Menswear brand Sunspel is relaunching its original British Boxer Short model, 40 years after it was made famous by an iconic Levi’s advert. However, the story of Sunspel and the boxer short started long before this.
The garment, as the name suggests, has its origins in boxing: in 1925, sportswear company Everlast introduced a new type of lightweight, elastic-waistband short designed for fighters. These garments were soon adopted as everyday underwear, particularly in the United States.
The story behind Sunspel’s iconic boxer shorts
The newly reissued boxer short, which appears in a new A/W 2025 campaign from the brand
It wasn’t until 1947 that boxer shorts made their way to the UK – thanks to Sunspel, according to the brand. John Hill, the great-grandson of Sunspel’s founder, discovered the style during his honeymoon in the US and brought the idea back home. Hill refined the design by adding a back panel, smoothing the seams and using premium long-staple cotton, transforming a utilitarian item into a luxury garment.
The Sunspel Boxer Short cemented its status as a classic in 1985, thanks to one of the most memorable TV commercials in advertising history: the Levi’s laundrette advert, in which British model and singer Nick Kamen strolls into a 1950s-style American laundromat, strips down to his white (Sunspel) boxers, and casually waits for his jeans to wash. The ad made the Boxer Short a staple overnight, and to this day, it accounts for nearly 50 per cent of Sunspel’s underwear sales.
Sunspel's Boxer Short original vintage packaging
Now, nearly 40 years later, Sunspel is reissuing the original model as part of its A/W 2025 collection. The reissue brings back the boxer in three archival stripe colourways, and is also presented in the original packaging, offering a nostalgic nod to a design that changed the landscape of men’s underwear.
Alongside the reissue, Sunspel is also introducing a new sustainable fabric to its range. Made from Tencel, a fibre derived from renewable wood sources, the new line includes a T-shirt, trunks and briefs. These additions, says the brand, reflect ‘the interplay between Sunspel’s unique heritage and its commitment to modern comfort’.
The 40-Year Archive Reissue and new Tencel collection will be available from 11 September on Sunspel's website and in stores.
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