Welcome back to the Gentleman's Gazette.
Today's video is the ultimate guide to Polo Shirts.
Polo shirt materials and which one you should go for.
Probably the most popular Polo shirt material are cotton blended fabric with polyester.
It's popular because it somewhat soft.
The polyester adds more longevity, colors don't wash out as easily and they are more
robust.
However, blended materials are less comfortable than pure cotton.
They are usually less expensive, favored by grocery stores, Target, or for uniforms.
If you wear them personally, in your spare time, I would suggest that you go with all
cotton Polo Shirt.
Sometimes, these blend polo shirts are also sold as "performance" and in fact, some are
performance in the sense that they are trying to move away the moisture from your body when
you play golf or tennis.
other times, it's more of a marketing ploy to use a less expensive fiber or material
then sold as more high end.
So personally, I prefer natural fibers over artificial fibers but it's something that
you have to decide on your own.
Polo Shirts made out of a hundred percent polyester are the cheapest one you can find,
you will sweat very easily, you'll overheat and it has a very ugly, shiny look that just
screams cheap.
I would recommend avoid polyester polo shirts at all cost.
Silk Polo shirts are usually more expensive cos it's a more expensive fiber and all silk
polos are not really around because the fiber is a bit too shiny and it's not really absorbent
but when blended with cotton or linen, it can be a really nice material.
It is often used for luxury Polo shirts that want to distinguish themselves from less expensive
Polo shirts.
In recent years, linen has become more popular because of its three dimensional structure
and the irregular yarns that are used to either weave it or knit it and Polo shirts, that's
true as well.
however, linen is much harsher and coarser than cotton so I would recommend if you want
this look, look for a linen cotton blend fabric or another blend with silk fabric so you get
the soft feel on your skin with the texture and the look you like.
In the medium and high priced segment, the hundred percent cotton Polo shirts are definitely
among the most popular ones.
Cotton is classic, it's absorbent, it keeps the color in better qualities, keep it for
longer, just like with any material, cotton does not always equal cotton.
There's a staple length and how pure it is, how the yarn is spun but at the end of the
day, cotton is a great material for Polo shirts and it's a classic that you can definitely
rely on.
Now, it's not all about the materials, it's also about how it is made up and as I said
Rene Lacoste invented the cotton mesh.
Now sometimes you will see people talking about Polo shirts fabric and when they say
that you know they have no clue, Polo shirts are knitted, not woven which is why they are
not a fabric.
The difference is a fabric only stretches in one way and knit stretches in all ways
is therefore more flexible and comfortable to wear.
What is knitting?
Knitting is a process of interlooping yarns while weaving means you have warp and weft
and you go back and forth and up and down.
You want to knit the fabric for your polo shirt because it's more flexible and comfortable
to wear and it stretches into all directions because it's interlooped.
You have two kinds of basic knits that are important, i am not going to talk about all
the 25 ones, just two basic ones so you can distinguish.
You have jersey knit and pique knit.
Pique knit is the more classic knit and it has a waffle like structure and the name is
derived from the marcela pique fabric which is woven and has not really much to do with
the pique knit that is knitted but it has the same waffle structure the same look which
is why it gets its name.
Different manufacturers have different sizes of the knit, a larger waffle knit will be
more breathable but also heavier a finer knit will be more lightweight but has smaller holes.
Overall, pique knit is really classic, I really like it and it's usually a little more expensive
to produce which is why most manufacturers still use pique and only the cheaper ones
are using jersey knits.
Here, I'm wearing a jersey knit polo which is cheaper it's a cotton poly blend that I
don't really like but on the other hand if you look at this Brioni shirt which is very
expensive it also has the jersey knit.
You can't always just say a jersey knit is always less expensive because it depends on
the brand and depends on the materials.
In general, overall, jersey knit is usually used for less expensive Polo shirts , pique
knit is used for more expensive ones.
Next up, Polo shirt collars.