From runway to poolside, skimpy men's swim briefs make a stylish comeback

The Star

11-07-2025

This season, after years of fielding requests for a particular swimsuit online and at his retail stores, menswear designer Todd Snyder gave those who had been asking what they wanted: a swim brief.
Snyder, who is known for making modern versions of classic items in the American man's wardrobe, said that even though he had a sense of customers' appetite for swim briefs, he was surprised by his version's reception.
'It's been doing killer,' he said of the brief, a new addition to his namesake brand's swimwear offerings – competing 'neck and neck' with the trunks his brand sells.
The Todd Snyder Mykonos brief, which is sold in three solid colours and has an inside pocket for small items such as keys, is among the latest iterations of a swimsuit being revisited by some luxury brands (most are European) and by men bold enough to wear it.
They do not include Snyder. 'I think I'm past that,' the 57-year-old designer said, laughing. 'Those days are gone.'
Bode expanded its line of nostalgic and embroidered clothing to include solid-colour swim briefs last year, and other rarefied styles currently for sale include asymmetrically cut briefs by Rick Owens, a rococo pair by Versace, a leopard pair by Dolce & Gabbana, a checked pair by Burberry and logo-stamped styles by Louis Vuitton and Gucci.
But no luxury brand has leaned in quite like Miu Miu, the womenswear label beloved by many men, which was ahead of the pack when it showed swim briefs styled with T-shirts, polos and low-slung shorts in its Spring 2024 collection.
Read more: Step up, guys! Let these stylish celebrities inspire your shoe game
Now the brand offers a pair in seven colours and 14 sizes. Its three-figure price, like those of some other styles, is just as likely to cause a double take as the briefs themselves are.
Like other trendy items, swim briefs are available at fast-fashion retailers including Zara, which is selling lower-priced pairs.
They have also been promoted by style publications.
Cultured magazine featured actor Walton Goggins sitting spread-legged in a fluorescent yellow Speedo on a spring cover. GQ, citing that photo (and other factors), suggested in May that briefs were poised to have a 'breakout summer'.
The Guardian and CNN have also reported on their resurgence in recent years.
Douglas Conklyn, senior vice president of global design at Speedo, said the amount of attention being paid lately to swim briefs reached levels he had typically seen only during the Olympics.
'The more people that are talking about the briefs, the better it is,' Conklyn said.
'This Walton Goggins moment has certainly gotten Speedo back in the conversation,' he added, and it has given swim briefs relevance outside sports.
'It's putting it in a context with beautiful fashion photography, on beautiful people, and it's all of a sudden feeling aspirational.'
Next to athletes, swim briefs are probably most commonly associated with specific groups of men. The image of Goggins, a virile straight man, in a Speedo also gave briefs a more universal relevance.
Time will tell whether they can infiltrate straight men's wardrobes in the ways that pearl necklaces and short shorts have (with help from straight men including Harry Styles and Paul Mescal).
Swim briefs have made waves in fashion before – see: Tom Ford's spring 1998 Gucci show featuring male models in them – without significantly altering men's bathing suit preferences.
And some trendy men's swimwear labels like Orlebar Brown, the British brand that helped popularise slimmer and shorter trunks in the 2010s, have had less success with briefs.
Read more: Once mocked, now coveted – 'dad style' is the fashion trend redefining cool
After introducing them in 2017, Orlebar Brown discontinued the style in 2023 to focus on other products, its founder, Adam Brown, said.
CDLP, a Swedish brand founded by Christian Larson and Andreas Palm, offers four men's swimsuits: three trunks and a brief. The swim brief is about as popular as any of the trunks, the founders said, accounting for 25% to 30% of their men's swimwear sales.
Larson said there 'has absolutely been a culture shift' around wearing swim briefs in the years since CDLP started offering swimwear in 2018.
Palm painted a picture of some of the people who had gravitated toward them.
'I have friends that I went to business school with who are working in private equity, and they were all in our swim briefs,' he said.
'I don't think they would've gone for that 10 years ago.' – ©2025 The New York Times Company
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.