The White Dress Shirt.

White is the most formally correct shirt colour. It reads as clean, professional and precise under any suit and in any light. Under a charcoal suit, it provides contrast. Under a navy suit, it complements. Under a grey suit, it lifts. Under evening dress, it is the only correct choice.

White also photographs well — an important consideration for the boardroom portrait, the wedding, the LinkedIn photograph, the award ceremony. No other shirt colour photographs as cleanly or reads as correctly across the range of situations where a man in a professional context needs to be seen.

The white shirt should be a proper white — not off-white, not cream, not the slightly yellowed white of a shirt that has seen too many washes with the wrong detergent. Thomas Mason's 100/2 two-ply poplin provides a precisely white cloth that holds its whiteness through many washes if cared for correctly.