A white shirt is the only garment that survives every decade without being redesigned. It does not trend, so it never falls out. What changes is how it is worn, and almost all of that comes down to three things: the fit at the shoulder, where the hem sits, and what goes over it.

Nine ways, below, from a Tuesday desk to a dinner that was not planned.

Why the white shirt outlasts everything else

Most wardrobes contain one garment that gets worn until it fails. It is usually a white shirt. The reason is structural rather than sentimental: white reflects rather than absorbs, so it reads as clean against almost any skin tone, and the collar frames the face in a way no crew neck can. It also sits at the exact midpoint between formal and casual, which means it can be dressed in either direction without looking as though it is trying.

The Shirt Long 01 and the Slim Fit Shirt 01 sit at opposite ends of that range: one cut with room through the body, one cut close. Which you reach for decides most of what follows.

Getting the fit right first

No styling fixes a bad shoulder. The seam should land where your shoulder ends, not past it. Everything else can be adjusted, taken in, shortened, rolled. The shoulder cannot.

After that, check three points. The collar should take two fingers at the neck. The cuff should stop at the base of the thumb. The hem should be long enough to stay tucked when you raise your arms, and short enough to sit flat when it does not.

Tucked, half-tucked, untucked

A full tuck raises the waistline and lengthens the leg. It belongs with anything high-rise. A half tuck, front only, keeps the lengthening effect while loosening the formality, and it works best when the shirt has enough body to hold a soft fold. Untucked only works if the hem is straight rather than curved, and if it ends somewhere deliberate: mid-hip, or well below it. The worst hem is the one that stops at the widest part of you.

Under a vest

A long vest over a white shirt is the fastest way to add structure without adding warmth. The vest draws a vertical line down the centre and narrows everything inside it. Keep the shirt sleeves full and let the cuffs show. The Vest Long 06 works over both a fitted and a relaxed shirt, which is unusual.

Under a jacket

Here the shirt is doing one job: providing a clean edge at the collar and cuff. That means the collar needs enough interlining to stand up on its own, and the cuff needs to extend about a centimetre past the jacket sleeve. If the collar collapses under a lapel, the whole outfit reads as borrowed.

With wide trousers

Volume below asks for restraint above. A white shirt tucked into wide-leg trousers is one of the few combinations that is almost impossible to get wrong, provided the shirt is tucked and the trouser rise is high. If the rise is low, the proportion collapses and both pieces look too big.

With a skirt

A shirt with a skirt lives or dies on where the waist is defined. Tuck fully, and if the shirt bunches, pull the excess to the back rather than distributing it evenly. For a midi length, keep the shirt close to the body so the eye reads one continuous line from shoulder to hem.

Evening, with silk

A white shirt after six needs one element that catches light. That is usually silk: a narrow scarf at the neck, a square in a pocket, or a shawl carried rather than worn. Nothing else about the shirt changes. The Scarf Narrow 04 does this with the least effort, knotted once and left loose.

Undo the top button, not the top two. The difference is between composed and unbuttoned.

Care and storage

White shirts fail at the collar and cuff before they fail anywhere else, because that is where skin meets cloth. Wash at thirty, treat the collar band before it discolours rather than after, and dry away from direct sun, which yellows rather than whitens over time.

Hang rather than fold, buttoned at the top and the middle so the shoulders keep their shape. A shirt stored on a wire hanger for a season will come out with a crease no iron removes.

More shirting sits in the FUNCTIONAL collection, cut for structure, and in MINIMAL, cut for line.

Related reading: How to Style a Long Vest and The Poetry of Simplicity.