The Times - UK (2022-05-25)

4 Wednesday May 25 2022 | the times

fashion

A T-shirt for £790? The front row’s

This season designers are selling the

staple with a three-figure price tag.

There are plenty of ways to wear the

trend for less, says Harriet Walker

W

ould you

pay £800 for

a T-shirt?

The ultra-

discreet

Italian

clothing

brand Loro

Piana, which caters for the most uber

of the uber-rich and is a favourite of

Vladimir Putin and on Succession,

charges £790 for its perfect white

cotton jersey.

Below the shot of a model on its

website is a picture of a farmer

cuddling a fluffy lamb, a visual

representation, presumably, of how

the wearer can expect to feel in the

garment’s 1 per cent embrace. Clearly

this is an outlier, but it is

representative. The white T-shirt is

no longer simply a wardrobe staple but

a trend item in its own right, designed

not to blend in but to stand out.

Loro Piana’s has a subtle punched

pattern along the hem, while Bottega

Veneta’s £430 version comes with a

just distinctive enough backwards

V-neck that only the cognoscenti will

recognise. There are flashier versions,

of course. Gucci’s white T-shirts are

£450 and heavily logo-ed, and

Balenciaga’s £495 cotton jersey tee

has faux-corporate branding at name

badge height. Dior’s costs £590 and

has no discernible designer stamp,

but it does preach that “we should all

be feminists”. If only being one paid

a bit better.

Go on, roll your eyes, but the haute

white T-shirt is coming for us all. That

doesn’t mean yours must be madly

luxe with a name emblazoned across

it, but anything greying, out of shape,

twisted at the seams or otherwise a bit

daggy is out of the question. Once, a

white T-shirt was a layering piece to

be worn underneath something else,

now it’s the main event. At a dinner

party I went to on Friday night, every

woman there was wearing one, teamed

with smart jeans and — in our own

words — “fancy shoes”. Then again at

a breakfast meeting with a couple of

high-ranking fashion types this week,

everyone at the table was in a T-shirt:

plain or with a little detailing, boxy or

fitted, two in white, one in black.

Not so long ago we might have worn

floral midis or silk shirts, perhaps a silk

T-shirt in chic navy blue at a push.

But a bog-standard white cotton

number? Forget the PE kit overtones,

this is the cool crowd’s unofficial

summer uniform.

“I pretty much wear one every day,”

says Vogue’s deputy editor Sarah

Harris. “I love a cut that is roomy,

with square, short sleeves and a high

neckline. The best are usually in the

men’s department.” She recommends

nothing more rarefied than Cos’s £19

oversized men’s style, the shoulders of

which will sit a little lower than your

own to give the correct utilitarian look

(cos.com). Front row types live for

geeking out over details such as these

— see also: thread count and depth of

crewneck. When, in 2016, women’s

lifestyle bible The Gentlewoman

created one in collaboration with the

hip British brand Sunspel, the design

team made endless tweaks to its

hemline and sleeves until they were

happy. The £65 Boy Fit style remains

a firm favourite at fashion week

(sunspel.com).

“I can’t bear a scoop or a V-neck,”

Harris adds. “The silhouette has to fall

away from the body — when it comes

to the perfect white tee, I hate any

element of cling.” For the same reason,

steer clear of stomach-enhancing

stretch — the lower the cotton

content, the worse a T-shirt will

wash, anyway. At £15 for 100 per cent

cotton, Arket’s crewneck is the best

value on the high street in my

opinion (arket.com), and I like

Ninety Percent’s £35 Drew style too

(ninetypercent.com). Avoid capped or

short sleeves like the plague: they’re

dated, ageing and immensely

unflattering on anything but the

most sinewy biceps.

The coolest white tees are plain,

but Gen Z love a logo. If you’re

looking for a bit of pizzazz, think

carefully about the message

you’re giving off. I am allergic to

slogan T-shirts, but you may

not be. Any writing on your

front should be authentic and

vaguely meaningful — for

example, Dolce & Gabbana’s

£395 “90’s supermodel”

T-shirt makes perfect sense

when worn by Heidi Klum,

but becomes a matter of

advertising standards on a

mortal. Sézane’s white and

be-sloganned “Bonjour amour

Bordeaux” is clearly meant for

natives of the city, but it would

work for anybody with a red

wine habit (£50, sezane.com).

Far preferable, in my opinion, is

something a little esoteric. I wear

Hesper Fox’s Frankie tee, with its

abstract line drawing by the artist

Above: influencer Gitta

Banko; Gigi Hadid for

Versace; influencer

Emilie Joseph; £17.99,

mango.com; Heidi

Klum. Below: deputy

editor of Vogue

Sarah Harris

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