Lemaire Light Plastron top

A plastron is the panel across the front of a garment, the term borrowed from formal shirting, where the stiffened bib front of a dress shirt is the plastron, and from fencing, where it is the padded chest protector. In both cases it is a discrete front panel that reads as a single unbroken surface, and that is what is being reproduced here in a much lighter register. The construction decision that makes it possible is easy to skim past: this top buttons up the back. Every conventional shirt or blouse puts its closure down the center front, which means the front of the garment is by definition divided into two halves meeting at a placket. Move the buttons to the back and the front becomes one continuous piece of cloth with nothing crossing it, no placket, no buttonholes, and no line down the middle. That is the entire reason the plastron reads as a plastron. The cloth is a silk plongé, a silk finished for a dense, supple, matte hand rather than a fluid glossy one, which is what allows a single unbroken panel to hold its shape across the chest instead of collapsing into folds. The buttons are mother of pearl, cut from shell, so they carry the same faint shifting iridescence the silk does and are cool to the touch.

The back closure is a real construction decision in service of one visual idea, and almost nobody makes a top this way because it is more difficult to put on and harder to fit. The result is a silk top with no line down the front, which is rarer than it sounds.

An unshowy garment carrying one structural decision that changes everything about how it looks is Lemaire working at close to full strength.

100% silk in a plongé, with mother of pearl buttons and a back closure. Long sleeve. Made in Portugal, in coal.

A back-buttoning garment fits differently from a front-buttoning one, since there is no placket at the front to give across the chest, so the fit is decided at the shoulder and the back. It is also a top that is easier to fasten with help than without, which is worth knowing rather than discovering. We do not hold measurements, and there is no Lemaire size chart on this site.

The uninterrupted front is the point, so nothing should cross it: no necklace at the sternum, no cross-body strap, and no jacket worn buttoned. Coal is a deep grey rather than a black, and in a matte silk it reads as depth rather than as darkness. Tucked into the Balloon Skirt it makes a single continuous line from shoulder to waist, which is the pairing worth trying.

Silk goes to a cleaner who has been told it is silk, and it should be kept out of direct sun, which weakens the fiber. Mother of pearl needs its own note, because it is shell rather than plastic: it is soft, it scratches, and it is damaged by solvents and by the perchloroethylene used in conventional dry cleaning, so the buttons should be pointed out or protected before the garment is cleaned. Do not spot-treat silk at home; water marks it and the mark spreads. Our fabric care guide has a section on silk.

In silk, the Balloon Skirt, which is the natural pairing, and the Straight Collar Twisted Shirt. The Seamless Top is the fine knitted layer. Everything we carry from Lemaire is listed together.