A shirt stud is a decorative

fastener A fastener (US English) or fastening (UK English) is a hardware device that mechanically joins or affixes two or more objects together. In general, fasteners are used to create non-permanent joints; that is, joints that can be removed or disman ...

that fits onto a

buttonhole Buttonholes are reinforced holes in fabric that buttons pass through, allowing one piece of fabric to be secured to another. The raw edges of a buttonhole are usually finished with stitching. This may be done either by hand or by a sewing machine. ...

on the front of a

pleat A pleat (plait in older English) is a type of fold formed by doubling fabric back upon itself and securing it in place. It is commonly used in clothing and upholstery to gather a wide piece of fabric to a narrower circumference. Pleats are cat ...

shirt A shirt is a cloth garment for the upper body (from the neck to the waist). Originally an undergarment worn exclusively by men, it has become, in American English, a catch-all term for a broad variety of upper-body garments and undergarments. I ...

, or onto the starched bib of a stiff-front shirt. Such shirts have special buttonholes solely for shirt studs. A shirt stud may be fashioned from

alloys An alloy is a mixture of chemical elements of which at least one is a metal. Unlike chemical compounds with metallic bases, an alloy will retain all the properties of a metal in the resulting material, such as electrical conductivity, ductility, ...

precious metal Precious metals are rare, naturally occurring metallic chemical elements of high economic value. Chemically, the precious metals tend to be less reactive than most elements (see noble metal). They are usually ductile and have a high lustre. ...

s, and

gemstone A gemstone (also called a fine gem, jewel, precious stone, or semiprecious stone) is a piece of mineral crystal which, in cut and polished form, is used to make jewelry or other adornments. However, certain rocks (such as lapis lazuli, opal, ...

s—materials uncommon to

button A button is a fastener that joins two pieces of fabric together by slipping through a loop or by sliding through a buttonhole. In modern clothing and fashion design, buttons are commonly made of plastic but also may be made of metal, wood, ...

s sewn on shirts. The stud may have an

inlay Inlay covers a range of techniques in sculpture and the decorative arts for inserting pieces of contrasting, often colored materials into depressions in a base object to form Ornament (art), ornament or pictures that normally are flush with th ...

, such as of

pearl A pearl is a hard, glistening object produced within the soft tissue (specifically the mantle) of a living shelled mollusk or another animal, such as fossil conulariids. Just like the shell of a mollusk, a pearl is composed of calcium carb ...

onyx Onyx primarily refers to the parallel banded variety of chalcedony, a silicate mineral. Agate and onyx are both varieties of layered chalcedony that differ only in the form of the bands: agate has curved bands and onyx has parallel bands. The c ...

. Dress code of the modern western world reserves shirt studs for men's

formal wear Formal wear or full dress is the Western dress code category applicable for the most formal occasions, such as weddings, Baptism, christenings, confirmations, funerals, Easter traditions, Easter and Christmas traditions, in addition to certain ...

and some

semi-formal Semi-formal wear or half dress is a grouping of Western dress code, dress codes indicating the sort of clothes worn to events with a level of formality between informal wear and formal wear. In the modern era, the typical interpretation for men ...

occasions. In the

western world The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to the various nations and state (polity), states in the regions of Europe, North America, and Oceania.

, shirt studs were first used in the mid-19th century, when some shirt fronts were too stiff to close with buttons. So remains the case for the heavily starched, modern full dress shirts worn with

white tie White tie, also called full evening dress or a dress suit, is the most formal in traditional evening western dress codes. For men, it consists of a black tail coat (alternatively referred to as a dress coat, usually by tailors) worn over a whit ...

References

Textile closures Types of jewellery {{Clothing-stub

See also

References