Search for the best fabric for boxer briefs and almost every answer comes from someone selling one of them. So does this one. We make ours from cotton, so read this knowing that. But we'd rather tell you where cotton loses than pretend it doesn't.
The short version
Cotton breathes, feels good over a long day, and is the easiest to live with. It dries slowly.
Modal and bamboo feel silkier and cooler to the touch. Both are regenerated fibres made from wood or bamboo pulp.
Synthetics like polyester and nylon dry fastest and are made for sport. They tend to hold on to smell.
What cotton does well
- It breathes. Air gets through, so heat doesn't build up. That matters most exactly where boxer briefs sit: between your thighs, and around a pad.
- It's comfortable for a whole day. Not the most impressive fabric in the first five minutes. The one you stop noticing by the afternoon.
- It's easy to wash. No special care, no separate load. How we'd wash them.
- It holds a pad. Pad adhesive sticks well to a flat cotton surface. Our gusset is two layers of organic cotton for that reason.
Where cotton loses
- It dries slowly. Cotton takes in moisture and holds on to it. For a run or a hard training session, a synthetic will feel drier. We don't make sportswear, and this is one reason.
- It isn't silky. If you want that smooth, cool, slightly slippery feel, modal does it better.
- On its own, it sags. Pure cotton stretches out and doesn't spring back. That's why ours has 5% elastane. It's what keeps the waistband in shape wash after wash.
What about bamboo?
Most bamboo fabric is bamboo viscose: bamboo pulp dissolved and spun into a new fibre. It's soft, and it feels a lot like modal. It's a perfectly good fabric. It just isn't bamboo in the way the word suggests.
What organic changes, and what it doesn't
Organic is about how the cotton is grown. It doesn't make the fabric softer or feel any different on your skin, and we're not going to tell you it does.
If you want the details on where our cotton comes from, and what we can and can't show for it, we wrote them down in how we make things.
So which one?
Cotton if it's for every day, long days, under a dress, or with a pad.
Modal if silky matters most to you.
Synthetic if it's for sport.
Plenty of people keep more than one kind in the drawer. That's fine.
Ours
95% organic cotton, 5% elastane, no label to scratch, and the same pad-friendly gusset in all three lengths:
