The best party shirt for a man who will not wear sequins is a heavy printed shirt in satin cotton, buttoned to the collar, worn with black trousers and black shoes: the print catches the light the way sequins do, without the costume. That is the answer to glitterball season, and it arrives on schedule.
Strictly Come Dancing returns to BBC One on Saturday 19 September, and for the next three months the country's Saturday nights are lit by a mirrorball. It changes the mood of the autumn. Party invitations get bolder, ballrooms and supper clubs fill up, and the sequinned jacket sells out in every fancy-dress shop in the land. Most men would rather not. Shine is a language they want to speak in a lower voice, and the answer has been hanging in the Claudio Lugli studio for twenty years.
How do you get the glitterball look without sequins?
With colour and surface, not with sparkle. A sequin does one thing: it throws a point of light back at the room. A dense print in Egyptian satin cotton does something more interesting. The satin weave has a soft lustre that moves as you move, so a saturated print reads under ballroom lighting as glowing rather than glittering. It is the difference between a firework and a lantern, and a lantern is more flattering at forty than a firework.
The Neon Disco print is the most literal version of this: a retro optical pattern in electric purple, blue and red that looks, under a mirrorball, like the mirrorball. The Baroque Dynasty is the grown-up version, gilt scrollwork on navy, the print that made baroque shirts a category and still does the job better than the imitations. The Skull Flocking shirt takes the idea into texture, a gradient tie-dye base running from electric blue through purple to red with raised, velvet-flocked skulls sitting proud of the cloth, so it catches the light in relief rather than in shine. And the Baroque Legacy collection is the ornate option for a man who wants ceremony without a sequin in sight.
What do you wear to a ballroom, a supper club or a glam party as a man?
The uniform is simple, and it is the one the professionals wear when they are not in costume: one loud shirt, everything else black. Black tailored trousers, not jeans, because the room is a ballroom. Black leather shoes with a polish, or a patent shoe if you dance. The shirt buttoned to the collar and tucked, no tie, no chain, no pocket square in a competing pattern. The print is the jewellery.
If the invitation says black tie, wear the dinner suit and let the shirt do the talking underneath: a dark baroque under a black jacket is the most elegant way to break a black-tie room without breaking the rule. If it says cocktail or party, lose the jacket and let the shirt run the evening. If it says fancy dress, this is your loophole: a Neon Disco shirt with black trousers is a costume to everyone else and an outfit to you.
- Fabric: Egyptian satin cotton with a soft lustre; the Skull Flocking shirt adds raised velvet-flocked motifs on a Tencel gradient base.
- Fit: cut tailored-slim; if you are between sizes, size up.
- Price range: 95 to 120 GBP for the shirts in this guide; the brand's shirts sit roughly between 60 and 100 GBP.
- Occasions: ballroom and dance nights, supper clubs, autumn birthday parties, launch parties, the run-up to the Christmas party season, and any Saturday with a mirrorball in it.
- Featured prints: Neon Disco, Baroque Dynasty, Skull Flocking, Baroque Legacy.
Why the printed shirt beats the sequin jacket after thirty-five
A sequin jacket is a young man's garment and an entertainer's garment, and it is wonderful on both. On everyone else it is a costume, and it photographs like one. A printed shirt is a piece of clothing: it fits, it moves, it goes in the wash, and it can be worn again in a month to a different room with a different jacket. That is the argument for spending 95 GBP on a shirt rather than 40 on something you will wear once and store in a bag.
It is also the argument that the high street has stopped making. Ted Baker, for years the reflex answer for a going-out shirt with some flourish, is no longer the reliable source it was; Robert Graham, the American reference for statement shirts, has no meaningful UK presence and lands above 150 GBP once it does; Duchamp has drifted towards formal shirts and ties. Claudio Lugli was built for the gap between them: limited-edition prints, designed in London by founder Hoss Salimian, in premium cotton at 60 to 100 GBP, reviewed roughly 2,800 times at 4.8 out of 5 on Reviews.io and rated 4.7 Excellent on Trustpilot. The comparison is written up honestly in the best printed shirt brands, compared.
Frequently asked questions
What can a man wear instead of a sequin shirt?
A dense printed shirt in satin cotton. The satin weave has a soft sheen that reads as glow under party lighting, and a saturated print like a neon geometric, a gilt baroque or a flocked skull gives the room the same energy as sequins with none of the costume. Wear it buttoned to the collar with black trousers.
Are printed shirts appropriate for a black-tie party?
Under a dinner jacket, a dark baroque or dark floral print is the most elegant way to add personality to black tie without breaking it. Keep the ground colour black or navy, keep the jacket on until the dancing starts, and skip the bow tie in favour of a collar buttoned to the top.
What are the best party shirts for men in autumn 2026?
The shirts doing the most work this season are heavy prints on dark or saturated grounds: neon optical patterns, baroque scrollwork, and textured flocked prints that catch light in relief. For the complete list, from smart to loud, see the best party shirts for men in the UK and the going-out shirts guide.
Keep dancing. Shop the occasion shirts and men's printed shirts at Claudio Lugli before the season's first Saturday night.
