What do you wear to a corporate 9 to 5 when you need an outfit that abides by HR’s dress codes but offers just enough cheek to feel like a middle finger to The Man?
New York City designer Jane Wade has an idea: baggy khaki trousers and a lavender button-down with a belt that slashes across the waist and a collar that puddles down the left shoulder. She describes the outfit—look eight from her namesake brand's Fall 2024 show—over Zoom as "a perversion of classic office staples." It might even stave off the dread of being a cog in the ever-grinding corporate machine.
The designer likes dissecting the age-old dilemma of what to wear to work. "I've always had this fascination with the different uniforms of the American working class and corporate workwear," she says with perhaps the most excitement ever expressed for clothing synonymous with stale coffee and fluorescent lighting.
Every collection from her 2022-launched label presents a cast of characters across the white- and blue-collar landscape. Think The Office, only without the doldrums of paper sales and none of Michael Scott’s antics. But a lot more underboob and button-down shirts turned into bustiers.
Wade sets the scene while tuning in from her NYC studio; “in a collection, you'll see the courier or the elevator operator in something more utilitarian,” like gorp-y cargo pants and thick-soled Salomon sneakers, Sharp, pin-tucked blazers and serious skirt suits signal the “executive, higher-level, CEO-type office people.” The over-eager intern “is wearing something a little flirty that’s inappropriately sexy for work—a button-down with her bra sticking out.” In TikTok terms, she’s the office siren.
"They’re characters Wade knows well. “I worked in corporate fashion alongside every single one of these archetypes,”—the 29-year-old cut her teeth assistant designing at Alexander Wang—“but my interest in workwear across the American landscape comes from looking at my parents as working professionals." The Portland native grew up watching her mother, a hairdresser, wear Etro and Comme des Garçons suiting while her dad, a contractor, did his job in Dickies, Carhartt, and tool belts. Two totally opposite examples of workwear, but each helped her parents clock in and out without complication.
Wade also gets a thrill out of challenging the many, many rules about what you can and absolutely cannot wear in the workplace. “What even is professionalism in the workplace, and who sets that standard? Can I be sexy and show a little skin at work? Or will no one take me seriously and deem me professional because I'm expressing myself, even though I'm equally excellent at my job?” That tension between a worker’s individuality and the expectations of professionalism is the sweet spot where Jane Wade lives.
Can I be sexy and show a little skin at work? Or will no one take me seriously because I'm expressing myself, even though I'm equally excellent at my job?
Jane Wade
Wade is a relatively new name in the industry—her official, on-calendar debut at New York Fashion Week was last season—but she operates with a veteran's business acumen and foresight. “At the end of the day, the collections always begin from a commercial lens, and I believe our archetypes make the collections relatable [to consumers]. You see our girl on the runway in a polished blazer carrying coffee and a stack of binders, and you're like, ‘I know that girl. I am that girl.’” As a shopper, you’re less likely to regret splurging on a blazer when you can already envision yourself in the work outfit.
Wade’s business acumen impressed the buyers at Bergdorf Goodman, who offered her an exclusive two-season partnership in 2023, which is not common for an under-one-year-old brand to receive two wholesale orders fresh out of the gate. Her work also caught Camila Cabello’s eye; Wade custom-made a bag out of a block of ice and a preserved copper rose for the singer’s 2024 Met Gala look. (Yes, it was real ice.)
The designer credits her time working at the bridal brand Danielle Frankel and womenswear label Elena Velez for informing her keen business mind. She watched first-hand as Frankel and Velez transitioned from emerging indie darlings to recognized industry names after winning the top prize of the prestige independent designer incubator, the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund. The latter is especially prescient, considering Wade is currently a finalist for the fund’s 2024 round.
“Being able to tap into the resources I currently have, regardless of whether or not I win the fund’s dollar prize,”—it's $300,000, by the way—“is the most advantageous thing for me. But I am definitely manifesting the top spot,” Wade says, showing the camera her crossed fingers.
Manifesting certainly won’t hurt Wade’s chances of winning the prize, but her work is enough to stand alone. There’s a phenomenal, pure cotton denim dress in her upcoming Spring 2025 that can be unbuttoned into two separate functional pieces: a bustier top and a matching mini skirt. “I love the BOGO of it all,” Wade says. “As a shopper, if I see something like this dress and realize, ‘Oh, I'm getting this incredible skirt and top that’s pre-styled for me, but I can also layer this into my closet in a thousand other ways. I'm investing in this $1,000 piece.’”
She already has a name for the Jane Wade-specific approach to convertible clothing that gives the wearer complete control. “We call it modesty modularity,” says Wade. “As a brand, we’re developing under the lens of what is deemed professional in the workplace and how we can grow that standard into something more expressive than repressive.”
Wade references a white hook-and-eye wrap shirt from her Spring 2025 collection, which shows on September 12 during NYFW, to illustrate the concept that’s become her brand signature. “You could button the shirt all the way up to the collar for a work meeting at 3 p.m., but then come 4 p.m.”—Wade pantomimes undoing a closure—“and then at 5 p.m.”—two more here—“you’re ready for after-work drinks.”
Slogging through a workday filled with meetings and mindless water cooler chit-chat can still be a bore. But a shirt that’s secretly a going-out top, one button away from freedom and a cocktail, certainly helps combat the dread.
