We’ve collectively moved the sartorial standard, and it’s time to celebrate. We are fortunate enough to be living in the age of peak comfort in fashion. After spending two years in sweatpants at home, it seems we have decided en masse that we are not going to surrender the comfort to which we had grown accustomed.
In menswear, this evolution has most commonly gone in the high-low direction of blending loungewear like sweatpants and hoodies with more formal styles, including blazers and loafers. This look defined the general vibe of men’s fashion in 2022, but 2022 is over and it is time to take the next step in comfort-first fashion. Fortunately, Bugatchi is ahead of the curve and has already designed the perfect fabric, cut into the perfect shirt, for this next gen of dressing.
The textile of this expert-tested shirt is Bugatchi’s exclusive OoohCotton fabric, a blend of 92 percent cotton and 8 percent spandex with some amazing properties. OoohCotton is double-mercerized, which means the cotton has twice undergone a special process to improve its strength, durability and ability to absorb and hold dyes. The result is cotton cloth with a faint lustre and silky feel; plus, it’s machine washable and wrinkle-resistant. This mercerized cotton is then woven with spandex to give OoohCotton flex on par with workout gear.
Bugatchi took this fabric and turned it into the well-fitting OoohCotton shirt, completely redefining what a formal men’s button-up shirt can do. At first glance, the OoohCotton shirt appears to be not much different from any respectable tailored shirt. There’s a slightly pointed spread collar that’s wide enough to handle the broader ties that are in fashion again. A French placket and no pocket make for a very clean front. The curved hem is long enough to stay tucked in, but short enough to look good untucked. And the single-pleat, notched cuff has two buttons for optimal fit.
You see, Bugatchi didn’t have to reinvent the wheel with the design of the OoohCotton shirt, because the OoohCotton fabric does all the heavy lifting. In fact, making a shirt that appears to be a traditional tailored shirt was the entire point. It is a well-established fact that nothing looks better on a man than a perfectly fitting shirt. The OoohCotton shirt has alleviated its only flaw—that restrictive feel. It is the next, and best, step in comfortable menswear because it allows the wearer to dress in formal, semiformal, and refined business attire again while holding on to that athleisure feel.
All this sounds familiar, I’m sure. Fashion brands have been making tailored shirts out of innovative fabrics for well over a decade, most of them are clear imposters when compared to the real thing. Which is why the real magic trick that Bugatchi pulled off was making the OoohCotton shirt appear indistinguishable to the naked eye from a traditional 100 percent cotton tailored shirt. Truly, it doesn’t really matter how they do it, only that they did it.
James Solid OoohCotton shirt
James Solid OoohCotton shirt
James Solid OoohCotton shirt
To test the properties attributed to the OoohCotton shirt, I decided to wear it for a full day at the home office. After my initial shock at seeing myself in a French-placket button-up on a day when I didn’t have any reason in particular to leave the house, I quickly relaxed into a confident ease. The OoohCotton shirt looks like a well-made traditional shirt, which is to say that it looks really good. There is a certain irreplaceable swagger that comes with wearing a great shirt. That feeling has been missing, at least for me, since I started spending most of my time in loungewear over the past few years.
After that pleasant start to my workday, I carried on as I usually do. Most of it was spent in my home office, on my computer. There were a few breaks to put away my kid’s laundry, placate my cat’s demands for attention, and eat lunch. By the time the first break came, I had completely forgotten that I was wearing a formal shirt. The OoohCotton lives up to the hype—it feels so light and soft that you forget it’s on your body. My range of motion was so unencumbered that I never rolled up my sleeves at any point in the day.
When my experiment had reached its planned conclusion, I decided that I wasn’t going to take my OoohCotton shirt off. I couldn’t think of anything more comfortable to put on, and I wanted to see my wife’s reaction to my wearing a shirt and seersucker trousers when she got home. She was predictably confused, so I explained to her that this is the future of elevated comfort in menswear. Bugatchi has brought the tailored shirt into the age of comfort-first fashion.
And my wife? She told me that I looked great—but I needed to start cooking dinner.
Contributing Commerce Style Writer
Brad is a contributing style commerce editor. After a decade working for menswear brands including J.Crew and Ralph Lauren, Brad switched from selling fashion to writing about it. His words have appeared in Huckberry, Heddels, and The Manual.
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