A Brief Tour: Collar Stays

If you’ve ever owned a dress shirt, chances are you’ve also owned some collar stays (and if you’re cool or British, which we aren’t, you may also call them collar bones).  Even Kohl’s brand shirts come with them (we think).  But you’ll probably want to upgrade from the flimsy pieces of plastic to something a little stronger and longer lasting.  Lots of retailers offer their own basic plastic versions; below are a few examples of other options out there.

Classic and refined, you can never go wrong with brass or stainless steel.  Or both.  $20 for 6 pairs of brass and 6 pairs of stainless steel:

Or go the more rugged route with these nickel ones and a hand-stamped customized initialing or message (please don’t use the examples in the picture if you plan on buying these for yourself). $25 for a pair:

Wurkin Stiffs has an innovative approach to collar stays, making them multi-functional. Not satisfied with just keeping your collar arrow-straight, it aims to keep your collar from splaying out (eg, under your suit jacket) by using strong magnets that are placed underneath your shirt. We don’t fully understand it, and we haven’t tried it ourselves, so we can’t endorse it.  But seems like a decent idea if you have floppy collars (ahem, ahem). $20 a pair:

Speaking of practical, it doesn’t get much better than this – on those dreadful days when you forget to pop in your stays, just reach for your wallet.  But don’t grab money for a quick run to the store – instead, pull out your spare collar stays.  A pair of 3 for $5:

And finally, if you need to go big, well, these should do the trick.  But please remember – collar stays are meant to be hidden, and no one is going to be seeing them except for you.  And perhaps your dry cleaner, after they’ve damaged your shirt.  Don’t forget to take them out! One pair of Stayclip Diamond Edged Platinum Collar Stays ($15,000):