Hero Image: Ben Sahagun (6 photosbyben)
They dressed a national stage in Las Vegas this summer and turned up on Bravo in Croatia.
But the reason Hunt & Harbor takes our Swim Trunks title is the fifty-odd prints you can order today.
Swim trunks are the most neglected item in most men’s closets. You buy a pair on the way to the airport, wear them for four days, and forget them until next July. It’s a strange blind spot, because there is almost no other garment you’ll be photographed in this often, wearing this little else.
So when a brand builds its entire identity around getting them right, we pay attention.
Hunt & Harbor is our Editor’s Choice for Swim Trunks in 2026. It earned the title on two fronts — a stage test almost no small label ever gets, and a catalog deep enough to back it up.
The Credibility: A National Stage, and a Beach Club in Croatia
This summer, Hunt & Harbor served as the official swimwear partner for Mister USA 2026, designing and producing the entire co-branded competition collection worn during Finals Week in Las Vegas. The line debuted at the swimwear showcase on August 21 and walked again at the national finals at Area15 on August 23.
That’s a brutal environment for swimwear. Stage lighting is unforgiving, the fit has to survive movement, and the fabric has to read from thirty feet away and in a phone camera three feet away. Hunt & Harbor built the collection in two hero looks — a black-and-gold metallic design and an all-over stars-and-stripes print — across three silhouettes: a mid-length board short, a low-rise square cut with compression, and a European-style lifeguard brief. The spec is genuinely premium: four-way stretch, UPF 50+, chlorine and salt resistance, fast-dry construction, sizes S through XL.
Then, entirely by accident, a pair turned up on this season of Bravo’s Below Deck Mediterranean — worn ashore at a beach club in Croatia by one of the yacht crew on a day off. Nobody planned that one. It’s the kind of placement a brand can’t buy, and it says something about where these end up unstyled.
What You Can Actually Get
Worth being precise here. The square cut and the lifeguard brief are the exact designs the contestants wore on stage — both return in limited sizes and quantities. The trunks are drawn from the other designs submitted and considered during the creative process, which is a far more interesting thing to own than a leftover.
The Reason It Wins: Everything Else
Strip the pageant away and Hunt & Harbor is still one of the deepest swim catalogs in men’s apparel — fifty-plus prints, most landing between $50 and $65.
The design point of view is the hook. “Field to shore” is the whole thesis: a deliberate collision of Southern heritage and coastal preppy that most labels treat as mutually exclusive. You can buy Lowcountry Marsh and Blue Toile Hunt in the same cart as Oyster Coast and Harborstone, then pick up Vintage Beach, Breakwater Knit, or the Riviera Colorblock for a trip that has nothing to do with a duck blind. Hunting toile. Nautical signal flags. Vintage cabana stripes. It reads like a brand with actual taste rather than a trend calendar.
Everything is quick-dry, made to order in the USA, and cut in a genuinely wearable mid-length. Because the pieces are produced on demand, the catalog stays wide instead of collapsing into three safe colorways.
It doesn’t stop at the water, either. Camp collar shirts, performance and French terry tanks, boxy tees, hoodies, caps, towels, and flip-flops round it out. Hunt & Harbor isn’t a swimwear company. It’s a lifestyle brand that happens to be exceptional at swimwear, and the best beach days don’t end at the shoreline.
The Man Behind It
Founder and creative director Keith Newport launched Hunt & Harbor at nearly fifty, alongside a decades-long executive career, with co-founder Charles Wooton running operations as COO. It went from side project to dressing a national competition in under two years, and the industry has started circling — established swimwear labels have approached about partnerships, and agents have reached out about taking the brand to buyers at major retailers. That trajectory shows up in the product. This is a label still designing like it has something to prove.
The Bottom Line
Hunt & Harbor wins because it clears the bar in both directions. Mister USA proved the construction holds up under the harshest light there is. The core line proves the brand can do it fifty different ways without a single lazy print.
Buy a pair before your next trip. You’ll be photographed in them more than anything else you pack.
