Sometime last year, a photo of Christy Turlington doing yoga came across my desk. How alarmingly chic this neckline looked on her, I thought. The rotund V elegantly framing her chest was a far cry from the 2010s deep V and its reputation as the uniform of obnoxious hipsters and greasy guys who hang out at the Jersey Shore. I’ve been longing for the right V-neck T-shirt since then, disappointed when I reach into my closet and find only crewnecks. It’s been more than a decade since I’ve regularly worn the V style — back in the day, usually paired with skinny jeans, a lethal side part, and a Charming Charlie bubble necklace in a sickly shade of coral — and I was finally ready to release my prior associations with the silhouette and seek more modern pastures. I was craving something fresh to fill the V-shaped hole in my closet.
My criteria as I searched for the perfect V-neck T-shirt: I wanted it unfussy but able to be dressed up; not too cropped to expose several inches of midriff, but not too long that it bunched awkwardly at my hips; I preferred natural fibers over synthetic; and though it wasn’t crucial, it would be a bonus if the V was rounded like Turlington’s. In other words, I wanted a V-neck that felt closer to CBK than “Party Rock Anthem,” and I tested eight options between $10-$115 to find the perfect one. For reference, I’m five-foot-eight and typically wear an extra small in T-shirts, but I sized up and down a few times as noted below.
