


Some Mormon women are obsessed with something illicit. They’re phoning friends, calling in favors and paying for international shipping to get it: a sacred tank top.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has redesigned its temple garments, which are worn by faithful members under their clothes. The garments are effectively underwear that until recently, looked like white short-sleeve shirts and knee-length shorts. Now, the church has removed the sleeve on some designs, turning them into tank tops.
The church is releasing the tops to its more than 17 million members around the world in phases. Last October, it quietly announced that the new garments would first be available to members in “hot, humid” climates like those in Africa and Asia.
They aren’t sanctioned for wear in the United States yet, but that hasn’t stopped American influencers from sourcing them — and showing them off in recent videos online.
“I was like: I want them now. I will get them at all costs. I will fly to Japan if I need to,” said Andrea Fausett, a 31-year-old influencer based in Hawaii. She secured a few tops from a friend in Asia. Other women told The New York Times that they had asked friends or family in Thailand and the Philippines to mail them.
Kim Austin, a 33-year-old consultant living in Provo, Utah, said that she wore the new garments under a sleeveless dress to church, and that women in her congregation asked how they could get them. “Utah women will stop at nothing,” she said. Alyssa and McKenna Banks, sisters who run master classes for styling modest outfits (advertised as “garment girlies — but make it vogue”), said their clients were dying to get them.