[Naïtsirk Róïd]

Dear Sirs,

this is my first post on your site. I have been reading many discussions on askandyaboutclothes and find that the tone on your forum is much friendlier and much more helpful than on styleforum. 😇 With you, questions are encouraged, as per the name of your forum. On styleforum, there are several members, who regularly get outraged 😤and quite aggressive 🤬if they feel that the answer to a question should be known or -worse still- if they feel the question implies something that goes against their convictions.😱

My question to you experts today is regarding shirt construction. 👔

I was at the beautiful Dior store on Avenue Montaigne in Paris today and there saw this framed photograph of the founder himself. What struck me most was his shirt. It does not have any visible placket. Certainly no placket where the fabric is folded over and sewn toward the outside (this strikes me as very functional-looking and not very attractive, although most of my shirts have this.

Nor does it seem to have a placket where the material is folded toward the underside and then sewn. Because I can’t really see the placket through the shirt, nor does the edge seem to be thicker from having been folded over. All this that makes it so much more elegant in my opinion. Many of my shirts have a placket, or even when they are a visible vertical seam to the left and right of the button part of a shirt.
Do you agree do you experts agree that the masters choices here makes the shirt more elegant? Do you have expert vocabulary for me on how to ask for this when I have a shirt made or buy one?

Second question is about his shirt collar. It looks so soft and floppy, but also very elegant and cool. It’s almost like a blouseo you think his shirt would also work with a tie? Or does this only work because with this type of shirt, you would never wear a tie? Can you help me with the right vocabulary in English for this also?

Thank you Andy and friends.

Roïd

 

[Matt S]

He's wearing a camp shirt, which has a one-piece collar known as a camp collar. There are other kind of one-piece collars too. It's a casual collar not to be worn with a tie. The front is folded under by a few inches so you see facings like on a lapel. Without a jacket and in bright sunlight you'd probably see the fold. It's held together by the buttonholes.

You'll see formal shirts done this way too, but the front is only folded under a small amount, and again the buttonholes hold it in place. It's often called a French front or a plain front. Sometimes a plain front has a line of stitching to hold the fold in place, but I think that looks clunky.

 

[Peak and Pine]

Funny, I've always thought a French front looked cheap (and it probably is cheaper to make versus the more common and more complicated applied placket), an exception being made in my head for the original Pendletons, where the Frenchie lessens the bullk that an applied placket of wool would make.

 

[Troones]

Funny, I've always thought a French front looked cheap (and it probably is cheaper to make versus the more common applied placket), an exception being made in my head for the original Pendletons, where the Frenchie lessens the bullk that an applied placket of wool would make.

Hey Peak and Pine, completely unrelated but it looks like you’re Mexican now? I recall you mentioned the flag of Iraq gracing your profile recently.

Edit: looks like they fixed it. Glitch in the matrix I guess.

 

[Peak and Pine]

Damn, just when I was getting a handle on Farsi.

 

[drpeter]

Damn, just when I was getting a handle on Farsi.

Not to worry, Peaks. I could teach you a bit of Urdu..Or some Spanish, but you probably know that language.

 

[Flanderian]

He's wearing a camp shirt, which has a one-piece collar known as a camp collar. There are other kind of one-piece collars too. It's a casual collar not to be worn with a tie. The front is folded under by a few inches so you see facings like on a lapel. Without a jacket and in bright sunlight you'd probably see the fold. It's held together by the buttonholes.

You'll see formal shirts done this way too, but the front is only folded under a small amount, and again the buttonholes hold it in place. It's often called a French front or a plain front. Sometimes a plain front has a line of stitching to hold the fold in place, but I think that looks clunky.

+1!

I'm also familiar with this type of shirt front as a French front. And when I was still had a shirtmaker it was a common and always available option for any shirts I had made. I think I may have tried one or two in this mode but found I much preferred shirts with a placket. The two shirts below are bespoke shirts from the Parisian chemisier Daniel Levy. The bottom shirt with piquet-like weave allows more of the construction to be visible.

While I agree with Matt concerning the collar at issue, there are also collars intended to be worn with a tie that are somewhat similar. I'm familiar with such collars by the term soft collar. Such collars have little to no interlining and typically no collar stays. This too is an option by many bespoke shirtmakers. The collar style can be varied, but the collar that I have seen most commonly is a longer point collar. This collar style was much more common in the '30's and '40's.

As to what is appropriate, IMO it's largely a matter of personal preference, though I do think a more structured collar works better with more serious suits and evening wear.