The T Shirt: A Startling Evolution

It was regulation issue for U.S. sailors and was called a skivvy shirt during World War II. It became popular with the public in 1947, when Marlon Brando wore one over rippling muscles in A Streetcar Named Desire. But no swabbie or civilian of the 1940s, suddenly confronted with the 1976 variety, would now recognize the T shirt--something that millions of Americans want to get on their chests.

From its humble beginning, when it was all white and inscribed only with the stenciled name of its owner, the T shirt has evolved and proliferated at a bewildering rate. Last week that evolution reached its highest stage yet with the introduction of Body Language, a collection that speaks for itself (see first color page). Shown in Manhattan by Promoter Philip Fox, these startling shirts will go on sale in March and could soon make the double take an institution on city streets. One, emblazoned with realistic-looking and oddly placed eyes, will put any woman one-up on male bosom watchers: her chest will stare back at them. Another has a pair of shapely legs draped over the shoulders, as if someone were riding piggyback. A third, though neck high, seems to be a scuba suit unzipped to the navel, partially revealing breasts dyed on in authentic flesh tones. Later in the year. Body Language will include other frontal lewdity, including a shirt that looks like a grotesque potbelly.

The artistic realism embodied--as it were--in the Body Language series is part of a proud trompe l'oeil T shirt tradition that is already months old. Some samples, now on the streets and in fashionable discotheques: a shirt that looks like a tuxedo jacket, shirt and bow tie --complete with a flower in the lapel; another that is indistinguishable from a sailor suit; and one, owned by San Francisco TV Reporter Bill Schechner, that is apparently a green sports shirt and blue tie looped in a Windsor knot. "I wear it on the air when it's too hot to wear anything else," boasts Schechner. "You can't tell that it isn't really a shirt and tie."

Smellies King. One of the newest wrinkles in T shirts is the Shirt-O-Gram, which features in large capital letters a Western Union-style message. Cost: about $7 for up to 15 words. Californian Chris Engen, 27, who created Shirt-O-Grams, custom prints the shirtfront messages and sends them anywhere in the U.S. One typical message: DEAR BARRY. CONGRATULATIONS. THE RABBIT DIED. PLEASE CALL!

Some older styles still fit Americans to a T. They include shirts decorated with iron-on glitter, advertising slogans (I'M BULLISH ON SCHLITZ MALT LIQUOR) and the snappy one-liners that have long been a hallmark of the T shirt genre. Among the latter is a classic created by Wisconsin Designer Verne Holoubek: HARD TIMES. STARRING YOU AND ME. COMING SOON.

Trailing the visually dramatic T shirts by a nose are the Smellies shirts --scented with everything from pizza to burnt rubber. Microscopic capsules containing the odoriferous oils are embedded in the fabric; by scratching the shirt, the wearer breaks the capsules and releases the fragrance. In the past 18 months, the Miami-based company run by the King of the Smellies, James Gall, 29, has sold or supplied the fragrance for a whopping 4 million shirts reeking with more than a hundred smells. Researchers at his company, Smell It Like It Is, Inc., have had the Gall to perfect such odors as cod-liver oil, dill pickles and lamb chops. But Gall may soon run into formidable competition. The New York-based Smell This Shirt Co. is working hard to develop marijuana-scented shirts.

Why the insatiable demand for T shirts? Manufacturers cite their low cost (often as little as $3) and their compatibility with jeans. Others look beyond pragmatism. "It's a more graphic way of displaying your feelings," says Larry Farrell, a student at the University of California at Berkeley. "It's better than a bumper sticker." Georgia State University Sophomore Jay Jay Brooks has an easy rationale for her T shirt, which as seen from the front is purple on one side and brown on the other. Says she: "I wear it when I'm feeling ambiguous." Alan Dundes, an anthropologist at Berkeley, may have the best explanation of all: "People want to be different, unique, departing from the norm--so they buy an anti-Establishment shirt. But then everybody ends up wearing the same thing."

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