While wigs and gowns have been removed from civil and family courts and the Supreme Court in the name of modernity, the criminal courts cling on. For my part, I rather like court dress as a social leveller, a sort of school uniform. It also offers a veneer of disguise in those rare but unsettling cases where a defendant you have spent an afternoon dismantling in cross-examination decides to wait outside the court building to offer a review of your performance.
