Mesh shirts for the masses
It’s fair to say that nobody needs a mesh shirt. But I have been finding my wardrobe bleak and prematurely matronly, and was drawn to a garment that, for an amount of money that even factoring in taxes and shipping fees, would not be that financially irresponsible.
Mesh shirts, of this nature, are like the ones the allegedly promiscuous girl I knew in middle school would wear to Hebrew school. Or like the one an almost staid-looking contestant on the French bake-off would wear. There is mesh for all moods. But it’s a glamorous style that is not actually revealing if you don’t want it to be (layering, etc.) or can be if you do. You have options!
Trouble is, the shirt doesn’t exist. Or it will, fleetingly—you can refresh the website like it’s 2021 and you’re trying to book a covid vaccine, and eventually there it will be, but in a size that isn’t correct, but maybe would be fine, or not, who can say? But what even is my size in a mesh shirt?
Reader, I went to the store and tried it on. Not it-it—sold out in black in all sizes in store as well—but in the white and navy, in long-sleeve and sleeveless, in the sizes that seemed plausible. (I had to be at the mawl because my headphones had broken and while I was there figured why not investigate, why not be ridiculous.)
I’m not going to newsletter the photo I took of myself in this shirt but suffice it to say, it is what the expression did her no favors was made for. That, and in person (sorry Uniqlo but this is becoming a pattern) it was just not as nice as it looked online. Something about the material of the seams, and the big hunking materials-and-care label on the side, visible through the mesh. Were these shirts athleisure or lingerie? They couldn’t decide. Maybe it’s better in the black. Big maybe.
It then occurred to me that maybe this sort of shirt exists elsewhere. But where? Online image searching inevitably yields e-commerce sites that only ship to Australia, plus a lot of ads for unrelated clothes.
Then I remembered Poshmark.
Then I remembered the “Flight of the Conchords” lyric: “you know you’re not in high finance / considering secondhand underpants.” Is a mesh shirt like underpants? I would draw the line even at a used bra, or (if I wore slips) a used slip. Had this quest suddenly gotten… disgusting?
But then I saw one, better than what I even thought I was looking for, and from a brand I know to use good materials. Even with shipping and whatnot this will, if my $10 CAD bid comes through, cost less than even the pre-tax Uniqlo. And it is, allegedly, new with tags, so I would not be buying secondhand underpants.
Will I still be going to drop-off in the t-shirt and leggings I slept in? No—the season is changing so it will soon be the t-shirt and shorts I slept in. But it is, at least, something to aspire to.