Dressing Down Is Rising Up Among Staid British : Style: Some of London’s executives adopt more casual dress, to the dismay of suit makers.

LONDON —  It was nothing short of a cultural revolution when IBM told its male employees in the United States they no longer had to wear their corporate uniform: dark suit, white shirt and dull tie.

Most workers liked it, leaving perhaps a small group of traditionalists wondering where they might turn to find a safe haven for old-fashioned dress codes.

Perhaps Britain? Such a thing as occurred at IBM could never happen on this stodgy island known for traditions as rigid as a starched white collar, could it?

It has.

IBM’s British executives were months ahead of the U.S. office in loosening the dress code. Coats and ties, or smart suits for women, are required dress for British IBM employees only when absolutely necessary, for example when they are out visiting clients who would expect this. Otherwise, every day is a dress-down day.

“There is a restriction on jeans and leggings. People have been good about it,” said Ann Fielder, an executive in the IBM personnel department in Portsmouth. “It’s gone down very well with employers and employees alike.”

As this pattern repeats itself, not only in American companies doing business here but throughout once-gray corporate Britain, the colorful national press has taken note.

London’s Evening Standard dubbed the casual corporate executive “slobboman.”

“At the end of the working week, men and women are throwing off their post-’80s power suits, dresses and ties to engage in daylight slobbery a day earlier than they used to,” lamented Neil Norman in the newspaper’s fashion section, referring to companies that have adopted “casual Fridays,” one dress-down day a week.

At Laurence Highman Bespoke Tailors, one of the few remaining places where executives can get a suit made in the City of London, managing director David Rothschild has seen the changes coming slowly. He doesn’t like them.

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Suit makers have gone out of business because of foreign competition and an overall decline in employment in the financial center, thanks to computers that have eliminated jobs and a flight of companies to the suburbs.

Even some banks have dismayed Rothschild by allowing men to wear jackets instead of suits on Fridays.

“In general, most people do dress pretty formally, with the exception of perhaps the fellow who wears a bright tie with his formal suit,” Rothschild said. “That’s a bit risque. They look very American, which upsets me to no end.”

Not that the less formal approach has taken hold everywhere. In the House of Commons, the speaker still wears buckled shoes that look like something from the days when the colonists in America were rebelling.

The dark suit is about all you see on male politicians. Those members of Parliament who dress down in a mere jacket are wearing a badge of radicalism.

British barristers continue to wear their wigs to court, although sometimes the wigs come off--even in public hearings--if the judge grants permission.

But in some staunchly traditional British offices, the idea of dressing down on Friday or any other day goes over about as well as a cold cup of tea.

At Coutts & Co., a private London bank, the dress code hasn’t changed much, if any, for generations.

Founder Thomas Coutts laid down the law late in the 18th Century: All male employees must wear long frock coats, waistcoats and starched white collars. Anybody who shows up sprouting whiskers is told to go home and shave.

Even near the start of the 21st Century, Coutts executives think they are showing off an appropriate conservative image to a well-heeled clientele that includes Queen Elizabeth II.

“We expect male staff to wear black shoes and black socks--that’s of lesser importance, but they all do,” Coutts spokeswoman Jane Dickers said.

Coutts executives sniff at the idea of even considering anything more casual, any day of the year. A visitor to the head office won’t see the coats draped over the backs of any chairs, either; the men keep them on as they wander about doing their banking.

“If you’re in a bank like this, you dress in a business fashion,” said Christopher M. Horne, senior associate director and secretary. “We’re not considering a dressing-down day. We wouldn’t even consider it.”

A younger colleague nodded.

“If you’re trying to put on a certain image, dressing-down days wouldn’t work,” said Nicholas Pollard, manager of the chief executive’s office.