If you’re a student looking for an internship or post-college job, khakis and a medium-blue button-down don’t say “professional”.

They say “dickbag”.

(And, if you must, for god’s sake: brown shoes, brown shoes.)

Until recently, I’d never worn a pocket square, assuming they inevitably took a suit or blazer to the far side of that fine line between ‘fashionable’ and ‘foppish’.

But, a few months back, for reasons I no longer exactly recall, I picked one up. And, wearing it, I started started getting compliments. Not on the pocket square itself, but on the suit. And not just from friends and colleagues, but from cashiers, doormen, waitresses and security guards.

So, feeling adventurous, I picked up two more. A different check, and an emboidered white. I tried them in the breast pockets of other suits and jackets, and the results were the same. People liked my clothing better. Not just the pocket sqares, but the whole outfits.

I’m still not sure exactly why this happens. Perhaps it’s an Emperor’s New Clothes effect – an assumption that anyone with a pocket square must take fashion seriously, and, consquently, that whatever they’re wearing must be fashionable.

Or perhaps it’s just that a pocket square is slightly unusual enough to catch people’s attention, to cause them to look at something – a suit – they’d otherwise largely ignore.

Whatever the reason, though, it works. By now, a jacket looks almost naked to me without a handkerchief in the front pocket.

But don’t take my word for it. In the last month, I’ve spotted pics of Tom Brady, Jay-Z, Daniel Craig, and Nicholas Sarkozy all sporting poking pocket squares. Not a bad crowd with whom to keep company.

Last month, Jess and I spent four or five hours one weekend afternoon trekking up and down the avenues of Midtown, trying on suits (or, rather, me trying on suits and she critiquing them) at every department store and boutique we could find.

We were off hunting for a wedding suit for me, something at once sufficiently fun and fashionable for such a big event, yet informal enough for an early-autumn Sunday afternoon.

By the end of the stretch, I still didn’t have a new suit. But I did miss my old ones.

On rare occasion over the past five years, I’ve donned a suit for work purposes. But, when I did, I’d always felt it a step back to my pre-film days, rather than a step forward.

By now, however, Cyan (and by extension me) lives at the wonkiest end of the film world, a place where our pitch to filmmakers includes phrases like ‘real-time web dashboard’ and ‘econometric research-driven screen selection’.

Our latest endeavor, the MovieSTAR Fund, is so dorked out that it’s now patent-pending. (Which, as an aside, makes me exceedingly happy – I’ve always wanted to author a patent.)

So perhaps it’s only natural that our clothing should swing business-ward, too.

It started small – an ‘anti-casual Friday’ policy of donning ties and cufflinks one day a week, with us disclaiming the attire at meetings. But, rather quickly, we discovered that people took us more seriously when it looked like we were taking things seriously ourselves. So we started donning suits on other days we had investor meetings. And, then, even on ones we didn’t.

It’s a bit of a change, especially in a world where calling someone a ‘suit’ is rarely meant as a compliment. But it’s one that seems to be working for us – investors think we look responsible enough to manage their money, filmmakers that we’re competent enough to release their films better than they could themselves.

So, this evening, I’m headed back to Barneys and Saks, fleshing out a wishlist of up-to-date additions to my business wardrobe. I’m not sure exactly what I’m looking for. Except for, still, that wedding suit.

Last Friday, with a lunch scheduled at the University Club, I came to Cyan’s office in a suit. Which, in turn, prompted unexpected jealousy from my colleagues. Apparently, wearing a suit is actually fun, assuming you’re not required to do it every day.

So, with consensus of the Cyan team, I’ve now re-instituted Anti-Casual Fridays, our old policy wherein we dress to the nines the one day each week that the rest of corporate New York (or, at least, the bankers with whom we’ve been dealing these days for our hedge fund) dresses down.

Of course, we’re not a perfect converse of those bankers’ schedule, as what qualifies as ‘dressed down’ in that world is something so Brooks Brothers catalog as to make even my CFO, a sailboat-owning WASP, cringe.

No, our casual still permits jeans and flip-flops. At least once the weather warms. But, even then, come the height of August, on Friday it should still be full-on Anti-Casual. Who doesn’t love a khaki or seersucker suit?

In my case, apparently, all you have to do is shave off the beard.

What I really want for Chanukah:

Although we’ve now been in Cyan’s new offices for a couple of months, the place is still, sadly, exceedingly barren. We have desks, chairs, and a conference table. And that’s it. No art on the walls, no extraneous seating, not even a table for our printer, which instead sits in the corner on the floor.

While we’ve grown increasingly accustomed to this minimalist chic, visitors persist in giving us a hard time about it. So, as of this week, we’ve started a half-assed decorating campaign – buying up reception seating and side tables, and strategizing about art options.

Unfortunately, the standard approach for production and distribution companies’ wall art is more self-aggrandizing than this site, and without any hint of tongue-in-cheek: framed movie posters from the company’s releases, organized in as looming an assortment of star power and combined theatrical gross as the company can muster.

Companies short on egotism, or at least short on films they can brag about, sometimes veer towards a more idealized approach, instead framing classic posters from film’s better eras.

We however, think it would be funnier to instead frame posters from really, really bad films: From Justin to Kelly, Glitter, Anaconda, 3 Ninjas: High Noon at Mega Mountain, Battlefield Earth.

Toss in SuperBabies: Baby Geniuses 2, for which I was for some time erroneously listed as Art Director on IMDB, and we’re pretty much good to go.

For the past year or so, I wore and loved a pair of Kenneth Cole boots. They were comfortable. They made me tall. (Or, at least, as close as you can get to tall from a 5’6″ starting point.) And they looked good.

Or so I thought.

A few weekends back, however, over pizza at our apartment with our siblings and all their significant others, Jess and the other females went on an extended diatribe, tearing to shreds ‘man boots’ – what I and three out of the four other guys in attendance were wearing.

And, in short, it turned out that, while we guys all thought we looked good, the girls thought we looked like idiots. Worse, in subsequent polling, I universally reconfirmed that initial split: guys, pro; girls, very, very con.

So, continuing further the field-research-driven footwear rethinking, I polled on replacement ideas, and ended up with a pair of navy Converse Chuck Taylor’s and another of tan suede Campers.

Which, on the one have, have elicited such male responses as my brother’s, “who’s your stylist, Ray Charles?” But, conversely, have been a hit with Jess and every other lady I’ve come across.

Given my demographic preference, I’m pretty sure that’s trading up.