Why Americans Are Shy About Swim Briefs (And Why Australians Can't Understand It)

Walk onto a beach in Sydney or Melbourne and swim briefs are everywhere. Walk onto a beach in Florida or California and you'll find wall-to-wall board shorts stretching to the knee. Same sun, same water — completely different relationship with what goes in it.

Ad Butler, founder of Australian swimwear brand Sluggers, has witnessed this cultural gulf firsthand. Every time he visits the US, the pattern is the same. "It's me and my son — we're the only people wearing them," he says, with the bemused tone of a man who genuinely cannot fathom the fuss.

Back home in Australia, Butler mows the lawn in his Sluggers. He takes the rubbish out in them. He hosts barbecues in them. Nobody blinks. It's just what you wear when it's hot.

So why the difference? Interestingly, it hasn't always been this way. In the 1980s, swim briefs were completely unremarkable in America — a staple at public pools, spotted on primetime TV from Dallas to The X-Files, and worn without a second thought by everyone from lifeguards to leading men like Harrison Ford. Somewhere along the way, the board short took over and the swim brief got quietly exiled. What was once mainstream became, for many American men, a source of genuine anxiety — comments from family, jokes from friends, tiny bricks that build into a wall before you even realise it's there.

Butler has seen this pattern play out with his American customers time and again. The guy who finally makes the switch isn't usually twenty-two. He's late twenties, maybe thirty-one, and he's just quietly decided he's done waiting for permission. "Nobody's watching," Butler says. "And if they are, it's because they like you."

The irony, of course, is that when Americans do clock a guy in swim briefs, the reaction is rarely negative. At Disney World, Butler and his son caused a minor sensation in the water slide queue — ending with a tipsy stranger slapping him on the backside and declaring "God bless you Aussies." At a resort in Hawaii, a Southern gentleman took one look and christened Butler's banana-print pair "banana hammocks" with obvious delight.

Nobody was horrified. They were just surprised — because they'd never seen anyone brave enough to go first.

That, Butler reckons, is really all it takes. One guy. One deep breath. And suddenly it doesn't seem so radical after all.

So next time you're poolside in America, come pre-loaded with a pair of Sluggers under your boardies. You might just find yourself at the start of a poolside revolution.

If you're not feeling confident, go for a solid dark colour like black or navy — less shadows means family friendly! Or try an all-over loud print in a darker colour, something like the Banana Hammock DTs or Hokusurf.