bjornb17
Senior Member
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2010
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- 766
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I've been on a mission lately to refine my style in the sense of being able to wear my business dress clothes in a slightly more relaxed and comfortable manner but without sacrificing my standards and giving into the overly casual clothes you see a lot in the office these days. Also I live in Texas where it will be 100+ degrees for months at a time.
A couple ways I've already been accomplishing this is, for starters having most of my suits being lighter weight and either in a natural stretch weave or occasionally with a 2% blend of a stretchy material. That has been really great because the fabrics don't get all hot, sticky, and weird when it is warm out. A second way of doing this is wearing no show socks to get rid of that extra fabric around my lower legs and this really does help provide ventilation and cools me down more effectively.
Another piece of the puzzle I'm currently looking into is whether or not to ditch the undershirt. Reading around the internet and watching youtube videos, it seems this topic is pretty well divided culturally. It seems the norm outside of the United States, including in England which is sort of my preferred aesthetic anyway, is to not wear an undershirt and essentially treat the dress shirt as the undershirt when worn as part of a suit. However, in America, people act like the undershirt is a necessity and it would be disgusting to not wear one. One of the cited examples is that the undershirt is a barrier to keep your armpits of the shirt from turning yellow. Well, I can't wear antiperspirant due to an allergy to the aluminum (I just wear regular deodorant) and so that is not the primary factor for me anyway. Also I don't really sweat too much and i have a bunch of dress shirts so not like any one shirt will get a high concentration of sweat anyway.
Intuitively I just feel like the undershirt is sort of a stuffy Americanism and the "reasons" cited for wearing them are often just excuses to justify the status quo. For the most part my high quality dress shirts feel a lot more comfortable than any undershirt, even the nice micro modal ones I have used, and it would be nice to shed that extra layer of fabric and be a little more cooler and comfortable as a result.
With all that said, what are your thoughts on ditching the undershirt?
A couple ways I've already been accomplishing this is, for starters having most of my suits being lighter weight and either in a natural stretch weave or occasionally with a 2% blend of a stretchy material. That has been really great because the fabrics don't get all hot, sticky, and weird when it is warm out. A second way of doing this is wearing no show socks to get rid of that extra fabric around my lower legs and this really does help provide ventilation and cools me down more effectively.
Another piece of the puzzle I'm currently looking into is whether or not to ditch the undershirt. Reading around the internet and watching youtube videos, it seems this topic is pretty well divided culturally. It seems the norm outside of the United States, including in England which is sort of my preferred aesthetic anyway, is to not wear an undershirt and essentially treat the dress shirt as the undershirt when worn as part of a suit. However, in America, people act like the undershirt is a necessity and it would be disgusting to not wear one. One of the cited examples is that the undershirt is a barrier to keep your armpits of the shirt from turning yellow. Well, I can't wear antiperspirant due to an allergy to the aluminum (I just wear regular deodorant) and so that is not the primary factor for me anyway. Also I don't really sweat too much and i have a bunch of dress shirts so not like any one shirt will get a high concentration of sweat anyway.
Intuitively I just feel like the undershirt is sort of a stuffy Americanism and the "reasons" cited for wearing them are often just excuses to justify the status quo. For the most part my high quality dress shirts feel a lot more comfortable than any undershirt, even the nice micro modal ones I have used, and it would be nice to shed that extra layer of fabric and be a little more cooler and comfortable as a result.
With all that said, what are your thoughts on ditching the undershirt?