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Once banned, now back: Iran sees timid return of neckties
Dress rules have stoked strong passions in Iran, especially restrictions on women who have long been required to wear modest clothing and headscarves.
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A shopkeeper assists a customer to try on a tie at a clothing shop in the north of Iran's capital Tehran on September 7, 2022. After the fall of the shah in 1979, the Iranian clergy who came to power with Ayatollah Khomeini banned the wearing of neckties because in their eyes they symbolised a subjection to Western culture. Today, ministers, senior civil servants or heads of state-owned companies wear under their suits a shirt with a buttoned, open or Mao collar.
(AFP/AFP)
M
ohammad Javad enters a fashionable shop in well-to-do north Tehran with his mother. For the first time ever he wants a necktie, long banned in Iran as a symbol of Western decadence.
The 27-year-old dentist said he opted for this clothing accessory in hopes of looking his best during the first meeting with his future in-laws.
"In our society, wearing a tie is like wearing a mask before Covid-19 hit," he said as the salesman adjusted his suit. "People would look at you differently because the negative view still remains.
"I think a man looks chic with one. Unfortunately, we Iranians have imposed strange and unnecessary restrictions on ourselves. It'll take time for that to change, but hopefully it will."
Dress rules have stoked strong passions in Iran, especially restrictions on women who have long been required to wear modest clothing and headscarves.
Iran was gripped by unrest, labelled "riots" by the authorities, after the September 16 death in custody of Iranian Kurd Mahsa Amini, 22, following her arrest for an alleged violation of the country's strict dress code for women.
Iran banned the tie for men after the 1979 overthrow of the US-backed monarch as a symbol of Western culture. Although it has made a slow comeback since, government officials and most Iranian men continue to shun the cravat.
