Business Dressing – Getting Started (Part 2)

Last week we began our discussion of assembling a business wardrobe by focusing on suits. This week, we will concentrate on adding dress shirts to your professional wardrobe.

Dress shirts come in a multitude of styles, fabrics and colors. Your dress shirt choices should reflect both your personal taste and the business environment in which you work. First, a couple general rules of thumb:

- Purchase only 100% cotton dress shirts. They can be laundered and ironed at home, or professionally laundered at your local dry cleaning establishment. If you are not handy with an iron and want to avoid the expense of professional laundering, “non-iron” or “wrinkle resistant” shirts are now available in 100% cotton. These shirts, in which the cotton fabric is treated to resist wrinkles, sell for about $15 more than traditional cotton shirts, but can be laundered at home and then lightly touched up with an iron.

- Unless you observe your supervisor and other managers wearing short sleeves, limit your dress shirt purchases to long sleeves only.

You will need to start with about 6-8 dress shirts. If you work in a company where the senior management team dresses conservatively, or if your clients tend to dress in this manner, stick to basic dress shirts. Plain white or light blue dress shirts, or white with a blue pinstripe, will pass muster almost anywhere. Spread collars are currently popular, although traditional straight collars and button down collars are always acceptable. If you wish to express yourself a bit within a conservative business environment, choose a blue or pinstripe shirt with a white contrasting collar and cuffs. French cuffs can also dress up your otherwise traditional look.

If your work environment allows you to go beyond the most basic of dress shirts, a wide variety of patterns and colors exist to select from. Since dress shirts do not have the life expectancy of a business suit, you need not be as concerned with fashion obsolescence. Currently stripes, ginghams, glen plaids and tattersalls are all quite popular, as are solid patterns in a variety of spring colors. Choose patterns and colors that you are comfortable with which complement your build and the shape of your face (a topic we will discuss in greater detail in a few weeks).

Now that we have the suits and dress shirts with which to start, we will complete our three-part Getting Started series next week with a discussion of how to accessorize your business wardrobe.