Do dress shirts shrink at the neck over the long term?

August 7, 2023 8:19 AM

Do dress shirts shrink at the neck over the long term (i.e., years not days)?

I have a bunch of dress shirts (~10) that are ~3-5 years old. Because of the pandemic, I did not need to wear ties for most of about the past 3 years. I wore the shirts most work days, but no tie and no top button - they work fine. But more recently I find that I need to put on a tie more often. The shirts all fit at the neck pre-pandemic, but they are now generally too tight at the neck. Is this a "me" problem or a shrinking shirt problem? I did not have any significant weight gain, so I would be surprised if my neck is bigger, but who knows. I am not asking about shrinkage after the first few washes, etc. - I'm asking if there is a gradual shrinking at the neck over multiple years. The shirts are cotton, not wrinkle-free. I take the shirts to the cleaner every ~2 weeks, they launder them (not dry clean) and iron them and probably use light starch. This matters because I need to figure out if I should buy new shirts with a bigger neck size, or just the same size new. Thanks!

posted by Mid to Clothing, Beauty, & Fashion (14 answers total)

I have not noticed said phenomenon, but in the end, either measure or try on new shirts one size up. Usually, all the shrinking happens in the first few washes.
posted by advicepig at 8:23 AM on August 7, 2023

Can’t say that I’ve noticed it either. Seems more likely that it’s your neck that’s changed in its dimensions tbh. Or even just that going back to wearing a tie after a long gap makes your collars feel tighter because you got used to leaving your top button open.
posted by Puppy McSock at 8:24 AM on August 7, 2023

Never noticed that either, and some of my dress shirts are old enough to vote.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:27 AM on August 7, 2023

I suppose, if you had a very marginally tight shirt, and wore it buttoned up and with a tie every time, it could conceivably stretch it a little each wear and not doing so could let it shrink to it's natural finished size, but still, get one with some breathing room.
posted by advicepig at 8:30 AM on August 7, 2023

I wore dress shirts for over 50 years. Over time, their necks seemed to get tight. But not during my youth, when I was running a lot, etc. There seemed to be a correlation with aging.... and indeed it must be that my size was changing. I must advise, as well, that my shoes seemed to get tighter as well. All of this was fixed, by getting a larger size. Or, I could try to save the shirts hoping to become frail....
posted by swlabr at 9:01 AM on August 7, 2023 [3 favorites]

I have totally noticed the shrinkage you have described. I mostly wear made to measure shirts, so over a couple orders of new shirts I slowly increased the collar size because I thought it was just a "me" problem, and eventually it became clear to me that the older shirts' collar size was actually getting smaller. The difference between the old shirts and new shirts was bigger than the increased collar size that I had ordered.
posted by odin53 at 9:11 AM on August 7, 2023

I only wear cotton or linen dress shirts...when I wear them at all, which is not terribly often as I have bottom older... But honestly I never noticed any shrinkage of neck size...Maybe our weight could stay the same, but our body anatomy gets a bit distributed differently...
posted by Czjewel at 9:22 AM on August 7, 2023

Measure the shirt collar and compare to what it should be when you bought it. Measure your neck and see if it correlates with the shirt size you have.
posted by Crystalinne at 9:25 AM on August 7, 2023

Dress shirt fabric can shrink up to 3% or so, depending on how it's treated, etc. Most of this shrinkage happens during the early days, but it does continue throughout the life of the shirt albeit in increasingly smaller amounts. That may not seem like a lot of shrinkage, but over time a 16 inch collar can become a 15.5 inch collar. If the 16 inch collar fit just right, there's a good chance the shrunken collar will be uncomfortably snug.

If you're getting the shirts professionally laundered and pressed, the usual way of doing this is to apply a professional press to a damp shirt, which both irons and drys the shirt. This is a pretty high temperature affair, as you may imagine, and higher temperatures cause higher levels of shrinkage.

Some of this also depends on the fabric. I have a number of bespoke dress shirts in various fabrics and have noticed that the necks on the plain white broadcloth shirts get a bit smaller over time while those of shirts made from other kinds of cloth don't seem to have reduced to a similar extent.

Also, you say no significant weight gain over the pandemic, but my experience is that even moderate weight gain can result in my neck getting bigger. Moreover, no significant weight gain doesn't mean no changes in body composition, and it's possible you have different percentages of body fat and lean muscle compared to when you purchased the shirts. Changes in either of these things in either direction could affect your neck size.

A tricky thing about dress shirt collars is that you want them to fit just so around your neck. If there's a noticeable gap, you can look sloppy or even sick; and if it's a little to tight it's uncomfortable and looks like your neck might bust out of it. Small changes in weight and/or body composition can change a perfectly fitting collar into one that doesn't fit very well. Properly fitting vests have similar challenges.
posted by slkinsey at 10:07 AM on August 7, 2023 [3 favorites]

Anecdotally, I have noticed that necks shrink more than other parts of shirts, and the neck is just less forgiving to begin with since a change of 1/4 or even 1/8 inch can dramatically impact comfort. So in a 100% cotton shirt, even just one wash in hot water, a known or unknown trip through the dryer, or, yes, too-hot treatment at the dry cleaner as slkinsey says, would do it. Necks are tough. The only failsafe I've found is to do all the washing, line drying, and ironing myself.
posted by kensington314 at 10:40 AM on August 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

Your posture can change collar fit dramatically. Measure them to see if they’ve shrunk, and if it doesn’t seem significant, check how you now stand and sit.
posted by clew at 10:48 AM on August 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

Quality dress shirt fabric isn't going to shrink much, if at all, after a few washes. It's a tight weave, there's just not that much space in there.

I would go for changes in body composition. Are you bench pressing more than you were before? That alone is going to cause an increase of 1/2 to 1 inch. But any exercise involving your shoulders is going to recruit muscles you didn't know you had in the neck.

If your neck is bigger than the rest of your body, you may find that you prefer the "slim" cuts of shirts even if you, personally, are not slim.
posted by wnissen at 1:30 PM on August 7, 2023

When you take them out of the washer, grab the collar and pull; do this again out of the dryer. You can stretch them a little, probably enough.
posted by theora55 at 2:12 PM on August 7, 2023

I used to notice this when I still sent my shirts out to be laundered. I don’t think it was a matter of a change in my neck measurements because newer shirts that I had bought, with the same measurements, fit just fine. For the last eight or nine years I have been washing my shirts at home and hanging on hangers to dry, then ironing. I haven’t had collar shrinkage issues since.

(Also a soak in oxyclean before washing every six months or so takes care of the ring around the collar.)
posted by thecaddy at 5:01 AM on August 8, 2023