Remember Casual Fridays? Naked Thursdays Were Always More Productive

That time a bored Thursday at the office ended in a very public… reveal. How an office dare, impeccable timing, and a hallway walk made every meeting after somehow… better.

They say nothing good ever happens in a fluorescent-lit hallway. I beg to differ:

It wasn’t planned. Not officially. There were four or five of us hanging out in our manager’s office during that inevitable 2 p.m. Thursday slump: half-eaten sandwiches, open Netscape browsers, a light scent of printer ink and procrastination. Someone had brought up streaking in the 70s (this was a tangent about football slash soccer… no, it’s football, thing). Then someone else said something about team spirit. Then came the dare.

But first, some background:

The year was somewhere between Y2K panic and the rise of the Gmail invite. I was working as a web designer at a mid-sized media company.

The job was fine, the pay was incredible. And, actually, there was no free coffee (Starbucks was across the street). 

Ok, now back to the dare:

Like many young creatives at that time, during the mid-to-end-of-week-slump, I chimed in with “how did we all end up wearing khaki pants, anyway?” 

“Bet you won’t walk out into the hallway butt-naked,” someone grinned.

There was laughter, high-fives, you know, all the noise men make, etc. Then, a beat…

I looked around, shrugged, and began. First, I stepped out of my brown Kenneth Cole shoes (of course I had those!). Then came my grey, Banana Republic, stretchy-fabric, button-down. I took that off slow enough to be deliberate, but fast enough to still qualify as “you know I AM going to do this.” Finally, I unfastened my belt and then my Club Monaco slacks and let them fall.

Boom.

For a moment, no one said anything.

Then, just above the hum of the HVAC system, someone whispered, “I always said he gave European energy. Now it’s confirmed.”

Ok, that was funny. Oh yeah, it was Brett, I remember his name now. He was a project manager.

Applause. Some laughter. One exaggerated cheer. I gave one of those “thankyouverymuch hand roll-in-the-air” bows.

Then I opened the door and strolled out. Naked.

We were making endless noise, so of course, everyone looked when the door opened. And then you could hear the energy shift; keyboard taps slowing, swivel chairs creaking. The air took on that strange hush, the kind that hovers when something breaks the spell of corporate monotony.

But no one screamed. No one scolded. A few heads tilted. A senior designer from the other side of the bullpen muttered,“Finally, something exciting happens here.”

And just like that, the tension popped. People chuckled, a couple of slow claps broke out, and someone even offered me a granola bar like it was the most natural thing in the world (pun intended). Now I wonder, did he do that so I could use a granola bar to protect my modesty? Grr.

Oh yeah, I worked the rest of the day completely nude. And oddly, it was the most productive afternoon I’d had in weeks. Yup!

The Boss Who Didn’t Flinch

James C. our Creative Director, never once told me to get dressed. Of course this story got told many, many, MANY times. He didn’t condone it, exactly. But he didn’t stop it either. And in that office, silence was basically permission. He once joked, “He worked better that day.”

So Was It Sexual Harassment?

Here’s the thing: no one complained. Not once. Which raises the inevitable question: was it sexual harassment if no one cared? Or worse—if no one was particularly interested?

To be fair, this was a different era. We were still in the long hangover of the 1990s; before MeToo, before Slack channels for “sensitivity concerns,” before compliance trainings. Boundaries were blurrier, yes, but also softer. People weren’t as performatively inhibited about their bodies yet. We shared birthday cake! No one thought twice about changing in the office bathroom if they had a date after work.

And let’s not forget, this was the golden age of full-frontal television. Oz, Sex and the City, Six Feet Under, bodies were everywhere, often naked, often male. Nudity wasn’t shocking; it was premium cable. We were soaking in it, even while designing banner ads and coding CSS.

There was no TikTok. No viral outrage cycle. Just a web design team in low-rise jeans trying to meet a Friday deadline. We weren’t reckless; we were just… open. And if anything inappropriate happened, I must’ve missed it—probably because I was busy resizing a nav bar. Completely nude. Ha Ha. Just kidding. Maybe. 

Closing Thoughts from the Guy in the Hallway

I look back at that photo: me, striding through a bland corridor like a Renaissance statue in an IT department, and I think: that guy was onto something.

Speaking of Sex and the City, I couldn’t help but wonder, if vulnerability was so powerful, why were we all still hiding behind khakis?

Maybe Naked Thursday shouldn’t be confined to just a dare. It certainly wasn’t about rebellion. It wasn’t even about comfort. No labels, no pleats, no pretense. Just raw creative energy… and maybe a slight breeze. What a rush it was, tho!

So, if you’re wondering why your team’s morale is low, ask yourself: Are they really comfortable at work? Or are they just clothed?

Is this story fiction, tho? Check out the uncensored photos and you decide (requires paid membership). Oh, btw: years later, I would pull a stunt sort of, kind of similar to this at Brands Conference in New York, granted it was much, much, much more sanitized. After all it was a new century.

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About the Author

Stefan Pinto is a photographer, writer, and occasional subject of his own lens. He currently lives in the South of France and rarely wears clothes.