Notes on a summer uniform

Linen, salt, and one good pair of frames.

A summer uniform is not a wardrobe. It is a decision made in advance, so that fewer decisions are required later.

Ours is built from five things: a white linen shirt, a pair of wide cotton trousers in a colour somewhere between sand and stone, a leather sandal that improves with salt water, a straw hat that has been crushed and reshaped at least twice, and one pair of frames.

The shirt is always linen. Not because linen photographs well — though it does — but because it forgives. It wrinkles immediately and then stops wrinkling, which is to say it reaches its final form within an hour of being worn and remains there until evening.

The trousers should be wide enough to move air and narrow enough to hold a line. A drawstring is preferable to a belt. Pockets should be deep.

Sandals are a longer conversation. We favour a single leather strap across the foot, an ankle band that does not buckle too tightly, and a sole thin enough to feel the heat of the stones. The sandals should be repaired, not replaced.

The hat is optional, but only in the way that shade is optional.

The frames are not optional. A summer face needs a summer frame — lighter, slightly larger than the winter equivalent, in a colour that works against tanned skin. Honey acetate is almost always right. Crystal is right more often than people expect.

Together, these five things will carry you from a morning swim to a long lunch to a late dinner without requiring a single revision.

The point of a uniform is not to look the same every day.

It is to stop thinking about looking, and start noticing everything else.

— The Editors