# Short Stuff: Leisure Suits

An episode of [Stuff You Should Know](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/278981407), 16 Sep 2026, 11 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pscrb.fm/rss/p/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/a91018a4-ea4f-4130-bf55-ae270180c327/9c70373b-0b66-4a10-9650-b4c5011d380d/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=44710ecc-10bb-48d1-93c7-ae270180c33e

You know the leisure suit, perhaps the tackiest suit to ever be invented. It was so huge in the 70s and spread as wide the lapels of the shirts worn with them. Then, as fast as they hit the scene they disappeared in shame. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:04] Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck,
[0:07] Speaker 1: and Jerry's here too, sitting in for Dave. So that
[0:09] Speaker 1: automatically just converted this to a short stuff, whether you
[0:12] Speaker 1: like it or not, sucker.
[0:15] Speaker 2: Converted.
[0:17] Speaker 1: Very good. And we converted right back into the 70s accidentally, Chuck,
[0:21] Speaker 1: because we're talking about leisure suits. And there's really no
[0:24] Speaker 1: other decade that the leisure suit truly existed in. It's
[0:28] Speaker 1: It's an icon of the 70s. I'm just going to
[0:30] Speaker 1: come out and say it. Face it. Yeah, I agree.
[0:34] Speaker 2: And why do we feel the need to be so
[0:36] Speaker 2: silly in shortstuffs? When did we give ourselves that permission?
[0:39] Speaker 2: From the get?
[0:40] Speaker 1: Pretty much from the get-go, yeah. All right.
[0:42] Speaker 2: They have a different tone, which I enjoy.
[0:45] Speaker 1: Well, yeah. I mean, you don't want just the same thing.
[0:47] Speaker 1: That's crazy.
[0:48] Speaker 2: Yeah, you never hear me going, meep, meep, meep, meep,
[0:51] Speaker 2: converted on a regular episode. Those are far too serious.
[0:55] Speaker 1: For sure. They're dead serious. Very dry. All right.
[0:58] Speaker 2: It also gives us a chance to cover things like
[1:00] Speaker 2: leisure suits, which, you know, we'll talk about sort of
[1:05] Speaker 2: the precursors that weren't really leisure suits but may have
[1:07] Speaker 2: led to them. But the leisure suit that we're really
[1:09] Speaker 2: talking about, obviously, is the one from the mid-70s, which was,
[1:13] Speaker 2: you know, the jacket and pants thing with the wide lapels.
[1:18] Speaker 2: And apparently they came about really in the 70s but
[1:22] Speaker 2: had a lot of precursors, including the 1960s when hippies
[1:25] Speaker 2: were like, Yeah, I got to wear a suit sometimes, too,
[1:29] Speaker 2: but I don't want to be a stuffy. So I
[1:32] Speaker 2: want something a little more chill.
[1:34] Speaker 1: Yeah. And so like the guys in the 70s looked
[1:38] Speaker 1: up from their lines of Coke and said, hey, we
[1:41] Speaker 1: want to be more chill, too. But we still have jobs,
[1:44] Speaker 1: unlike those dirty hippies. So we need to have something
[1:47] Speaker 1: to wear to the office, but also chill. So weirdly,
[1:51] Speaker 1: a leisure suit is or came out of the concept
[1:55] Speaker 1: of hippies. Wearing suits at the office. That was where
[2:01] Speaker 1: the leisure suit was born. Yeah.
[2:04] Speaker 2: Some early maybe inspirations. Maybe some of these are reaches,
[2:07] Speaker 2: but there had been in fashion history, some other kind
[2:11] Speaker 2: of a little more relaxed suits, including in 1800s Britain,
[2:15] Speaker 2: there was something called a lounge suit that was, you know,
[2:18] Speaker 2: that was a very stuffy time when everything matched and
[2:22] Speaker 2: everything was maybe even had like Coattails and things. And
[2:26] Speaker 2: this was just a little less structured, a little softer.
[2:28] Speaker 2: And maybe the jacket and the pants didn't match, which was,
[2:31] Speaker 2: you know, like a very casual look at the time.
[2:33] Speaker 1: Right. It was the original navy blazer with khakis.
[2:37] Speaker 2: Yeah, probably.
[2:38] Speaker 1: Pleated khakis.
[2:40] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[2:40] Speaker 1: So, yeah, that one's kind of like, all right, you
[2:42] Speaker 1: can connect that just in that it was like a less,
[2:46] Speaker 1: like you said, stuffy suit.
[2:48] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[2:48] Speaker 1: And connected a little further, starting in the 1920s, the
[2:52] Speaker 1: Roaring Twenties in the United States, there's something called a
[2:54] Speaker 1: sack suit. And if you go look for images of this,
[2:57] Speaker 1: you're going to see basically every type of suit there is,
[3:00] Speaker 1: all called sack suits. So I'm still not entirely certain
[3:03] Speaker 1: what a sack suit looks like, but it's a tailored,
[3:08] Speaker 1: relaxed type of suit, as opposed to, say, something in
[3:12] Speaker 1: like flannel form. with like sharp lines and stuff like that.
