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It’s 10 a.m. on a Tuesday in July. I’m getting dressed for the day. The heat index has already hit 88 degrees, my overworked AC unit is sputtering with all its might, and literal heat waves are zig-zagging up off the concrete outside. Even still, I consider an unthinkable—some might say stupid—fashion choice: layered tank tops.
My impulse to wear two tanks at once didn’t come out of nowhere. On almost every New York City block I walk down recently, in every Substack outfit roundup I read and fashion person’s Instagram I peruse, I see two tank tops layered on top of each other. A white spaghetti-strapped cami peeking out from a gray one. A Hanes base layer under a sheer wisp of a blouse. Last Saturday in SoHo, I saw an impeccably dressed woman wearing a sleeveless crop top over a breezy linen tunic. With an Hermès Kelly in hand and no discernible sweatmarks for my eyes to see, she was cool in every sense of the word.
As anyone sentient during the early aughts will tell you, wearing multiple tops at once isn’t new. Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, and Britney Spears would walk around Rodeo Drive in two, three, even four layered tanks or tees at a time. Disney Channel alum and perhaps the best figurehead for the layered look, Ashley Tisdale, is the go-to internet meme for when Millennials want to reminisce about the Y2K fashion choices they’d prefer to forget.
But unlike the double-layered tank tops pop stars wore in the aughts (and the turquoise and baby pink Aeropostale camis I stacked for seventh-grade Algebra), today’s take on the trend is far less kitschy. Color palettes are kept simple; black clashed against white, or a muted pistachio mixed with cream. Tank silhouettes are streamlined, and flashy logos and rhinestones aren’t front and center. There’s a refinement at play here that gives the layered-tank look a modern, minimalist update.
Take, for example, Katie Holmes at the June 6 premiere of Happy Hours. Styled by Brie Welch, the actor-slash-writer-slash-director layered a champagne silk tunic by Magda Butrym over a white scoop-neck tank, which wasn’t dissimilar to those I buy in a $15-for-three pack. Her lacy slip would’ve been elegant on its own, but the cotton tank added a grounded, almost grunge-y element that made the look more complex. One Night Only star Monica Barbaro also jumped on the trend recently, showing us how to play with color with layered pink and red tanks.
Typically, I would balk at the idea of wearing an unnecessary layer in the summer, a season when I strategically engineer my outfits to be as lightweight as possible so I don’t melt into a mush of a woman. But what I’ve come to realize about the fashion set’s new favorite styling trick is that if you choose your tanks wisely—prioritizing loose cuts and breathable materials like linen and cotton—you hardly feel the extra layer. Instead, it adds dimension and contrast and makes the overall outfit feel well-considered and intentional. Two tank tops, arguably the most basic of summer basics, now feel anything but.
All this to say that, yes, on this scorching July morning, I slipped a cotton pointelle Cou Cou Intimates cami over a gray ribbed racerback from Sold Out NYC. The end result, I was pleased to see, was a neat little shirt sandwich that was far more interesting than an itty-bitty tank top on its own.
Ready to try wearing layered tank top trend too? Shop our starter kit, below, containing some of our favorite camis, scoopnecks, ribbed tanks, and more:
