The 5-Shirt Capsule Wardrobe, Part 2: A Week of Outfits

A capsule wardrobe doesn't have to mean beige. With five well-chosen printed shirts, you can dress a full week — work, weekend and everything between — without repeating a look. Here's the formula we shared on Instagram, expanded.

The five shirts

1. A striped shirt. The workhorse. Stripes read polished in meetings and relaxed with shorts. Try the Modern Stripes family.

2. A little-blossom floral. Small-scale florals are the easiest prints to wear daily — enough interest to lift an outfit, subtle enough to repeat. Browse our cotton shirts for the current crop.

3. One bold statement print. A tropical, a scenic, an animal print — the shirt that carries the whole outfit on its own. This is the one people ask about.

4. A schiffli or white-based shirt. Texture instead of colour. It pairs with everything and photographs beautifully. See the schiffli collection.

5. A pastel. Your soft option for daytime plans, and the bridge piece that mixes with the other four.

The week, mapped

Monday: stripes + dark trousers. Tuesday: little blossom + white jeans. Wednesday: schiffli + tailored trousers for the big meeting. Thursday: pastel + denim. Friday: the statement print, because it's Friday. Weekend: statement or floral with shorts; stripes open over a tee for errands.

Why prints work for capsules

The secret is that a good print carries an outfit by itself — you don't need layers, jewellery or effort to look dressed. And because every Print Factory shirt is anti-bleed, anti-peel and anti-shrink, a capsule you build today still looks new after a year of weekly wear.

Ready to build yours? Start with the best sellers, or catch five brand-new prints every week in the Friday 5 drop.

Missed Part 1? Read The 5-Shirt Capsule Wardrobe, Part 1: 15 Outfit Combinations — the colour-thread method, the 15-outfit maths and three copy-paste outfit formulas.