Summer Wardrobe Essentials for Men: The New-Season Edit
Summer dressing has a habit of revealing more than intended. The shirt that felt perfectly fine in April now clings in all the wrong places. The trainers you trusted all winter suddenly look heavy beside bare ankles. The only shorts in rotation appear to have escaped from the gym.
The fix is not a full wardrobe purge, but a sharper reset of the pieces you reach for most. From heat-friendly shirts and breathable layers to refined shorts, sandals and sunglasses, MR PORTER’s new-season arrivals bring the strongest warm-weather upgrades into one place.
Focus on a few key pieces and you can move between office days, park afternoons and weekends away without feeling as though you’ve packed for three different lives.
Shirts & Tees
The quickest way to spot a man who has understood summer dressing is to look from the collarbone down. This is where most wardrobes start to crack: shirts worn to exhaustion, T-shirts too heavy for the heat, cuts that cling rather than skim, and fabrics that make even a short walk feel like a minor endurance event.
What you need is a rotation that treats heat as part of the brief. The tee, for a start, deserves better than being treated as a lazy base layer. Mr. P’s striped linen tee makes the case neatly, with textural linen to keep things cool and tonal stripes that can lift shorts or sit comfortably beneath a relaxed jacket.
For shirts, fabric and cut do most of the work. Linen and cotton should be your first ports of call, preferably in shapes that allow air to move. Drake’s 36-piece capsule includes a camp-collar linen shirt with Cuban-style pockets that drips with summer insouciance, while Polo Ralph Lauren’s boxy beige cotton-piqué shirt adds easy texture.
For something quieter, Japanese label Ssstein’s quietly assured linen button-up is exactly the sort of clean, minimal shirt that earns its keep when the temperature climbs.
Then there is the polo, which has largely shrugged off its sporting baggage to become one of modern menswear’s most useful pieces.
Drake’s striped long-sleeve polo riffs on a smock silhouette, while its mesh-knit short-sleeve polo is the very definition of elegant summer versatility: sharp enough for a terrace lunch, yet infinitely more relaxed than a shirt that still pretends it needs a tie.
Streetwear-minded types can reach for a printed cotton jersey tee by Our Legacy, while Enfants Riches Déprimés’ Vienna jacquard knit, part of an exclusive collection for MR PORTER, brings considerably more bite than your average knitted polo.
Lightweight Layers
The myth that summer means no layers usually survives until the first overenthusiastic air-con unit or post-dinner coastal breeze. Few things are less elegant than shivering in a linen shirt while pretending it was all part of the plan.
The answer is not to reach for autumn clothes in a panic, but to keep a small roster of summer-specific layers ready.
An overshirt is the easiest place to start. Drake’s denim overshirt works more like a classic chore jacket, sitting neatly over OCBDs, tees and polos for much of the season. For cooler evenings, Our Legacy’s beige ‘Evening Polo’ adds warmth without dragging the whole outfit back into winter.
When the setting calls for a cleaner line, Brunello Cucinelli’s leather-trimmed denim jacket and Canali’s herringbone wool-linen-silk blazer offer two polished routes through summer dressing.
One speaks to relaxed modern luxury, the other to old-school Riviera refinement. Both keep the structure light, which is the important bit.
Trousers And Shorts
If shirts are where men make their summer style declarations, trousers and shorts are where they often betray them. A strong top half can only do so much if the bottom half is too heavy, too tight or too obviously chosen in a hurry.
The brief is simple: lighter fabrics, easier cuts and no loss of dignity.
Ssstein’s wide-leg pleated linen trousers do exactly what good summer trousers should, bringing fluidity, comfort and enough shape to feel intentional. Enfants Riches Déprimés’ straight-leg jeans, meanwhile, keep denim in the conversation without falling back on the usual anonymous template.
They come from different menswear worlds, but both use cut and fabrication to make warm-weather dressing feel considered rather than compromised.
Shorts should behave like clothes, not sports equipment. Anderson & Sheppard’s straight-leg linen shorts deliver comfort courtesy of the British label’s modern sartorial attitude, while Canali’s linen-and-silk Bermudas answer that very specific question: what does one wear on a hot day when someone has promised canapés and champagne?
Between them, bare legs become a styling choice rather than a concession.
Swimwear
The average swimwear drawer is a small museum of sun-addled optimism: retired prints, questionable fits and at least one pair bought because the weather briefly made you lose all judgement.
The sentiment is admirable. The execution rarely is. Your swim shorts need to work on land as well as in the water, which means irony should be kept firmly out of the suitcase.
A printed mid-length short is usually the safest place to begin. Drake’s gets the balance right, with enough pattern to suggest holiday and enough restraint to survive lunch away from the pool, while Frescobol Carioca’s Rio Copa print brings a more obvious beach-club mood, drawing on Brazilian architecture and coastal culture.
If you prefer your swimwear with a raised eyebrow, Stone Island’s water-reactive camo pair is a party trick for grown-ups, while Burberry’s checked crinkled shorts make a strong case for treating swimwear as part of the wardrobe rather than a holiday admin task.
The rule is simple: if you would happily wear them with a linen shirt and decent sandals, they have earned the suitcase space.
Footwear
Summer is ruthless about footwear. Trainers that felt perfect in November suddenly look sombre beside bare ankles. Formal shoes feel faintly absurd. Most sandals still carry the faint whiff of a survivalist forum. A small, disciplined edit makes the season much easier to navigate.
Start with one sneaker that can work with both tailoring and shorts. Maison Margiela’s Replica and Loewe’s Bellet runner take different routes to the same destination: one discreetly retro, the other sportier and more graphic, both able to carry lightweight trousers without looking overeager.
Then concede, gracefully, that sandals are no longer the enemy. The best versions are now craft-led, considered and far removed from anything involving hemp necklaces.
Tom Ford’s Kai suede slides makes the most casual silhouette imaginable feel strangely cultivated, while Zegna’s Panarea suede sandals come with a suitably glamorous Aeolian mood.
For anything involving tailored trousers, blazers or a table you are expected to sit at properly, Brunello Cucinelli’s suede penny loafer remains the grown-up solution.
And if you want something with the same polished ease but a little more off-duty charm, Brioni’s leather boat shoes make a strong case for the boat shoe’s return, smart enough for linen trousers, relaxed enough for shorts and thankfully miles away from tired yacht-club cosplay.
Accessories
Accessories are the footnotes of summer dressing: apparently minor, but often where the argument is won. They are what turn “perfectly fine” into “he knows what he’s doing”.
Think the tote that implies competence, the sunglasses that suggest good judgement, the belt or scarf that hints at creative intent without demanding a round of applause.
Lemaire’s leather-trimmed canvas tote has the right air of understated confidence, while Drake’s cotton-and-silk neckerchief offers that rare menswear flourish that does not need over-explaining. Worn around the neck, tied to a handle or folded into a pocket, it adds cultured mischief without tipping into costume.
With eyewear, the aim is just as clear: frames that neither vanish nor shout. Zegna’s round titanium pair occupy that narrow, useful space between anonymity and spectacle.
Finally, Enfants Riches Déprimés’ braided leather belt supplies a neat hit of character at the waist.
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A paid partnership with MR PORTER – words and opinions are Ape’s own.