Winged Tip Tuxedo Shirts

The most popular formal shirt is the wing collar tuxedo shirt. This option has been the tuxedo shirt of choice for over 20 years. Though it is not technically the original tuxedo shirt, it is the one that people associate with wearing a tuxedo.

A standard wing collar tuxedo shirt consists of the basic shirt form with multiple additions. The first and most important addition is the wing tipped collar. This style collar is made from a band of material (the collar) which wraps around the neck and ends in the front with a wing on each side. Hence the collar is wing tipped. The formal wear industry and consumers alike use the term "wing collar" as an abbreviated form of wing tipped collar.

The wing collar tuxedo shirt has a couple of other features. Some of which are found on many other formal shirts. The next addition to the basic shirt form is the bib. A bib refers to the part of the shirt which covers the front of a person’s body. A wing tip collar tuxedo shirts bib can either be pleated, pintuck, pique, flat front or ruffled.

Pleated wing tuxedo shirts adorn a bib in which has vertical pleats ranging from one eighth of an inch to one full inch in width each. A pleat is a fold of fabric, folded back upon itself so that the pleat is comprised of three layers. Pintuck bibs are the same as pleated only it is very narrow (one eighth of an inch thick) and must be stitched. Pleated formal shirt bibs can be either pressed or stitched.

Pique tuxedo shirt bibs. There are two ways to describe this type of bib, the easy way and the technical way. The easy way is that the bib of the shirt looks like a plain paper towel type of fabric. The more technical definition is that the bib is a plain-weave fabric with sunken lines between rounded cords with a plain-weave face. When the cords are in straight lines across the fabric the structure is known as welt and when they create waved lines it is known also as waffle pique or marcelia. Read more about Pique shirts.

Flat front wing collar tuxedo shirts are simply non-bibbed formal shirts. The front of a flat or plain front tuxedo shirt is exactly that, plain. Just like a standard dress shirt. In this case, with a wing tipped collar.

Ruffled tuxedo shirt bibs are made of gathered fabric that is stitched in place to show a decorative front.

The final addition to the wing collar tuxedo shirt is the cuff. The cuff is material located at the bottom of the sleeve. This is where the shirtsleeve is buttoned or cuffed. There are two basic styles of cuff, the barrel cuff and the French cuff. A barrel cuff on a wing collar tuxedo shirt is an unfolded cuff which is closed by either a button or a cufflink. A French cuff is a soft double cuff that is made by turning back half of a wide cuff band and fastening with cuff links and never a button.