[3:15] Speaker 1: That's the best I can explain it as. Yeah, agreed.
[3:18] Speaker 2: It can get confusing when you're looking this stuff up.
[3:21] Speaker 2: But the leisure suit is noted for polyester and polyester
[3:25] Speaker 2: didn't come around until the 1940s in the UK and
[3:29] Speaker 2: didn't really like get big until the 1970s in the
[3:33] Speaker 2: United States when the leisure suit came around. And maybe
[3:38] Speaker 2: we should take an early break because we have a
[3:41] Speaker 2: little bit of a teaser on Why? Well, I don't
[3:44] Speaker 2: know if it was named this for this reason or not,
[3:46] Speaker 2: but we'll settle it after this.
[3:48] Speaker 1: Okay. Okay. All right.
[4:20] Speaker 2: This is what I don't quite understand. When the first
[4:23] Speaker 2: sort of leisure suit as we know it came around
[4:25] Speaker 2: in the 1970s, it was manufactured by Lee Jeans as
[4:30] Speaker 2: the L-E-E-S-U-R-E suit. And is that where the name came from,
[4:36] Speaker 2: like the leisure suit?
[4:40] Speaker 1: My two cents is yes.
[4:41] Speaker 2: Or were they playing on the fact that it was
[4:43] Speaker 2: a leisure suit and they were like, Lee, sure.
[4:46] Speaker 1: No, I think that they were they were playing. It
[4:49] Speaker 1: was a play on leisure, obviously, but I think they
[4:52] Speaker 1: were the ones who introduced the the word leisure to
[4:56] Speaker 1: the concept of a relaxed suit. That's my take.
[4:59] Speaker 2: OK, I found one ad that I think I found
[5:02] Speaker 2: for the actual Lee Shore suit.
[5:04] Speaker 1: I saw that, too.
[5:05] Speaker 2: And, you know, it's everything you think. It's it's like
[5:08] Speaker 2: a disco stew like guy.
[5:10] Speaker 1: Yes. It was designed by a guy named Jerry Rosengarten,
[5:14] Speaker 1: who was designing for Lee at the time. And I
[5:16] Speaker 1: think I saw it debuted in 1970 on the Lee website,
[5:21] Speaker 1: which is gold. It debuted in 1972. Okay. But regardless,
[5:27] Speaker 1: when Lee debuted it, remember, this is something that guys
[5:30] Speaker 1: were like, we want something relaxed, but that we can
[5:32] Speaker 1: wear for the office. And moms were like, we want
[5:35] Speaker 1: something relaxed that is made out of durable fabric for
[5:39] Speaker 1: my little boy to wear to Easter mass. And that's
[5:43] Speaker 1: that's pretty much what it was originally released for. It
[5:45] Speaker 1: was like meant to be like less stuffy business attire
[5:50] Speaker 1: slash Easter attire. Yeah.
[5:52] Speaker 2: And if you've never seen one, you know, the pants
[5:55] Speaker 2: and the jacket match. It was the 70s, so the
[5:58] Speaker 2: pants were flared, maybe a bell-bottom, maybe just a nice flare.
[6:03] Speaker 2: The jacket looked sort of like what you might call
[6:06] Speaker 2: a shacket these days, like a shirt jacket.
[6:09] Speaker 1: I've never heard that before.
[6:10] Speaker 2: Oh, you've never heard of a shacket? No.
[6:12] Speaker 1: I've heard of Shaquille O'Neal, but that's the closest.
[6:15] Speaker 2: I mean, you've seen shackets. It's like a shirt jacket.
[6:19] Speaker 1: All right.
[6:20] Speaker 2: I'll point one out next time we're hanging out.
[6:21] Speaker 1: Okay, thank you.
[6:22] Speaker 2: Or maybe I'll buy you one.
[6:24] Speaker 1: Okay.
[6:24] Speaker 2: Okay. So they have wide lapels. The leisure suit did. Uh,
[6:29] Speaker 2: some of them did have a vest. Like if you
[6:30] Speaker 2: think of the classic Travolta suit that we'll talk about
[6:33] Speaker 2: at the end, that, that had a matching vest and
[6:36] Speaker 2: another kind of big, uh, giveaway was, uh, they usually
[6:42] Speaker 2: had contrasting stitching. So the stitching was a different color
[6:45] Speaker 2: than the suit, which is a look.
[6:48] Speaker 1: It is definitely a look. Um, A lot of people,
[6:51] Speaker 1: I don't want to say a lot, some people would
[6:54] Speaker 1: actually just go buck wild and wear white patent leather
[6:58] Speaker 1: shoes with them. You can see there's plenty of pictures
[7:01] Speaker 1: from the 1970s, people standing in front of their Malibu
[7:04] Speaker 1: proudly wearing a leisure suit with like white patent leather shoes.
[7:09] Speaker 1: And I think Cousin Eddie wears patent leather shoes, white
[7:13] Speaker 1: shoes with his leisure suit, if I'm not mistaken.
[7:16] Speaker 2: He's a great example.
