Ask Tug: Ribbed Cotton Undershirts – Which style should I choose?

My friend from the men.style forum who had questions about ribbed and fitted undershirts emailed me and had some additional questions:

Hi Tug, I found your site very useful as u recommended me on Men’s style forum. I got few questions to ask you regarding on undershirt style.

Now i’m understood what is the rib cotton shirt. But rib shirt also have different kind of style. Which is suit the best and good look? Loose or fitted? V-neck, round neck or U neck or Square Cut undershirt? I’m noob on choosing undershirt. Usually i wear it under my dress shirt and sometimes at home. Please advice.

Hi K,

Glad to hear the information I posted on Men Style helped you out.

Good questions! I’ll address each one separately.

Best Looking? Well, my friend, I can honestly say this is more of a personal choice and it depends on what you’re trying to solve for. I favor wearing full undershirts over wearing tank tops because I like to protect my outershirts from getting stained in the underarm area. Some guys who don’t sweat very much swear by wife-beaters. What’s most important is that you find an undershirt that fits YOU good, feels comfortable, and keeps you cool.
Loose or Fitted? Personally, I like longer, more fitted undershirts because they stay tucked in better and don’t bunch up under my clothing . This allows my shirts to lay very nicely. Also, most of the fitted undershirts are made out of light-weight stretchy material, so they are extremely comfortable to wear.
V-Neck or Crew Neck? It depends on what shirt I’m wearing. I don’t have any hard fast rule in when I wear a v-neck over a crew neck, but I do recommend wearing a crew neck if you’re wearing a nice dress shirt with the top button or two open. If you’re dressing casual, take your pick.
U-Neck or Square Cut Neck? This is isolated to the topic of tank tops. While I don’t wear tanks that often, I’d probably lean to wearing a u-neck wife-beater around the house and wearing a square cut tank if I were working out, biking, or participating in some sporting event.
Color? (I know you didn’t ask, but I have to include it) I wear either white or black undershirts. White goes with about anything. If I feel like wearing a black undershirt, I’ll typically wear it under darker clothing. The thing I like about black undershirts is that they can usually double as a casual outer shirt.

Thanks for writing in!
Tug

Here’s a couple of additional questions he asked as well:

K>I’m weird. Why square cut shirt is best suit for sport? because it is tight fitted?

TUG>Two reasons. First, square cut tank tops are usually made out of a polyester or other synthetic moisture wicking materials and will normally manage moisture and dry faster than non moisture wicking tanks. Second, I think they look better

K>Another question, i actually bought quite few 100% cotton undershirt last time, due to the shirt cant long lasting / not durable ‘coz the shirt stretch out and its shape changed and became so loose to wear it. I’m not using the washing maching to wash it. I usually dump it into water with soap powder to wash it then hang it until it dry. I heard those people said first wash it should shrink. But it is not instead. Got any idea how to wash it?

TUG>Best way to shrink an undershirt is to wash it (by hand or washing machine) in HOT water. Then, tumble it dry on the hottest heat setting your dryer has. If you want to avoid having that problem in the future, consider switching to fitted undershirts. Those types of undershirts retain their shape pretty well wash after wash.