Dress shirts are available in a huge range of colours and patterns, some suitable for more formal attire and some more suited to casual dress.

Formal

For dress shirts to wear with suits or more formal tailored jackets and trousers, patterns and colours should remain relatively muted and conservative.

The classic business shirt colours are white and blue. The old adage of white collar workers and blue collar workers is no longer true and either colour is suitable for any level of job requiring a dress shirt. The white shirt does, however, have the edge in terms of formality and should be chosen for the most formal of occasions.

A man could easily own just plain white and blue shirts and look good in a suit at all times. After all, wearing white shirts every day is an old fashioned yet very sharp look. One may, however, get bored with such muted styles and wish to step up from this is to subtly patterned fabrics such as a herringbone or textured weave.

Subdued solid colours such as light reds, pinks, purples and shades of blue are also great office choices. Dark colours such as black and navy blues should be avoided as these are far too casual for office attire.

For those who wish to add more visual interest to a solid colour shirt, there is the option of white contrast collars. This is a style most commonly associated with bankers but is a great office choice. It is flashier than a plain shirt so other accessories need to be toned down so as to not look too ostentatious. Shirts with white collars should always be worn with a tie as the white collar ups the formality somewhat, so looks disjointed when worn with the collar open.

Shirts with white collars may or may not have white cuffs. Generally, if the shirt has a barrel cuff, the cuff will be in the same colour as the shirt whilst double cuff shirts will have a white cuff.

Away from solid colours, patterns are popular for dress shirts. However for a dress shirt to be suitable for more formal attire, the pattern must be subtle in design and colour. A popular pattern is the vertical stripe; a classic with a business suit, a fine alternating white and bold colour, such as red or blue, stripe adds visual interest whilst keeping the formality of a solid colour. This style can also work well with white collars and cuffs.

Casual

As with casual tailoring, there is more scope to inject vivid colours and patterns in casual dress shirts over those meant for more formal attire.

Adventurous colours such as bright greens and oranges and darker colours such as plum red and navy are colours that are ill suited to more formal attire, due to their unconventional aesthetic, but are great choices for casual wear.

A personal favourite of mine is the contrast of a bright, solid colour dress shirt with a conventionally styled tweed jacket. The juxtaposition of a vivid, modern colour to a jacket made from a traditional fabric is a great way to update a classic country look.

There is also a greater license to use patterns with casual dress shirts. Bolder checks, with large higher contrast patterns, go great with a tailored jacket. However, those wearing a loud shirt should tone down other areas of their outfit so as to not look too colourful and ostentatious.

For those looking to achieve a country feel, a dress shirt with smaller checks in earthy colours in combination with a tweed or waxed jacket and trousers of another earthy hue looks great and works well at any age.

The dress shirt is a great way to add colour and personality to an outfit and is much more subtle than wearing brightly coloured jackets or trousers and, therefore, much easier to pull off for the less adventurous. Of course, when adding colour one must look at the entire outfit to make sure there is no clash of colours and that all the colours work together.



This post is an excerpt of Essential Men's Style by James Wilson.