Late Summer's Essential Button-Down: The Brook Shirt

One style that is perfectly adaptable, and has been ever since it was invented by British military officers in India is the button-down shirt, which we call our Brook shirt. This classic style has been a mainstay of preppy wardrobes for nearly a century  - if it ain't broke don't fix it. Otherwise known as an OCBD (Oxford Cloth Button Down), the soft handles of our Brook shirts feel more like the sumptuous jersey fabrics of loungewear than they do traditional shirting, and can be dressed up or dressed down depending on the situation. We've created super soft corduroy styles with micro wales, as well as an indigo rinse style, and versatile cotton iterations.

There's no better context for them than right now, as many of us find ourselves working from home, conducting our jobs through video calls and online meet-ups. They have the feel and comfort of luxury loungewear, while still conforming to the classic tenets of shirting, guaranteeing you'll look the part in front of your boss. They're great layering pieces too - the soft collar construction can be popped up from beneath a sweatshirt or cardigan for a preppy look or worn down beneath a softly tailored blazer for a more professional aesthetic. Either way, formality never eats into comfort. You can even do as the great Gianni Agnelli did with his, and wear the collar down but unbuttoned - Rebel without a cause!