The Search for the Perfect Dress Shirt – Perry Ellis

Perry Ellis French Cuff Shirt – $49.50

Perry Ellis is almost there as a label.  But their target demo doesn’t seem to be the kind of young men who have embraced a more fitted, tailored style.  Instead, they go after the guys who don’t want to break away from those boxy cut shirts their Dad helped them buy.  Now some of their jackets and suits actually fit pretty trim, but when it comes to their shirts they leave a lot of fabric at the sides.  Almost $50 seems pretty pricey for our search for the Perfect Affordable Dress Shirt… but we tried it on anyway.  Here’s what we found:

Pros

• Nice fabric.  Thinner but certainly not thin cloth.
• Good herringbone stitch pattern on the fabric gives it some heft.
• Arms are perfect length, nice and trim in circumference

Cons

• Going to need to be brought in on the sides
• Collar seemed a little floppy.
• Not a semi spread.  Traditional Point
• No exact sizes.

The verdict?  If you don’t like a lot of extra cloth around your waist, $50 is a bit too steep for a shirt that you’ll have to spend $10 – $20 on to get tailored.  That and you’ll need cuff links.  There’s always the darn cuff links.