[7:17] Speaker 1: And then another great example is Otho from Beetlejuice. When
[7:21] Speaker 1: Beetlejuice pulls his smart suit off and all of a
[7:24] Speaker 1: sudden he's wearing blue polyester leisure suit with white patent
[7:27] Speaker 1: leather shoes. People actually wore that, Chuck.
[7:30] Speaker 2: Yeah, they wore that stuff. It never became office wear
[7:34] Speaker 2: like they were hoping it would, I think. I'm sure
[7:37] Speaker 2: some people wore it to the office, but it was
[7:39] Speaker 2: kind of frowned upon. It was for like a more
[7:42] Speaker 2: formal thing like that. And it was definitely more for
[7:44] Speaker 2: Like hitting the disco or going out or getting together
[7:48] Speaker 2: with neighbors and that kind of thing when you wanted
[7:49] Speaker 2: to look dressy. But I guess still be comfortable. But
[7:53] Speaker 2: it was like an it look for about 10 minutes.
[7:56] Speaker 2: And then it became a bit of a joke.
[8:00] Speaker 1: Yeah. I think it started to be forbidden at like
[8:02] Speaker 1: nicer restaurants. You couldn't wear it. And I'm guessing the
[8:05] Speaker 1: reason why is because most people paired it with a
[8:08] Speaker 1: shirt that was well open at the collar. Lots of
[8:11] Speaker 1: chest hair flowing out. Medallions. Like it was not. It
[8:15] Speaker 1: was not an appropriate suit for the kind of place
[8:19] Speaker 1: the Blues Brothers showed up to get their maitre d'
[8:21] Speaker 1: horn player fired from.
[8:24] Speaker 2: Boy, nice reference. And, you know, before too long, it's
[8:28] Speaker 2: out of style. You know, styles come and go, but
[8:31] Speaker 2: the leisure suit did not last long. That 80s power
[8:34] Speaker 2: suit came in pretty quickly. And, you know, now it's
[8:38] Speaker 2: just a little blip on the radar of fashion history.
[8:42] Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a signifier, right? So, like, Disco Stu is
[8:46] Speaker 1: definitely going to be wearing a leisure suit. Or Leisure
[8:49] Speaker 1: Suit Larry, obviously, is going to be wearing a leisure suit, too.
[8:54] Speaker 1: But like you said, I think the most iconic leisure
[8:56] Speaker 1: suit of all time was Travolta's from Saturday Night Fever.
[8:59] Speaker 2: Yeah, that's had an interesting history over the years. It
[9:02] Speaker 2: was purchased for the film from a store in New Jersey,
[9:07] Speaker 2: not surprisingly.
[9:08] Speaker 1: Right.
[9:08] Speaker 2: For about $ 100, and very famously, and we've talked about
[9:11] Speaker 2: this before, Gene Siskel, the great, great movie reviewer with
[9:16] Speaker 2: his partner Roger Ebert, owned that suit. He bought it
[9:19] Speaker 2: in 1978 for a couple of grand, which was a
[9:22] Speaker 2: great deal because he sold it in 1995 for $ 145, 000.
[9:29] Speaker 1: Yeah, which is worth about $ 300, 000 today.
[9:33] Speaker 2: What an investment.
[9:34] Speaker 1: Yeah, for real. Did you know that Gene Siskel's favorite
[9:37] Speaker 1: movie is Saturday Night Fever?
[9:38] Speaker 2: Oh, yeah. We talked about it in that episode.
[9:41] Speaker 1: I know. Many times since then, I think. So it
[9:45] Speaker 1: actually has gone down in value. I guess people are
[9:48] Speaker 1: less attracted to kitsch today because the most recent time
[9:52] Speaker 1: it was sold was at auction in 2023. And it
[9:53] Speaker 1: had dipped down to.
[9:56] Speaker 2: $ 260, 000.
[9:56] Speaker 1: Yeah. It's not bad for a white leisure suit. Yeah,
[10:02] Speaker 1: not bad.
[10:03] Speaker 2: And the good news is if you ever get invited
[10:06] Speaker 2: to a 70s party or something, a leisure suit is
[10:09] Speaker 2: always a great way to go for men and women.
[10:12] Speaker 2: I feel like the women had sort of the pantsuit
[10:16] Speaker 2: leisure suit version of this as well.
[10:18] Speaker 1: Yeah, like Kate Jackson in Charlie's Angels wore that kind
[10:22] Speaker 1: of thing.
[10:23] Speaker 2: Kate Jackson.
[10:25] Speaker 1: I'll go down as a Jacqueline Smith fan.
[10:29] Speaker 2: Oh, sound like a real fan.
[10:31] Speaker 1: Beset?
[10:33] Speaker 2: Jacqueline Smith was Charlie's Angels, yes.
[10:35] Speaker 1: Why can't I keep that? They look alike. Do they
[10:39] Speaker 1: look at all alike?
[10:40] Speaker 2: I mean, they were both brunettes, attractive brunettes in the 70s, sure.
[10:44] Speaker 1: There you go. So, yes, I'm justified. That's right. I
[10:48] Speaker 1: think short stuff should be out, Chuck. Let's go.
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