Plain/ off white t shirt or polo shirt with odd non-worsted wool (eg. flannel) pants

[SartorialTaste]

Hello fellow SFers,

I wonder if one has enough sprezz, he can pull off the plain t shirt or polo shirt and non-worsted (flannel for example) wool pants look? I mean I love jeans and chinos but I find them to be very ubiquitous (esp. jeans). Jeans has its roots in workwear and I think it is a bit overused. I feel like people used to wear more real pants/ trousers in the old times. So far I have restricted my J crew bowery wool pants to only ocbds and more formal dress shirts but wasn't 'dress shirt" has its root as an undergarment? Then so is t shirt, designed to be worn under the american WW2 military uniform. Difference is that t shirt is/was a casual undergarment and that more formal dress shirts are for lounge suits. However wearing t-shirt and a non worsted wool pants makes sense since I read that flannel, as well as cavalry twill pants has hunting/ military usage to it and therefore the style of t shirt and wool pants should be congruent.What is your thoughts on this fellas? How about polo shirt and odd wool pants?

-Sartorial Taste

 

[YRR92]

You know what people wore on top when they went hunting in cav twill and flannel trousers? It wasn't t-shirts worn out.

There's gonna be a gap in formality. With a t-shirt, it would look like you spilled something on your real shirt. With a polo shirt, there'll be a gap in seasonality – a cotton pique short-sleeve polo with heavy wool trousers? Where does that make sense?

I guess you could do a merino long sleeved polo with a pair of flannels or something, but it would look more finished to my eye with a jacket on top. And it wouldn't look as good as an ocbd under a crewneck. I'll sometimes wear cords or moleskins with a long-sleeved polo and a tweed jacket in winter.

Of course, you could certainly do something interesting with it, but it would be out of my wheelhouse. You could look at old pictures of laborers (though they mostly seem to have been wearing cotton trousers by the time it became socially acceptable to wear just a t-shirt. There's also a lot of this kind of thing if you look at '80s Armani.

Stick to cotton trousers with your knit shirts, and if you want something other than a dress shirt to wear with your winter wool trousers, how about a turtleneck?