funeral clothes

[adrian_turtle]

What with the pandemic and not driving and all, my recent experience of funerals is limited. My experience of funerals outside my local (very informal) social group is particularly limited. So I'm asking the rest of you, particularly midwesterners.

Do women wear suits to funerals? I know it's the kind of event where a suit is appropriate, but if a woman shows up in a skirt and sweater is that inappropriate?

My mom's twin sister lives in Columbus, which is too far away for my mom to travel in her current state of health. My uncle is in failing health, and yesterday morning it looked like he was about to die of pneumonia and parkinsons disease and stubbornness. Last night he started breathing better and we hope he will make a good recovery. But for a little while, I thought I'd need to rush off to Ohio right away to support my aunt at his deathbed until their sons could get there and then to be at the funeral and oh no what can I wear? It's wonderful not to have a funeral today! But I just realized I want to be there when the time comes, and support my aunt, and that will be necessary one of these days.

I don't know if I should wear my dark gray skirt and black sweater, or go shopping because nothing else fits? Most of the family has suits, because they're men, and/or because they spend significant time in formal business or social settings.

Comments

[jenett]

My experience of this is that it depends a bit on the formality of the funeral/relevant customs.

But black sweater and dark grey skirt sound entirely appropriate here. (I would never wear a suit, because I never wear suits, but I do have a range of black dresses in my closet for other reasons, and would consider an equivalently presentable top/skirt to be the same thing. By that I mean stuff like the overall cut/design, on the upper edge of business casual - not exposing a lot of skin at neckline or shoulders, opaque fabric with some weight to it, no gaudy details. But that's partly my preppy-influenced New Englander showing.)

[adrian_turtle]

Thank you! I don't even know where the upper edge of business casual is anymore. For the world I usually live in, my clothes from Deva or Svaha are as dressy as I need. But I feel like I'm visiting another world. One where I have "let myself go."

[jenett]

Business casual is also a moving target! I do think a lot of it comes down to cut and fabric (or at least, hitting those gives you a fair bit of leeway.)

I live in a lot of Lands End t-shirts and cardigans, which are right about that line often (knit fabric rather than woven - I cannot deal with the non-stretch of woven mostly - but denser fabric, solid colors, shoulders covered, not too much chest, etc.) The Svaha cuts would mostly do it, except for the prints.