Paraguayan American Perfect Heritage Heart Tee

Paraguay, on the hand that is almost never printed

Same heart, different half. The left hand carries the United States, blue canton and white stars out on the forearm, red and white stripes across the fingers. The right hand carries Paraguay in three horizontal bands, red across the top of the fingers, white through the middle, deep blue along the bottom edge, with the national seal drawn in its circle on the back of the hand, the words of the republic curving around a yellow star. Between the two hands sits the open heart, left black so the shirt itself fills it. Underneath, in thin white capitals set wide apart, PERFECT HERITAGE runs the width of the chest.

Who it’s for

Paraguayan families in the United States are not many, and that is exactly why this Paraguayan American heritage shirt matters to the people who find it. When your country almost never shows up on a rack, seeing it there at all is the whole event. Good for a parent who left Asuncion decades ago, for a grandchild who has only heard about it, and for the friend who keeps asking where Paraguay actually is.

The detail that matters

The seal is actually drawn. Look closely and the star inside the green wreath is still a star, and the words curving around it are still words, at a size where most prints give up and leave a gray dot. The same care went into the Guatemalan American Perfect Heritage Heart Tee, which is the design that started this series.