THE JOURNAL
Photograph by Mr Jeremy Moeller/Getty Images
Things change, people change, but there is one constant in my life: shorts. Shorts are to me as the cassock is to the priest. I like short shorts, long shorts, multicoloured shorts – a spectrum as broad as a rainbow. As we approach autumn and the days become misty, crisp and cold, there is nothing I like more than putting on a pair of shorts.
Now, I understand this might seem particularly strange. Perhaps it is the eccentric faculty of an Englishman getting older. I have long held to this principle. It all goes back to childhood.
My affinity for shorts started when I was young. I would often wear a pair of shorts (or three-quarter lengths – God help me!) and a T-shirt, waiting for the bus in the middle of winter. Where the other kids wore padded jackets and sweaters and hats and gloves, I waited, quite serenely, with my calves bare. It was, in a way, like I had my own internal combustion engine. Well, no. I think, in hindsight, I was probably being stubborn. Although I was on some level cold, I wouldn’t admit it to anyone. It was an article of faith as immutable as the Ten Commandments. And I thought it looked cool. It is questionable whether that is true. As I have got older and talked to people about this more, I realise there are many reasons why you should wear shorts all year round.
For one, it makes you look marginally younger. I am 33 now and the pandemic and its assorted crises have added a few lines to my face and a few inches to my waistline. I like to think, wearing my shorts, that I resemble an handsome athletic Swiss man climbing a mountain alone, conquering the world. A man for all seasons. It is a fantasy. If I can manifest just one iota of that vigour, I will have succeeded in my day.
Shorts are also comfier than long trousers. Where the scratchiness of wool and the restriction of denim grate, shorts do not restrict you. Whether that’s the sharp lines of Orlebar Brown or the loose, relaxed silhouette of NN07 cargo shorts, there are shorts for all times, places and situations. It is no longer the case that shorts are to be worn only on the beach or by the pool. They are a perfect uniform for any event, able to be dressed up or down.
My favourites – the shorts that stay with me like a faithful dog – are a pair of relatively plain, unadorned, beautifully simple Anderson & Sheppard Ghurka straight-leg pleated linen shorts. They are inspired by the clothes worn by the Nepalese regiment of the British army – hence the name. If that’s not an inspiration to tackle the day head on, I don’t know what is.
“One thing you should never underestimate about the pleasure of shorts is air. A breeze around your nethers is nothing short of luxurious”
The man who wears shorts also loses weight more easily and stays warmer than his trouser-wearing brothers. A study of Scandinavian swimmers found that their winter “swimming culture” – polar waters followed by hot saunas – helped them adapt to the extreme temperatures. The findings in Cell Reports Medicine suggest these chilly temperatures activated their brown adipose tissue, otherwise known as brown fat, which burns energy and generates heat. The cold, over time, made them warmer. The next time someone asks if I’m cold in my shorts, I will point out that I really do have my own combustion engine.
“It’s attention seeking,” one friend said when I turned up at the pub in the middle of a downpour in some CELINE HOMME shorts. Maybe it was and maybe I am. Perhaps the implication was, as they said, that I am tough enough not to feel the cold. And yet not so.
Sometimes you can be a little too confident. For reasons that now escape me, I once took shorts to the northern town of Tromsø in Norway. Reader, it was autumn. Was it a rush of blood to the head? I was there to write about living in polar darkness. There were in total three hours of bluish light between midday and 3.00pm. The rest of the time it was me, the snow, my shorts and the darkness.
One day, I decided to stroll outside the town towards the hills nearby. I soon had to give up my adventure and sulk inside the wine bar on the edge of the harbour because I couldn’t cope with the cold any longer. Still, I like to think I braved the unknown and tested the boundaries of shorts wearing. Which, it turns out, does not include towns in Norway.
One thing you should never underestimate about the pleasure of shorts is air. The airiness of shorts is a balm to the sweaty. A breeze around your nethers is nothing short of luxurious. And no one can tell me otherwise. Where other men complain about getting all sticky and gross, I rest assured that I am as dry as the Sahara. And in autumn, when the rain comes and people complain about being all soggy and damp, I am again smug that air will solve all my ills once more – shorts dry more easily than trousers.
So, what is my final piece of advice for those thinking about wearing shorts all year round? Stand your ground. Reject the tyranny of trousers, but keep a pair to hand should you have to go to a funeral or a wedding. We all have to draw the line somewhere.