by Artina Dozier-Gage

It’s versatile. It’s classic. It’s iconic. It’s the white T-shirt.

Want to get a good bang for your buck in fashion wear? Invest in a good classic white tee, a style essential. The white T-shirt has so many qualities to love. Let’s begin with a feature that is uber important, but one that can be sometimes overlooked in fashion, that is comfort.

Upon getting home from a busy workday what’s one of the first things that you reach for when you really want to maximize your comfort level? After perhaps a glass of red wine I reach for a T-shirt, my husband’s to be more specific. The soft feel of cotton hugging or draping, and caressing my skin makes me feel nurtured and instantly puts me in a relaxed and more peaceful state of mind. 

In researching the history of the T-shirt I found that the roots of what would be considered the more modern day t-shirt began to gain it’s popularity around the turn of the century in 1904 with a marketing campaign by the Cooper Underwear Co. which was targeted towards men, bachelors in particular. According to ‘How The T-Shirt Was Invented’ by Karl Smallwood the campaign focused on the idea that a shirt not requiring buttons, nor needle or thread was appealing to men who were single and who did not possess sewing skills themselves.

This was just the beginning of the T-shirt’s skyrocket to popularity. Soon after the advertising campaign the US Navy added the t-shirt as an official requirement to be worn underneath the troops uniforms.  Apparently during warmer weather there was a need for lighter clothing material and so the official US Navy undergarment was duplicated using lighter cotton allowing troops to be more comfortable. Soon there after the US Army incorporated the T-shirt during WWI. After the war the troops returned home and brought their comfortable casual t-shirts with them and began to wear them as single item pieces. Although the t-shirt had successfully gained popularity with men as a comfortable choice it certainly had not been recognized as a stylish or even appropriate piece to wear on it’s own.

And, then there’s Hollywood…with all of it’s glamour and glare, starlets and stars. In the mid-century one could say that there was not a more popular Hollywood figure than that of Marlon Brando who starred in the film, A Street car Named Desire in 1952. In that role he wore a form-fitting t-shirt which clung to his chiseled body and took the t-shirt from just merely a somewhat popular and comfortable piece to the stratospheric heights that we see today denoting not only comfort, but also style.  

Investing in your own quality white T-shirt will allow you too to carry that same feeling of cozy comfort without sacrificing a minuscule of style.

So, here’s where I demonstrate my white Tee from Everlane. Try your own take on it.  

Photography: R. Gage 

Art Direction: Artina Dozier-Gage