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POLOS: THE SHIRT, NOT THE BRAND

Polo shirts have always genuinely been such an interesting clothing item to me.

It sits in this odd middle ground where it's professional casual, a little preppy, a little tidy. Safe to say, pretty conservative. But worn with trackies, a cap, and any other form of streetwear? The energy is completely different. The contrast is massive.

That's exactly what eshay/adlay/Australian street fashion did with the polo. It flipped it and created the antithetical. It omitted loud, noisy, abrasive, bold, and rebellious energy. It took the polo's conservative, intended visual weight and just disrupted it entirely.


And I honestly feel like the brands themselves made this intentional too. Ralph Lauren, Lacoste, Nautica, Fred Perry, Tommy Hilfiger, Gant, Sergio Tacchini, all of them were marketed to the upper middle class and above. Promoted as golfing wear, yacht club attire, tennis club fashion, and symbols of wealth. 


Instead, they got adopted by inner city housing commission estates across Sydney, like Glebe, Waterloo, Woolloomooloo, Redfern, to just name a few. Lads were going into Myer and David Jones to rack these brands and their recognisable logo that sat on the chest of the polos to flex a symbol of status. Essentially appropriating the preppy upper class look. But it also became something else - a way to make money. Selling a $200 polo for half the price.


Ironically, you could always clock where someone got their polo just by their vibe. Whether from across the street, the way they dressed or the way they walked. But outside of that, this fashion was honestly ahead of its time. And underappreciated doesn't even cover it. It was, no joke, villainised.


The polo also offered something no other piece could. A flair that was entirely yours, depending on how you wore the collar. You wanted that flair? Pop the collar up, adlay. And you know why I say so confidently that brands directly encouraged this and loved it that eshays/adlays/Australian street fashion was adopting this style? Nautica, honestly, the staple of the community during the Y2K era to mid 2010s, put their branding underneath the collar. So when you popped the collar up, that logo revealed itself from behind. They knew exactly what they were doing. And we all know how loud, bold and rebellious the community is. So they kept making these loud and bold colourways that you definitely weren't catching a conservative, possibly religious North Shore boy wearing.


Anyway, trends cycle, and brands fall in and out. The polo? Nah man, that sh*t is still tough. I refuse to wear a button-up to work. Only polos allowed.

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