Posted 3:15 AM by Blah blah

Metrosexual: The Feminized Straight Man (Social Trends)

My housemate is so much this kind of man---definitely masculine, he also cares about how furniture and curtains are arranged and the kitchen is equipped. He gets his hair cut by an expensive barber in San Francisco just so, wears the Brooks Brothers pants and Banana Republic shirts, and makes sure to spray his cologne in the air and walk through it properly. He cooks well and keeps our house very neat. All of our kitchen appliances match. Before he had his current girlfriend (who barely cooks), he'd always ask me before he left for a party, "How do I look? Do you think I look too fat here?"

Plus he's as straight as a ruler. Women love this attention to detail with your clothing and house.

Metrosexuals Come Out (NY Times):
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"Metrosexuals" — straight urban men willing, even eager, to embrace their feminine sides....

America may be on the verge of a metrosexual moment. On July 15, Bravo will present a makeover show, "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," in which a team of five gay men "transform a style-deficient and culture-deprived straight man from drab to fab," according to the network. Condé Nast is developing a shopping magazine for men, modeled after Lucky, its successful women's magazine, which is largely a text-free catalog of clothes and shoes.

There is no end to the curious new vanity products for young men, from a Maxim-magazine-branded hair coloring system to Axe, Unilever's all-over body deodorant for guys. And men are going in for self-improvement strategies traditionally associated with women. For example, the number of plastic surgery procedures on men in the United States has increased threefold since 1997, to 807,000, according to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery.

"Their heightened sense of aesthetics is very, very pronounced," Marian Salzman, chief strategy officer at Euro RSCG, who organized the gathering at Eleven Madison Park, said of metrosexuals. "They're the style makers. It doesn't mean your average Joe American is going to copy everything they do," she added. "But unless you study these guys you don't know where Joe American is heading."...

[W]hat separates the modern-day metrosexual from his touchy-feely forebears is a care-free attitude toward the inevitable suspicion that a man who dresses well, has good manners, understands thread counts or has opinions on women's fashion is gay.

"If someone's going to judge me on what kind of moisturizer I have on my shelf, whatever," said Marc d'Avignon, 28, a graduate student living in the East Village, who describes himself as "horrendously addicted to Diesel jeans" and living amid a chemistry lab's worth of Kiehl's lotions....

Most metrosexuals, though, see their approach to life as serving their own interests in the most important marketing contest of all: the battle for babes. Their pitch to women: you're getting the best of both worlds.

Some women seem to buy it. Alycia Oaklander, a 29-year-old fashion publicist from Manhattan, fell for John Kilpatrick, a Washington Redskins season ticket holder who loves Budweiser and grilling hot dogs, in part because of his passion for shopping and women's fashion shows. On their first dates, Mr. Kilpatrick brought Champagne, cooked elaborate meals and talked the talk about Ms. Oaklander's shoes. They were married yesterday.

"He loves sports and all the guy stuff," Ms. Oaklander said. "But on the other hand he loves to cook and he loves design. It balances out."

The proliferation of metrosexuals is even having an impact in gay circles. Peter Paige, a gay actor who plays the character Emmett on the Showtime series "Queer as Folk," frequently complains in interviews that he's having a harder time than ever telling straight men from gays.

"They're all low-slung jeans and working out with six packs and more hair product than I've ever used in my life, and they smell better than your mother on Easter," he said. Mr. Paige said there was at least one significant difference between hitting on metrosexuals and their less evolved predecessors. "Before, you used to get punched," he said. "Now it's all, `Gee thanks, I'm straight but I'm really flattered.' "