What’s so great about the wardrobe of Succession?

The great joy of HBO’s Succession is not in debating whether its creator Jesse Armstrong is the natural heir to Shakespeare (he’s not), nor which cast member should be garlanded with Emmys (Matthew Macfadyen, always), it’s in dissecting the real or imagined codes in every scene. In a binge-watch era, the opportunity to digest each crumb of trivia alongside others is a rare and delicious pleasure, one that has been cruelly eroded by the streaming age. Viewers abhor a vacuum, so the weekly gap between instalments has been filled with forums, threads and TikToks in pursuit of hidden meaning in each gesture, detail and mobile phone. To wit, I am especially grateful to @drinkwithrapha (aka sommelier Rapha Ventresca), who offers a devastating analysis of the psychological significance of Connor Roy’s choice of wine (Château Haut-Brion).

As a former fashion critic, however, it is the clothes that most excite me. The influence of the “Succession wardrobe” has been a phenomenon rare for a TV show, with the exception of something like Sex and the City, in which the clothes were actually the star. Mad Men may have revived the double-breasted blazer, Peaky Blinders may have inspired a few blokes to get a haircut, but the Succession wardrobe has been linked to everything from the rise of neutral palettes to the return of “normcore” (see Kendall’s gilets) and the current preoccupation with quiet luxury and extremely “boring” clothes.

In particular, Succession has brought attention to the rise of “stealth wealth”, the trend whereby the super-rich eschew flashy logos for the more subtle branding of vicuña by Loro Piana, swaths of Himalayan cashmere and unbranded but exorbitantly pricey bags. Last month, Zegna released a new campaign with Kieran Culkin (the hilarious sexual deviant Roman Roy) to sell its very stealthy £745 hybrid sneaker The Triple Stitch, which, the brand says, is worn “everywhere, from private jets and boardrooms” and is often seen “on the next generation of leaders around the world”.

But despite the focus the show has thrown on men’s tailoring and the new professional wardrobe, it is Shiv who has emerged as the most confusing and frustrating tastemaker of them all. The youngest and only female of the sibling pretenders, Shiv has enjoyed the most dramatic transformation. In season one she was the liberal outlier on the fringes of her father’s empire. She has since become the most nakedly determined to take the crown. Gone are the Titania tresses and hippie knits that characterised her first appearances. Gone also are the backless dresses and flashes of naked flesh. As Shiv’s emotional investment in her future has become more complicated, so too has her wardrobe been on a journey of its own.

As Shiv’s emotional investment in her future has become more complicated, so too has her wardrobe been on a journey of its own

Currently, as the tourniquet of succession grows ever tighter, Shiv has assumed a mantle of power suiting and covered-up-ness that belies her vulnerability as she operates, increasingly, alone. Her clothes have become a suit of armour: in episode three (at arguably her weakest moment) she wore a Tom Ford blazer fastened with a huge padlock, while the way her blunt bob meets the point at which her polo hits her jawline puts me in mind of Joan of Arc.

Will Shiv be the sacrificial martyr of Succession? Or will all these cookies turn to crumbs? I’ve never quite forgiven her for wearing a revolting Ted Baker dress to the season three Italian wedding — such a peculiar lapse in judgment that I assumed all efforts to understand her sartorial psychology must be in vain.

Even so, Shiv’s wardrobe holds a strange fascination for many women. And while most of her clothes may come from luxury brands such as Gabriela Hearst and Sportmax, I suspect many are drawn to Shiv less for her “stealth wealth” power uniforms than for her more everywoman style.

Shiv is a rare figure on TV in that she is an extremely powerful professional who is neither conventionally Hollywood beautiful nor stick-insect thin. Sarah Snook, who plays her, once declared she cannot be “fucked subscribing to an unrealistic beauty standard that . . . makes more women unhappy because they feel like they can’t attain something that’s not actually realistic anyway”.

Underneath the flesh-coloured, body-contouring base layers and high-waisted trousers, Shiv has an earthy sensuality that makes her way more accessible and sympathetic than first it seems. She doesn’t always make great wardrobe choices; she trips over in stilettos and insists on wearing nasty, floppy hats. She’s also strangely fragile, her pale, freckled skin always on the brink of burn. She looks like the sort of person who gets savaged by mosquitoes, because bugs don’t care who’s a billionaire.

Shiv is my favourite sartorial conundrum. Every time I think I’ve got her number, she confounds me with another maddening choice. She’s either the manifestation of the most brilliantly devious wardrobe mistress or the result of a costumier who very often drops the ball. Unlike the other characters, who have worn a more consistent uniform, Shiv’s clothes are chaotic, inconsistent and often catastrophic. Her clothes are a costume for a character who can’t reveal herself completely or simply doesn’t know herself at all. Maybe that’s a good thing. She drives me bloody mad. But maybe out of chaos will come restitution. Maybe she will ultimately come good.

Email Jo at [email protected]

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