The Bear guide to really (really) good T-shirts

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The Carmy Classic

One of the biggest television talking points of last year was a white T-shirt, worn by Jeremy Allen White for much of his on-screen portrayal of Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto in season one of The Bear. Carmy is a wildly talented and equally depressed chef drowning in debt and the pressure of inheriting a failing business from a dead brother. Despite running on Marlboro Reds, sleep paralysis, and big cans of Monster, it’s immediately clear that he knows his way around some clean Americana and workwear. 

Internet sleuths revealed that Carmy’s plain white tees were mostly made by Japanese label Whitesville, Supreme’s collaboration with Hanes, and niche German basics label Merz B. Schwanen. It turns out that the old menswear truism of “If in doubt… dress a bit like Paul Newman, Marlon Brando and James Dean” still held true in 2022. It also helps that Carmy has arms like two big joints of Wiltshire ham… but that’s by the by.