All Things Vintage: T-Shirt Shape Guide
Anyone who has ever looked for vintage shirts knows this: a (small) "medium" size from the 80s is not comparable to a (medium-sized) "medium" of today. And shirts in the 90s, 2000s and 2010s had a different fit! Reason enough for us to take a look at how drastically the silhouette of shirts has changed over the decades.
1980s: The slimmer, the better!
Even though the 80s were rich in opulent trends - shoulder pads, blow-dry hairstyles, and fringe jackets send their regards - they were also the decade of the slim fit: T-shirts were form-fitting and often tucked into pants.
Sweaters were not worn as tight, but were also cut shorter. Not much fabric was needed to reach the waistband of the (also tight and high-waisted) jeans. It's clear that the sizes were accordingly much smaller compared to today! An XXL from the 80s is therefore more like a Medium by 2020s standards.
That's why we note on each of our items whether a piece is "true to size" or not (or whether it's a "women's size", which is always shorter and narrower).
Speaking of "shorter and narrower": Crop tops, which are currently making a comeback, also come from the 80s. And they actually have a hyper-masculine origin (contrary to homophobic "critics") - namely in American football. Because jerseys were regularly torn during games, players' abdominal muscles were often visible. This, along with the bodybuilding hype at the time, led to the trend of producing shirts this way. True to the motto: "Show 'em what you got" - but even without a six-pack, crop tops were rocked.
1990s: Baggy, baggy, baggy, can't you see?
In the 90s, not only technology and movies became faster, bigger, and louder (Playstation 1, CGI, or Love Parade, anyone?). But fashion also did: although tight-fitting clothes still existed, they were now often combined with wide baggy pants or directly swapped for shirts with a boxy fit.
TLC: Crazy, sexy, cool (and still very baggy)
The trend towards "bigger and wider" was logical, on the one hand, because fashion has always sought the greatest possible contrast to previous designs. However, two youth cultures that completely exploded into the mainstream in the 90s were definitely instrumental in the baggy trend: Skateboarding and Hip Hop. They had a penchant for loose-fitting clothing for very logical reasons, namely for more freedom of movement and storage space. You can find more on this topic in our article on the evolution of Carhartt Work Pants.
But not only rappers and skaters wore T-shirts and sweaters (and pants and jackets) oversized now: The "boxy fit" - meaning just as wide as it was long - was everywhere, from raves and runways to TV.
2000s: The decade of XS and XXXXXL
The new millennium, in addition to ringtones and German gangster rap, brought about two extremes in terms of "T-shirt" around 2004: very tight and veeeery wide shirts.
Emocore also likely played a role in the popularity of tight-fitting T-shirts – many bands of the emotionally charged music genre expressed their individuality through their outfits, and alongside makeup and hairspray, a return to the tight 80s style was celebrated – including tight shirts, which is not surprising given potential (style) role models like The Cure.
At the same time, Hip Hop was once again significantly involved in the opposite oversized trend: After the music genre had been dominated by artists from New York and Los Angeles for decades, the "Dirty South" gained importance from the early 2000s onwards.
The sound of Trap (in the T.I. sense) and the music videos drew the spotlight to oversized T-shirts that seemingly hung in the closet of every Southern (T)rapper. One explanation for this: illegal substances could easily be hidden unseen under the wide (mostly white) shirts. They were also cheap to get (and from then on were also made extra long by new brands).
Dem Franchize Boyz with THE anthem to oversized T-shirts
2010s: A little bit of everything
After the extremes of the previous decades, the fit of shirts and sweaters in the 2010s mostly settled in the middle: The Regular Fit, which of course never went away, also made a comeback in subcultures. And even if skinny jeans were still selling like hotcakes, above the beltline, much was 'normal' again – meaning somewhere between the slim fit of the 80s and the drop shoulders of the 90s.
Of course, narrow, but extra-long shirts must also be mentioned here, which everyone from Kanye West to the shisha bar owner in Buxtehude rocked in the early 2010s. Also important and, above all, innovative: shirts and tops made of Dri-Fit. This polyester material, which helps cool the body thanks to high-performance microfibers, certainly also helped to make close-fitting clothing more acceptable - but for functional reasons for once.
PS: The next time you browse through our vintage shirts and vintage sweaters, you'll know why we provide every single piece with size information and the note "true to size" or additional information - because "XL" or "Small" meant something different then than it does today.
