Off the Cuff - Carson Kressley [22]
If you don’t wear a suit to the office every day, odds are you’re not going to need that many dress shirts. Since they’re expensive, there’s no need to make that investment. I’d rather see you take your money and buy a cool sports shirt or a cashmere sweater. All the average guy needs is a few really great dress shirts, so get yourself a white one, a blue one, and maybe a stripe, and you’ll be fine. Invest in quality rather than quantity.
Dress shirts are meant to fit precisely, so it’s important to pay attention to sizing. If you’re in doubt about your size, go to a fine quality department store or menswear store and have them measure you. A lot of people haven’t been measured since they got out of high school, and they still think they’re the same size. I have news for you: You’re probably not.
The first thing to consider is sleeve length. When you have your suit jacket on, you want to see about one quarter inch of the shirt cuff. The cuffs should fall roughly one inch below your wrist bone. If your mom smoked during pregnancy, your arms may be longer than usual. You just have to be vigilant about getting the right size—they’re out there, I promise.
Dress shirts are also going to fit differently in the neck from sport shirts. When you button the neck on a sport shirt, it’s not going to be an authentic fit. It will be sized bigger than your neck, because it’s meant to be worn open, not all buttoned up, like Miss Beadle on Little House on the Prairie. Dress shirts, on the other hand, are true to fit. When you button them closed to wear a tie—which is what they’re meant for, people—they should fit your neck snugly. That means you should be able to easily slide two fingers inside the collar: no more, no less. If you find yourself wanting to make the international choking sign, that’s not a good fit.
Fairy Godstylist Carson
As long as your dress shirts are 100 percent cotton, they’re good quality and they fit you, I don’t care where you buy them. You can get great quality dress shirts from well-known designers at stores like Marshalls and T.J.Maxx for about $19. They’ll definitely have the basics there, although it might require a little digging. If you’re not up for that, you’ll probably find the best selection and variety at a department store. They’ll also have the best selection of ties and have a friendly sales professional who can help you select shirts and mix and match them with your ties.
Now, I don’t want to confuse you, but you need to know that most dress shirts are made of fine cotton that is not preshrunk like sportswear. So when you try them on for the first time, the neck may be a teeny bit large, and the sleeves may be a little long. That’s okay. After about three washings, they’ll shrink to the right size. You’ll also find that dress shirts might be leaner in the side seams, so they’re not bulky under your suit jacket. And the shirttail may be longer than a sport shirt, so it stays tucked in to your pants.
A lot of men seem completely lost when it comes to choosing the right kind of collar. That’s okay, that’s why you have me. Collars are important because your face is your art, and your collar frames your face and draws the eye upward. Find the collar type that looks best on you, and don’t worry about all those rules you’ve read in men’s magazines that say things like “If you have a long, round face, you can only wear this kind of collar.” If you have a long, round face, you need surgery. Just kidding, people. But don’t worry that there’s only one kind of collar that you can wear with your short, fat head. Everyone’s different. There is no absolute rule, except that you should keep it in balance.
Now, just because you find you like the look of, say, a tab collar, you still need to have a good mix. Aside from point collars, which are very versatile and can basically be worn with everything, your collar choice should go back to the dressiness of what you’re wearing with it. A spread collar, for example, is more of a dressy, suit look. The