Mai Gidah White Shirt with Autoportrait

There is no garment with less room to move in than the white shirt. Everything about it is settled, which is why it survives and why almost every attempt to advance it fails by breaking something that was working. This one leaves the structure alone. The collar is a standard collar and it is not reinvented. What changes is the closure, which is built to work two ways rather than one, so the shirt can be fastened from either direction and the front can be worn as two different fronts. That is a pattern decision, invisible on a hanger, and it is the kind of change that survives being worn because it does not depend on anyone noticing it. Then there is the print. The house calls it an autoportrait, which is the French for a self-portrait, and it is silkscreened rather than digitally printed. Silkscreen pushes ink through a mesh onto the surface of the cloth, which means it sits on the fibers with weight and edge, and it ages by softening and cracking slightly rather than by fading flat. A designer putting his own face on his own white shirt is a joke and a signature at once, and you have to be reasonably sure of the shirt underneath to make it. One hundred percent cotton, in the color Paper White. Made in the Netherlands.

Why we selected it

We will take a white shirt that has been argued with, as long as the argument is in the pattern. This one is, and the print is the part you can decide to ignore.

Mai-Gidah puts the change in the closure on almost everything it makes, and on a white shirt that is the only place a change can go without wrecking it.

Materials and construction

One hundred percent cotton. Standard collar, with a two-way closure, and an “autoportrait” silkscreen print. Color: Paper White. Made in the Netherlands.

Fit notes

A shirt with a two-way closure has to be cut symmetrically enough to look correct fastened either way, which means it sits squarer through the front than a conventional shirt. Cotton at full strength will soften considerably with washing and will not lose shape. Wear it out or tucked; the closure is what changes, not the length.

Styling

Under the Corduroy Worker Style Jacket or the Bourbon Red Jacket, where a white shirt is doing the usual white-shirt job and the print is a private matter. On its own when it is not. With the Extra Classic Trousers.

Care

Cotton takes a warm wash and does not need a delicate one, but the silkscreen does: wash the shirt inside out, keep it out of a hot dryer, and never press directly onto the print, because heat is what lifts a screen print off a cotton ground. Our care guidance covers the rest.

Related pieces

The Zip-Through Hoodie with Contrast Under-Stitching is the house putting a seam on the outside where a shirt puts a print. Everything we carry from Mai-Gidah is listed together.