The Best Workwear Brands On Earth (According To Esquire Editors)
You want the best. And heck, you deserve the best. But there's a lot of choice out there, and sometimes the best is hard to find. Fortunately, we know where to find it. Every week, the Esquire editors reveal their favourite brands, from under-the-radar finds to luxury loves, so you can invest in the finest clothes, watches and accessories that money can buy.
This week, that menswear pillar built on hard graft: workwear.
Albam
Charlie Teasdale, style director
"As I write this, I’m wearing my Albam chore jacket, which I've had for at least five years. It is largely as it was when I got it, although the indigo denim has faded in all the right places. Every button is intact, every stitch in place, every pocket attached (but maybe a little lint-laden.) I’m currently living out of a 'rona-induced grab bag of clothes, and I can say that this was the first thing I packed.
"The London company, founded in 2006, makes super high-quality, utility-minded essentials that last, as demonstrated by this carpenter’s jacket. It’s much the same as my own chore jacket, but cut from tobacco-coloured cotton twill in a shape that’s perfect for spring layering. Invest now, wear it forever."
Dickies
Murray Clark, digital style editor
"Like Tom Ford, I have found my uniform. Unlike Tom Ford, it is not a deluxe black suit. It is Dickies, and specifically, the brand's age-old Original 874 Work Pant. I do indeed work in them. I play in them. I am rarely without them.
"The boxy fit is not only enjoying a moment of late (which is good), and there's lots of comfort as a result too (which is very, very good), but they also haven't veered much from Dickie's roots. Founded in Texas in 1922 to craft overalls and bibs for proper American grafters, I last bought a pair at Dave's – a one-stop tradesman shop turned menswear mecca on Sixth Avenue – and I was served by a peaceful, bespectacled New Yorker in his Sixties. Next to me in the queue was a burly gum-snapping construction worker. We all had a pair on."
Universal Works
Finlay Renwick, deputy style editor
"I am quite a lazy dresser, so discovering that Universal Works made matching chore coats and trousers that could be put together like you were a carpenter wearing his Sunday best was a bit like how those archaeologists must have felt when they discovered King Richard in that Leicester car park.
"Founded in Nottingham in 2009 by David Keyte, UW is one of those brands that could build a full year-round wardrobe, which I like a lot. I currently have four different Lazy Boy suits from them, in Klein blue canvas, navy cord, midnight blue with red pinstripe and, my latest and favourite, a ‘space’ tie-dye seersucker two-piece that is as wild as it is beautifully made (Italian fabric, baby!). Do I need the olive twill? Or the ecru linen mix? Or the navy seersucker or the washed indigo? Inevitably, yes I do."
The Workers Club
Dan Choppen, fashion assistant
"Back in 2015, The Workers Club released its debut offering ‘The Works’, an all-weather, unique collection of interchangeable garms that included a waxed shell jacket, a down-filled reversible bomber and a gilet. Each item works as well on its own as it does in tandem.
"I purchased this holy trinity in the label's early days, and it's been a staple ever since. That's because each piece is well-crafted and well-engineered, and as a result, I find myself returning to The Workers Club as it builds upon its collections. The brand's aim is to remedy the problem of fashion fashion, and it's succeeded: this jacket of mine is going nowhere fast."
Kapital
Tom Banham, digital editor
"Is Kapital really workwear? You’d have to have significantly more money than sense to do anything strenuous while wearing its perfect shirts or slavishly engineered jeans. But then again, modern workwear is so far removed from anything resembling clothes for labouring in that I find something perversely appealing about taking that distance to its extreme.
"Kapital is a brand that was launched by obsessives and is adored by obsessives for its painstaking reimagining of mid-century American workwear. Ironically, that labour makes it so delicate and expensive that the idea of wearing it to do anything more strenuous than data entry is laughable. This is homeopathic workwear, luxury clothes with a barely present memory of sweat and toil. Think of it as the apparel equivalent of the guy who worked his way up from the production line to the CEO’s chair. It’s the American dream, as perfected (of course) by the Japanese."
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