Earlier this year, I spoke to menswear writer and consultant Michael B. Dougherty about an article he published, declaring, in no uncertain terms, the end of “personal style”—or rather, the extent to which editors, bloggers, and influencers dictate “personal style” to the masses.
I wanted to pick up this conversation, albeit from a different angle, with Nico Lazaro. A crucial voice of the menswear commentariat, Lazaro was a founding member of Grailed, and spent the last few years heading up brand storytelling for Buck Mason. He also runs a popular Substack called The Bengal Stripe, where a recent post caught my attention: “Style Authority Is a Lie.”
Like Dougherty, Lazaro is of the mind that quote-unquote “real” style is much more a byproduct of the life you lead than any adherence to the advice of voices on high—particularly when the TikTok-ificaiton of menswear (see also: everything) has laid bare the relative inefficacy of those voices in the first place.
“The so-called authorities look more like weather vanes than prophets,” Lazaro argues. “It seems like just yesterday the industry decided slim trousers were dead; now those on the fringe are telling you wide trousers are already over. Authority dissolves the moment you realize it’s just taste in motion, constantly repositioned for clicks, engagement, or sales.”
Taken by this sentiment, I called Lazaro to talk about his article, trend cycle velocity, style experimentation, and the value (or non-value) of gatekeepers in 2025.
Apropos of your overall claim here, I find there to be a real oversaturation of “style authorities” now, to the point where it’s difficult to hear the signal through the noise. How does one respond to that?
What I’ve found helpful is not necessarily hard and fast rules, but more inspiration and guidance. One of the people [I looked to] was Glenn O’Brien, who was the original style guy at GQ. If you look at the advice he was giving, a lot of it wasn’t about the clothes, but more about how you carry yourself and develop confidence. If you’re able to have a clear idea of what your values are and what you bring to the table, the clothes kind of come after that—as a natural extension of who you are as a person.
Something you bring up in the article is the speed with which certain menswear “takes” or trends age nowadays. Can you talk about that a bit?
The world of menswear has been cracked open. With the advent of TikTok, there’s so much exposure which leads to quicker fatigue. And because there’s less substance there, it’s more about virality, and catching your eye, and being exciting in the moment.
You look at older men that dress well and that’s something they’ve developed over a very long period of time. When I think back to what got me inspired about fashion, it was kids in skinny jeans. But that hasn’t lasted for me. What has lasted is being inspired by the way my grandparents’ generation dressed, and the older men I was around growing up just having this casual confidence in how they presented themselves to the world. There are other elements at play there beyond the clothes that you need to cultivate if you want to have a real, enduring sense of style.
To what you’re describing, do you think about ways that guys might slow these cycles down?
Yeah, I think the more you can educate and inform yourself [the better]. I don’t mean reading books and stuff, but when it comes to developing personal style, I think you need to go through a period of exploration, understanding your body and how things fit you, how you like to move around in the world and whether your clothes add to that or take away from it.
You need to try things. I can say for myself that [the reason] why people trust and value my opinion now is because I did a lot of experimentation. A lot of that is failure, a lot of it is walking out the door and looking dumb and feeling embarrassed. But that’ll lead you to the stuff you feel good about.
In general, do you think we’re heading towards a place of greater experimentation?
The optimist in me is saying, because there’s so much exposure and fatigue, there’s no rules at this point. You can kind of wear whatever you want, and people might have opinions on that, but no one’s going to say you’re on-trend or not.
This is sort of a straw man argument, but I feel like I’ve seen more and more takes that along the lines of “Gatekeepers are good, actually.” What do you make of that?
I don’t think gatekeeping has much of a place anymore. I think that gatekeeping can be a way to try to preserve things in amber. And I don’t think that’s necessarily the healthiest way to move through the world. It’s important to understand history and the context that gives things value or power. But I don’t think that’s the only valuable part of clothing. And I think breathing new life into things is just as valuable.
There’s always going to be people who ruin things for you. But it’s an interesting time [for said people] to reflect on, like, “Why does that irk you so much?” I do want to see a better-dressed world, but it’s really up to people to take it upon themselves to do the research or not.
Something I took away from your article, too, is that it’s harder than ever to identify what a particular gatekeeper’s real agenda is.
A lot of new voices in this sphere are trying to present themselves as authorities, and for me it was interesting to explore that because it’s perpetuating a sort of false ideology in my mind.
A lot of gatekeeping comes from this desire to maintain some level of authority, but when you look at the bigger picture, [style] is still entirely personal. At the end of the day, no one can take that away from you.
Any last words of wisdom you want to offer?
Style is iterative, and something you’re constantly growing and evolving. Anything you look at and think, “Oh, that’s cool, I wonder if I could pull that off”—just give it a go. What’s the worst that could happen?
This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
My notes: Understand your body, experiment, learn history, don’t worry or care what others think. No rules. Wear whatever you want and makes you feel good…Bravo!