Gen Z Is Entering the Office. Here’s What They’re Wearing.

Gen Z’s dislike of millennials’ skinny jeans has been one of the most documented generational feuds on the internet, so it doesn’t come as a surprise that when it comes to workwear, they’re opting for wide-leg trousers.

“Comfort is such a huge trend right now,” Sommyyah Awan, a content creator who shares advice on luxury and corporate fashion with her 365,000 TikTok followers, told Business Insider.

A big part of that may be a lasting impact of the work-from-home days, when Gen Zers logged in to their computers, for school or work, wearing athleisure or pajama-like loungewear, Awan said.

With the new office generation not having a “before” to compare to, this is what they’re most used to.

“So comfort — whether it was wide-leg jeans or loose tops or dresses that flow a bit more, or flat shoes — translated well into everyday wear,” Anwan said.

As young people define their personal style and brand through mood boards or social-media inspiration, some are finding it most accessible to incorporate elements of those aesthetics into work through functional accessories.

“I love funky blue light glasses, staple earrings, or statement necklaces that you can just pair with a button down or something,” Cornelius, who shares fashion and work advice with her nearly 50,000 followers on TikTok, said. “Don’t be afraid to show your personal style again through those accessories. I think it adds to your brand at work.”

Accessorizing more traditional work outfits can be an affordable and safe way to signal personal style and craft a curated brand for yourself.

“What you wear and how you present yourself at work is part of your personal brand alongside the work that you do,” Cornelius said. “I think that the way I dress has influenced the way that my co-workers view me in, I think, a positive way.”

While past generations might have favored statement florals or contrasting colors, Cornelius said Gen Z leans heavily towards monochromatic hues.

Sticking to a color palette can also make it easier to curate a capsule wardrobe, which can be more cost-efficient for those entering the workforce.

“If you have a capsule wardrobe, you have a few things you cycle through,” Anastasia Gerrans, a content creator with over 1.2 million followers on TikTok and a former marketing consultant, told Business Insider. “I think really playing with colors and thinking about different fabrics and different silhouettes is super helpful because not only can you think about how it displays your personal style, but you can also think about what’s comfortable.”

Additionally, Gen Z is embracing neutral tones: light, dark, beiges, and grays.

Dark blacks and greys or whites and beiges paired together are classic color combinations that can easily find their way into professional wardrobes.

“Longer hemlines have really become more and more popular and just ubiquitous in more casual clothing wear and the non-work context,” Gerrans said.

Part of this could be an economic signal, Gerrans said.

One theory, known as “the hemline index,” posits that the popularity of longer hemlines can be seen as a recession indicator in the United States for the past few decades, calling back to the popularity of mini-skirt styles in the booming 1960s economy. The theory has long been researched and, in part, debunked.

Still, long skirts can be an avenue to showcase different textures and fabrics in an office outfit. Long satin skirts can be a comfortable, stylish, and appropriate way to spice up an office outfit.

A classic styling technique has long suggested pairing loose-fitting items with tighter-fitting ones, and Gen Z’s affinity for wide-leg trousers can only mean one thing: tighter-fitting tops.

Enter the bodysuits.

Long gone are the days of pairing flowy blouses with skinny jeans or tapered pants, Cornelius said.

“Older generations may opt for a little bit more flowy pieces,” she told BI. “You hear in fashion, you wear something tighter and then something looser top versus bottom, and switch it out, and I think Gen Z does carry that theme with them.”

Instead of following outdated style guides that mandate wearing heels or pumps to the office, Gen Z is choosing comfort while still finding ways to make it stylish.

“It’s about making it realistic and not having to change your whole outfit once you get to the office, which I feel was more a focus in the early 2000s and the stereotype of you wear sneakers on the subway and then you put on your heels when you get to the office,” Gerrans said. “Gen Z is more about figuring out maybe a ballet flat or a kitten heel that can be worn for both of those experiences.”

A clean, stylish, and casual leather sneaker is another popular office footwear option for Gen Z.

Anwan said that while it was more common for people to wear heels to the office a decade ago.

“You wore heels or a pair of pumps if you were a woman, or a pair of leather shoes if you were a man. And now people are wearing sneakers,” she said.

While breaking with tradition, fashion sneakers can help members of Gen Z embrace their casual style and prioritize comfort in the office.

Sleek and modern sneaker styles from Adidas, Everlane, Cole Haan, and other brands have found their way into professional settings.

When incorporating colors into their workwear outfits, members of Gen Z opt for color blocking, a styling technique where solid-color pieces are paired together to create visual blocks.

“What I love about Gen Z is how they bring so much color and patterns into what’s comfortable,” Awan said.

Color-blocking can help make single-color items statement pieces.

Most recently, butter yellow seems to be the trendy color of the season, Gerrans said.

“I think the cool thing is, if you like that color on yourself, you could wear it for years on end,” Gerrans said. “It’s just like a nice little pop of color you can incorporate into your wardrobe. It feels similar to burgundy in the last season.”

Gen Z’s love for oversized blazers is well known.

While the trend has been ongoing for years now, it shows no sign of slowing down and is instead becoming a Gen-Z staple that sets the generation apart from others when it comes to workwear trends.

Just like we remember the 1980s for its dramatic shoulder pads, the 2020s are shaping up to be the decade of the oversized blazer.

“It’s often about the version of a certain item [people] can kind of associate with your generation or a different generation,” Gerrans said.

While Gen Z hasn’t fallen in love with blouses yet, looser sweaters and poncho-style tops have slowly been creeping into fashion, especially in office settings.

“Going for a sweater that’s that poncho silhouette where you can have your arms through or drape it over your entire body can be a fun way to add a new silhouette for the workplace without having any sort of compromise on the dress code or the appropriateness of what you’re wearing,” Gerrans said.