Great Summer Shirt from NY & Co

This is a great summer potential clergy shirt from New York and Company--the buttons are even covered by a placket!  Feminine short sleeves and easily convertible collar.  Also comes in white.  

Black Gap Shirt

All my black clergy shirts are starting to fall apart.  I have been having a hard time finding black button down shirts that button all the way up to the neck, but just noticed that Gap has one right now that comes in regular, petite and small.  This would be a great basic black clergy shirt, once the collar has been taken care of.

Right now it is $44, but I can't imagine it will be that long before it goes on sale. . .

You can find it here.

Cross Designs

One of our lovely readers recommended Cross Designs to us.  According to their website, it looks like they make a variety of clergy shirts, including features we've discussed like:  T-shirt material, 3/4 sleeves, curved side panels, even cap sleeves.  They don't have photographs, but you can see sketches of some pretty cute ladies' shirts (even maternity!) here.

Prices aren't terrible, either.  Even with the falling dollar, they seem to be under $100 each.  I don't know how much shipping to the U.S. would cost. If anyone has a photograph of one of these shirts, we'd love to post it!

ETA: I looked more deeply on their website and found two photos, attached here:

Another Maria Sjöden Update

So, Maria was nice enough to send me a sample shirt as a thank you for the publicity.  I thought I'd take this chance to review it for you.

I still can't afford one until I pay off my epic Lasik bill, but if I had money to burn, I would buy out her inventory.  The shirt is profoundly COMFORTABLE and fits really nicely.  She sent a small, and it fits perfectly, even though almost no other clergy shirt company makes an off-the-rack size that fits me.  (I haven't tried the WomenSpirit small yet.) The fabric on Maria's shirt is really soft and stretchy without feeling artificial.  It's a really nice knit.  It feels like wearing a mock turtleneck.

I don't even mind walking around looking like a Lutheran wearing this shirt. :)  I wish she made some styles compatible with the Episcopal collar, but maybe we'll create such a market for her shirts here, she'll be interested!

Where, oh, where are black sleeveless shirts?

After returning the pillowcase that Almy sent me as a sleeveless shirt, I went on a hunt for an extremely short sleeved or sleeveless black shirt that I could convert to a clergy shirt.

There are none to be found.  I've checked Gap, Old Navy, Target, the mall, Bluefly, Overstock.com, LandsEnd, Eddie Bauer, all the usual suspects. Sleeveless button ups are soooo not in this season.  Curses.  I tried to ignore all the gorgeous feminine blouses that ARE in and would be SO FUN to wear to work.  (I love the swingy jacket with a long camisole underneath. Sigh.)

The closest I found was at Target, but beware:  Their Merona white and black shirts do not button all the way up, which you cannot tell on the webpage.  The Mizrahi white shirt does button all the way up, but is VERY shiny and a bit off white, which always looks weird with a collar, I think.

I did find this shirt at Target.  Not black, but still cute and easily adaptable:

I then went into NY and Company, which I never do.  I associate NY and Company with clothes my more fashionable friends wore in college, so never really considered them for "grown up" clothes, but now that I can no longer afford Banana Republic and Ann Taylor consistently, I was really, really impressed at the offerings of NY and Company.  (And they have a AAA discount! AND their shirts were buy one get one 50% off!)

These shirts won't work with the jackets I bought, but they will look great on their own this summer.  They had four different options in black, alone, though only one in my size. Anyway, I bought these:

If you can wear yellow, they also had the most beautiful yellow shirt with subtle white stripes that was really lovely.  The website also has white, lavender and rose colored shirts.

If you find sleeveless black button up shirts, let me know! I'm still eager to wear the cute short sleeve jacket I found at Target this spring!

The Bite of the Benefit of the Doubt

Summer is coming and most of my three-year-old clergy shirts are starting to show their wear and tear, particularly in the. . .ahem. . .underarm area. They've worked fine all winter, layered under sweaters and jackets, but I can't bear to expose them to summer's light.

So, I went on a mission. I bought two, very inexpensive, short sleeve jackets at Target and Kohls. I thought I could pair them with an Almy sleeveless shell.

Why do I keep going to the same well over and over again, even though there is clearly no water there?

The shell came today and this is how it fits:

The shoulders fit great, but the rest of it is literally two rectangles sewn together--completely shapeless.  When I put the jackets on, there is eight inches of material beneath them.  Keep in mind, this is the smallest shell they sell, and I am 5"4' and 120 lbs.  I'm on the small side, but not extremely so.

I thought briefly about having it altered, but then decided for the $36 I spent on it, and the minimum of $20 it would cost to get it altered, I could buy nearly four short sleeve shirts at Target and just adapt them, so the shell is going back in the mail tomorrow.

Maria Sjöden Update

Okay, I've emailed with her and this is the shirt that is available now:



This shirt will be available in about two months:



She has adapted the priesty part of her webpage to be in English, which is helpful. The contact page is here.