You could spend hours—or days—just searching for the best plain tee. Or you could take a shortcut and go directly for a heavyweight Japanese loopwheeled tee. That is always a safe bet. The Flat Head tee is one of our favorite options in the Japanese market, not only for its impeccable construction and durability but also for its perfect fit and comfort. Without a doubt, it's one of the best T-shirts money can buy.

This ("Turi-Ami") t-shirt is woven using only premium long-staple cotton from the US in Wakayama. The only tension used in the knitting process is gravity, resulting in a knitted fabric with virtually no inbuilt stress or tension. A loopwheel machine rotates at just 24 revolutions per minute, compared to a modern knitting machine which exceeds 10 times that speed. The result is a very soft but strong fabric, making it the best tee material available today.

It features triple-stitch (two-on/tone-off) reinforced collar, a superior-quality detail typically found in high-end Japanese brands. This feature prevents collar stretching, resulting in a long-lasting masterpiece worth every penny. The three-line stitching synchronizes the shrinking of the collar and body, ensuring a super durable collar shape.

The Flat Head is one of the benchmark Japanese repro Americana-style brands. Its founder, Mayashi Kobayashi, is known in the scene for being a die-hard fanatic of 1950s American style. Inspired by the music, motorbikes, cars, architecture of the era, and with a clear rockabilly influence, Kobayashi created in 1996 a truly authentic brand that today has some firm devotees. It stands out for the extreme quality of each one of its pieces. The brand is always very much aware of a curious philosophy that believes that a product is fully finished only after the customer has worn and moulded it to themselves.