Can You Use Cufflinks on a Regular Shirt? A Simple Guide
Can You Use Cufflinks on a Regular Shirt? A Simple Guide
It’s a question we hear often at Cufflinks Palace: “I love the look of cufflinks, but can I wear them with my regular, everyday dress shirts?”
The short and direct answer is no, you cannot. But the more helpful and exciting answer is yes, you can—you just need the right kind of shirt!
Let me explain the crucial difference that makes all the difference.
The Problem with “Regular Shirt” Cuffs
The typical “regular” dress shirt you own almost certainly has a button cuff. These cuffs are designed specifically for… well, buttons. They have something called buttonholes—the slits where the button is pushed through to fasten the cuff.
A cufflink, however, needs two things to work:
- Two adjacent buttonholes that are not sewn shut.
- A specific type of cuff that is designed to be fastened together, not overlapped.
A standard button cuff is meant to be overlapped and fastened with a button. There’s no mechanism for a cufflink to hold the two sides together.
The Solution: The French Cuff Shirt
The shirt designed specifically for cufflinks is called a French cuff (also known as a double cuff). You can easily spot one:
- The Cuff is Double-Length: The fabric is folded back on itself, creating a longer, more substantial cuff.
- It Has Open Holes: Instead of sewn-shut buttonholes, it has two open holes on each side of the cuff.
- The Cuffs “Kiss”: When fastened, the two sides of the cuff meet edge-to-edge (they “kiss”) rather than overlap. The cufflink’s post or chain simply passes through the four holes to hold them together elegantly.
This is what a French cuff looks like, ready for a cufflink:
So, if you want to wear cufflinks, you don’t need to alter your regular shirts—you need to invest in shirts with French cuffs.