You know the type of shoes I’m talking about, even if you’ve never given them much thought; there are hundreds of Pinterest boards ... Easy—simple black dress shoes. Boring?

Colors are usually in the same range as dress shoes, meaning brown, black, blue, or gray. The lone exception is white, since solid white sneakers pass for dressy, especially leather varieties.

To accessorise, men must also wear cufflinks as well as shirt studs, black patent shoes and black dress socks. A step down from white-tie is, of course, black-tie. While it does approach the same ...

In the 1950s, cocktail dresses were often mid-calf length and made of fabrics such as black taffeta ... Typically any form of dress shoes are considered cocktail attire appropriate.