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Canadian P.M. Brian Mulroney and U.S. Pres. Ronald Reagan in black tie in Quebec, Canada, March 18, 1985.

The tuxedo is a man's dress suit of clothes in the semi-formal, black tie evening dress convention. Typically, the tuxedo suit — of light-weight black or midnight blue wool — comprises a single-breasted, single-button stance, peaked-lapel coat and matching trousers with side seams decorated with an inch-wide cloth ribbon matching the lapel facing. A white dress shirt with linked cuffs, and a black, gross-grain bow tie, cummerbund, and shoes.

The tuxedo's sartorial details — cloth-covered or plain coat buttons; ruffle-, pleated-, or placket-front shirt; slipper, moccasin, or Oxford lace-up shoes; et cetera — are particular to the man's taste, not de rigueur, as in a uniform.

Etymologically, tuxedo, tux, and dinner jacket are the American words for this semi-formal evening dress. The former are the mainstream and colloquial usages, the latter is specific to the Anglophile Northeast U.S. — all three denote and connote the complete suit of clothes. Dinner jacket and black tie are the British English equivalents.

The tuxedo's history dates from 1860, when Henry Poole & Co. (Savile Row's founders), confected a short smoking jacket for the Prince of Wales (Edward VII of the United Kingdom) to wear to informal dinner parties. Per sartorial legend, in spring of 1886, because the Prince fancied Cora Potter, he invited her husband, James Potter, a rich New Yorker, to Sandringham house, his Norfolk hunting estate. When Potter asked the Prince's dinner dress recommendation, he sent Potter to Henry Poole and Co., in London. On returning to New York, Potter's dinner suit proved popular at the Tuxedo Park Club; the club men copied him, soon making it their informal dining uniform.

Linguistically, the word tuxedo pre-dates dinner jacket by two years, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. Moreover, in the U.S., tuxedo is inaccurately used to denote any form of formal dress or semi-formal dress including white tie, morning dress, and strollers.

• White tie
• Black tie
• formal attire
• suit
• morning dress

• Origin of the tuxedo & Henry Poole
• Henry Poole & Co
• The Essential Black Tie Guide
• Buying a Tuxedo