Brad Pitt and the age of The Middle Man

Is it the sultry eyes or the lustrous bed hair that draws attention to the latest face of Chanel’s No5 fragrance? Perhaps it’s the square jaw and stubble. If, at first, Brad Pitt seems a counter-intuitive model for a ladies’ perfume advertisement, then ponder, too, why David Beckham is on the cover of Elle magazine next month, a first for the women’s fashion title.

Might this all point to a new new breed of male? Let’s call him the Middle Man. Here’s the theory: the 1990s saw the rise of lad culture, when boyish adolescence, beer and porn were rewritten as acceptable pastimes for grown men whose ambition in life was to be a Gallagher brother; then the social pendulum swung the other way as men discovered their metrosexual, feminine side, drank cocktails, cried in public and covered up their dark under-eye baggage — the Orlando Bloom type; another, shorter swing of the pendulum saw the advent of the so-called retrosexual, a return to the gruffer, bearded, booted archetype our grandfathers might have recognised — the Colin Farrell type.

Now, yet another swing is synthesising these experiments towards a man who is neither feminised nor macho — the Middle Man, occupying the space between the two extremes and unattached to any fixed definition of what it ‘means to be a man’. Enter Brad selling ladies’ smellies. Or Obama noting earlier this month of David Beckham that it’s a ‘rare man who can be that tough on the field and also have his own line of underwear’. Well, not too rare actually, Mr President...

Consider some of the styles that will be on the catwalks for the debut London Collections: Men in two weeks’ time. Recent seasons have seen collections from the likes of Lanvin, Givenchy and Rick Owens pushing transparent fabrics, blousy shirts, sarongs and bold patterns — such as this summer’s floral and animal prints trend — that not long ago would have turned heads down the pub for all the wrong reasons. ‘We’ve certainly found that aggressively masculine, “red-blooded male” aesthetic of the past few years is making way for a softer, more louche silhouette,’ says Stacey Smith, menswear buyer at Matches. ‘It’s not feminine as such, but it avoids clichéd notions of masculinity.’ That’s an apt summary for Middle Man thinking.

‘There’s been a cycle of the genders asserting and reasserting themselves over recent decades, but that toing and froing is ultimately about finding a balance somewhere at the centre,’ argues Ed Booty, global strategy director at creative agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty. ‘None of the “lad” or “metrosexual” labels have fully represented real life. Men now are just much more comfortable in their own skin — they can wear a floral shirt and drink a pint, be creative and beardy. Ideas of what masculinity is about have become blurred in a way that may not fully manifest itself for a couple of decades.’

Look to the wrist for further evidence. On the former you may find a bangle or a Hannah Martin necklace — her black pearl spur pendant necklace for men has a touch of Jack Sparrow about it. Much as men and women’s clothes are more unisex now (American Apparel currently has 724 unisex items on its US online shop), so ‘around three-quarters of the bracelets we sell are the same design, whether they’re for men or women. That goes for leather straps through to diamond bands, and any colour, too,’ says Robert Tateossian, founder of the Tateossian jewellery brand. ‘Even in macho cultures like banking you see men wearing bracelets now — they’re talismanic,’ he adds. ‘Men have a greater readiness to express their own individuality and, while they may not go the Grayson Perry way, if that means not conforming to male stereotypes, that’s fine with them.’

And then to the cheek. While sales of shaving products in Western Europe have remained largely stagnant over recent years, sales of men’s skincare products have gone through the bathroom roof: according to market researchers Mintel, up by 45 per cent since 2005 to €420m in 2010, comfortably outpacing the growth in women’s beauty products. Only 15 per cent of men now feel it’s unacceptable to use skincare products.

So it’s no longer a case of pink for girls and blue for boys (during Victorian times these colour codes were the complete opposite, which just goes to show how easily manipulated stereotypes can be). ‘The idea of the Middle Man reflects how we’re getting over the idea that caring about our appearance is emasculating,’ says Carmelo Guastella, founder of the Melogy men’s salon at the St Pancras Renaissance Hotel. ‘A small percentage of men are into the extremes: hair transplants, surgical six-packs and the like, but even rugby-player types recognise the need to respond to pressures to look good, from partners, fashion, the media, and especially the workplace’ (perhaps this explains the Harley Medical Group’s recent figure, that 27 per cent of Botox patients are now male). Shane Warne denies that he falls into this group.

Indeed, Mintel has recently released a report on the blurring of the male/female divide, which — for those men who still feel they must drive trucks and hunt at the weekend to be considered ‘real men’ — it unhelpfully titles ‘Girly Men’. The report points to men’s growing involvement in activities that are typically considered female-centric, such as yoga, even if they are given a masculine spin (such as ‘broga’, in which a ‘retreat’ is repackaged as an ‘expedition’).

The Middle Man is not solely a British phenomenon; he has been spotted as far afield as Korea and Argentina. In Japan, one survey has seen 60 per cent of men aged 20 to 34 describe themselves as being the type of middle-leaning men dubbed ‘soshokukei’ or ‘herbivores’.