Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. US black) a style of suit worn in the 1940s and 1950s, characterized by a long, draped jacket with padded shoulders and high-waisted tapering trousers; also attrib.; thus zoot-suited adj.; zoot-shirt, a brightly coloured shirt designed to be worn with a zoot suit; zoot pants, trousers designed like those of a zoot suit; zoot suit action, a fashion competition in which a wearer of a zoot suit attempts to outdo their rivals.

1942		Amer. Mercury July 96: zoot suit with the reet pleat: Harlem style suit, padded shoulders, 43-inch trousers at the knee with a cuff so small it needs a zipper to get into, high waistline, fancy lapels, bushels of buttons, etc.
1944		C. Himes ‘Let Me at the Enemy’ in Coll. Stories (1990) 36: This George Brown was strictly an icky, drape-shaped in a fine brown zoot with a pancho conk slicker’n mine.
1947		I. Shulman Amboy Dukes 33: They wore zoot suits and felt hats with shallow crowns. [.
1952		Lait & Mortimer USA Confidential 76: The new royalty in overalls and zoot-suits.
1953		F. Paley Rumble on the Docks (1955) 56: He could tell you [...] the new cut in the Zoot.
1957		Kerouac On The Road (1972) 125: A great mob of young men dressed in all varieties of hoodlum cloth, from red shirts to zoot suits. [Ibid.] 187: The tenorman wore [...] a purple shirt, cracked shoes, and zoot-pants.
1965		(con. 1940s) Malcolm X Autobiog. (1968) 135: The young salesman picked off a rack a zoot suit that was just wild: sky-blue pants thirty inches in the knee and angle-narrowed down to twelve inches in the bottom, and a long coat that pinched my waist and flared out below my knees [...] When I modeled the zoot for Ella, she took a long look and said, ‘Well, I guess it had to happen.’.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 8: Always clean, none of that zoot-suit shit.
1981		H. Gould Fort Apache, The Bronx 100: Style was wearing a white zoot jacket that came right down to his hips.
1989		T. Blacker Fixx 83: I owned [...] a wardrobe of zoot suits that were the envy of Soho.
1999		E. Bunker Mr Blue 26: A zoot suit was ‘full drape,’ but they lost favor before I became concerned about style.
1999		Guardian Weekend 4 Sept. 51: Melly decided [...] ‘to leave the gangsters and move into zoot suits, worn by the black guys from Harlem.’.
1999		Observer Rev. 30 May 9: The zoot-suited announcer implored the crowd to welcome [...] ‘the Reverend Al Green.’.
2002		‘Touré’ Portable Promised Land (ms.) 43: A short, jet-black man [...] wearin a checkered zoot suit and diamonds on every finger.
2010		A. Steinberg Running the Books 307: The zoot-suited, fedora- and long-feather wearing persona.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 8: He stomped two pachucos dead during the zoot suit riots.

2. (US black) overexaggerated clothes.

1944

Cab Calloway New Hepsters Dict. in Calloway (1976) 261: zoot suit (n.): overexaggerated clothes.

3. (UK prison) prison clothing worn in the punishment cell.

2004

(con. 1970s) N. ‘Razor’ Smith A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun 185: The normal attire worn in the strong-box is the ‘zoot-suit’, a slip-on top and shorts made from unrippable nylon and vinyl mix.