In the warmer months of the year, it’s only natural to try to cut down on the number of layers you’ll be wearing each day. After all, with fewer garments on your body, you’ll generally stay cooler.
Even so, different situations call for different dress codes. A day at the beach may be well suited by shorts and a simple shirt but a summer business meeting at the office is still going to require something more formal and even within these general frameworks, dressing up a little bit more than others is still something that can be done. As an example, wearing a polo shirt, dressier shorts, and boat shoes to a barbecue will look infinitely more stylish than simply wearing a t-shirt, cargo shorts, and sandals.
Can One Effectively Pair A T-shirt With A Jacket?
Our answer, in a nutshell, is that we wouldn’t exactly recommend it. There are a host of other more stylish options out there. Still, if you are really dying to pair these two garments together, there are ways to do it that are better than others.
On that note then, let’s try to tackle the reasoning behind why someone would conceivably want to pair these two articles of clothing together:
- Firstly, it definitely presents a casual vibe in the overall scale of formality, it would probably rank even below smart casual in full-on casual wear.
- Secondly and perhaps more practically speaking, it can get hot during the summer months. Given that a t-shirt doesn’t often have long sleeves, you’ll be removing that extra bit of fabric from your frame and thus staying cooler.
Reasons Not To Attempt Wearing A T-Shirt With A Jacket
They’re At Greatly Different Levels Of Formality
When any garments of greatly different levels of formality are paired together, the overall formality of the outfit skews downward, not upward. In other words, pairing a t-shirt with a jacket doesn’t dress up the t-shirt, it only dresses down the jacket.
It Will Make You Look Dated
The height of the trend of wearing t-shirts and jackets together came in the 1980s as perhaps best exemplified by the TV show, Miami Vice. Not only were t-shirts worn with jackets and even full suits but the cut and colors were baggy and bright, respectively. If you do try wearing a t-shirt with a jacket today even if the fit is more trim and the colors are more muted, most people’s first associations are still going to be with the 80s and you’ll have the general effect of looking like a throwback.
You might be wondering how is this any different from the Gentleman’s Gazette’s frequent praise of early 20th century fashions? Well, the simple answer right now is that the 1980s are just dated enough that most of their fashions aren’t in style anymore but still, just current enough that some of those trends are hanging on. In other words, it’s kind of an uncanny valley in terms of time right now and being caught in the middle, wearing some of these distinctly 80s fashions is just going to make you look dated instead of like someone who’s celebrating these stylistic choices of an earlier era.
There Are Endless Alternatives
Finally, there are simply a great number of more stylish alternatives at your disposal than pairing a t-shirt and a jacket together.
How To Pull Off The T-Shirt With Jacket Combo
Choose Crew Neck Over V-Neck
The crew neck is a little bit more modest and will tamp down some of those 80s vibes. In terms of fit, the t-shirt shouldn’t be too baggy or too tight. If the t-shirt is baggy, you’re just going to look sloppy and not very well put together and if the t-shirt is too tight, you’re just going to look like you have something to prove or you’re trying to show off your physique.
Stay Away From Flashy Colors & Patterns
This should go without saying but absolutely no graphic tees, period. Solid and muted colors or perhaps a subtle pattern such as a Breton stripe will help to formalize the t-shirt just a little bit and bring it slightly more in line with the formality of the jacket. If you do still want to incorporate some color and pattern into your outfit, you can do so using your jacket within reason or better yet using a smaller accessory like a pocket square.
Choose Your Jacket Wisely
In terms of jacket styles, it’s best to go with a summer weight odd sport coat or blazer rather than a suit jacket. As we mentioned above, a suit jacket and a t-shirt are so wildly different in levels of formality that they’ll basically be actively fighting with each other if you try to wear them together.
Opt For Odd trousers
Cotton chinos or slacks in a neutral color and preferably without a pattern will casualize and ground the outfit at the same time. Wearing a t-shirt under a matching suit jacket and trousers is a one-way ticket to 80sVille.
Tuck In Your T-Shirt
An additional style tip for wearing a t-shirt under a jacket, make sure that the t-shirt is tucked in; if it’s untucked, things are just going to look that much more discordant in terms of formality and they really won’t work.
Recommended Stylish Alternatives
Open Collar Dress Shirts
Firstly, just wearing a standard dress shirt with an open collar under your jacket should still keep you cooler than if you were wearing a tie and it will look better as the dress shirt and jacket are closer in terms of overall formality.
Go For A Polo
Short sleeved dress shirts under jackets or even on their own can look a bit dorky so they’re best avoided. Not only should a polo worn under a jacket keep you cooler but also because it’s well within the realm of smart casual and therefore, closer to something like a summer weight sport coat or blazer, you can feel free to experiment to a greater degree with the colors or subtle patterns of your polo so long as they harmonize with those of your jacket. Just make sure that everything is working in harmony and of course, be sure also that your polo is tucked in.
As a bonus tip here, long-sleeved polos in darker jewel tones can work well under jackets in the cooler months of the year as well. Whether short-sleeved or long-sleeved, there is one potential pitfall of pairing a polo with a jacket and that’s the polo shirt’s more unstructured collar. In order to make sure things are looking good, give a check every once in a while just to see that things aren’t bunched up underneath your jacket’s collar. If you do this, wearing a polo with a jacket should be a look that you can pull off well and it will come off casually overall.
Henley Shirts
A happy middle ground between a standard t-shirt and a polo would be the Henley shirt. It isn’t quite as easy to pair with a jacket as a polo would be but it’s slightly easier than a standard t-shirt. Follow the guidelines we gave for pairing t-shirts and jackets together with your Henleys and you should end up looking good.
CONCLUSION
So there are our opinions on wearing t-shirts with jackets. Skip it for full suits as the difference in formality between the garments is simply going to be too great. If you want to wear a t-shirt with an odd jacket and trousers, you can do so slightly more easily and one additional note here, if keeping cool is your main aim, then look into getting jackets without an interlining in them and in lightweight summer fabrics.