is crisp and clean in your office space when you choose to dress business casual. The reason for keeping the sports jacket  is because while dressing business casual at your Toronto office space, there will be times you need to grab a jacket to “up” your look. When you get a unexpected visit from a client, you want to greet them wearing a jacket and take them to your Toronto boardrooms looking the best you can on short notice.