There was a time when uniforms were the bane of my existence. The Catholic school standard of starched Peter Pan collared shirts, prickly heat-inducing culottes and bleached white ankle socks were my norm for 12 years. Then comes my choice to attend Stephens College, the fashion school were expression is foremost found in what students wear whilst walking the quads.
I wasn’t used to this, and soon found myself wondering how I could set myself apart from my fellow fast-fashion clad matriculates. So just like Bob Dylan revisited Highway 61, I revisited what I also knew—routine. Now hanging in my closet are six chambray shirts, of various shade and style, ready to be cyclically worn, washed and adorned again. My draw to them is simple—they are comfortable, transitional through the seasons and easy to thrown on in a moment’s notice. Combine that with every retailer and their neighbor churning out new styles weekly, the selection has made it so everyone can have the one they drift to on days when they are, in the words of Cher Horowitz from Clueless, “ensembly challenged.”
Chambray shirts have somehow always found their way into my most important moments of adulthood. I have worn one on each first day of college, to my first days at new jobs and on every flight where I am going someplace I’ve never been before. The day one got shredded in a communal dorm washer felt like the day the sun never rose, and the night I wore one in the Las Vegas airport was the night I met Tove Lo and her euro-hipster entourage. They are important to me, my chambray shirts, and my closet would be bereft without them.
And in my mind, if they are good enough for the Barefoot Contessa Ina Garten to wear daily, then they are good enough for me.
