Getting the sleeve length right

This is a deal breaker. It won’t matter how much money you spend on your suit, how perfectly combined it is with all of your accessories, however great the rest of it fits or how good you think you look in it. If your suit sleeves are eating away at your hands, people will think that it’s your fathers.

Now here’s some great piece of advice: first, take care of the sleeve length right away, preferably whilst buying it. Secondly, do not, not, listen to shopkeepers. These weasels will tell you anything to make you walk out of their store with a suit, but without a ‘hassle’.

You’ve got to know for yourself, because nobody’ll tell you. Here’s what you need to know:

Have you seen the fourth image above? The beautiful one, that I stole and edited myself? Take a look, and now look at your own hand. Notice the wrinkle between your thumb and index finger when you place them close together? From where that wrinkle ends, it should be about 4 cm to where the sleeve of the suit jacket starts. Give or take 1 cm, depending on wether you like to show less or more of your shirt cuffs. It’s common to have the sleeve length a bit shorter than average if you’ll be wearing double shirt cuffs, leaving these and the cuff-links more visible.

A few more things. As I wrote in a previous post:

“Do not have the space between where the sleeve ends and the buttons start shortened (or lengthened) without moving the buttons and all the details up (or down) the sleeve accordingly. It’s easily done, but find a tailor that has the right equipment to remake the buttonhole stitches.”

And one last thing: if you’re buying a suit with one or more buttonholes open, which is more common on more expensive suits, you won’t be adjusting the sleeve length at all. Since that’ll leave a hole in the fabric.

Now, off to the tailor!

Paul Smith for Evian

I realise that water might be a bit of a stretch from the theme of this blog, but this is quite exciting, isn’t it?

John Smedley - AW2009

The company John Smedley has been around some 220 years, and has since that time done one thing, and one thing only: classic knitwear. Their point of view seem to be that quality lasts, and that there ought to be people interested in wearing other colours than beige, brown and black during the dark half of the year. They might be right.

As winter draws closer, you should take the opportunity to wear pullovers with your suit or suit trousers. Obviously it’ll add another layer to keep you warm, but moreover it’ll give you another variable in your daily outfit. John Smedley won’t disappoint you when it comes to their colour range, and neither will their quality.

Their winter collection is usually made up from New Zealand extra fine merino wool. It’s got great lustre, brilliant colour and the company claims it to be machine washable in a standard 40ºC program. The summer collection is made out of Sea Island cotton, which is the finest cotton fibre (barely) available in the world.

They’ve got v-necks, rounded necks, polos and much more. Don’t miss out! You won’t regret owning one.

What does Super 100’s mean?

Many shopkeepers will be bragging about their top notch wool suits, using any vaguely defined word they can find that seems to say something about the marvellous qualities they possess. The most common one found in wool suits is the Super X’s. Most people realise that if anything is labeled “Super”-anything, it’s got to be real rad. Add an increasing number after it, and you’re set. After we’ve cleared this matter out, you should take the opportunity to harass shopkeepers about it whenever a chance is presented to you.

Here’s how it works. Wool fibres are basically hair from sheep. Now, sheep, like man, comes in many different types.  I’ll leave the different types of sheep and their wool available for a later post, but the basic run down is: thin wool fibre is just great.

It’s usually said that thinner wool will feel nicer to the hand, but the thickness of the fibre is just one of many factors affecting this. It will, however, look better in a suit. This since thin wool fibre (hair) can be spun into a thinner thread. Thinner thread makes for thinner weave. Thinner weave makes a thinner suit. Suit’s made from thinner weave generally looks much more elegant, and won’t generally crease as easily. As a layman you might not understand at first why a particular suit seems so appealing compared to the rest, but a real thin and high quality wool thread might be the reason why.

Well strayed, time for facts:

Super X’s (where X is a number) is a marking that corresponds to the average diameter of the wool thread that the suit is made out of. The number does not have anything to do with the actual diameter though, it’s just nonsense. Here’s the scale:

Fibre Quality - Microns (Micro millimeters)

Super 80’s - 19.5 μm
Super 90’s - 19.0 μm
Super 100’s - 18.5 μm
Super 110’s - 18.0 μm
Super 120’s - 17.5 μm
Super 130’s - 17.0 μm
Super 140’s - 16.5 μm
Super 150’s - 16.0 μm
Super 160’s - 15.5 μm
Super 170’s - 15.0 μm
Super 180’s - 14.5 μm
Super 190’s - 14.0 μm
Super 200’s - 13.5 μm
Super 210’s - 13.0 μm

Higher Super-number means thinner wool thread. Do note, that a superthin thread don’t equal a great suit. There’s plenty of ways to ruin the quality moving from thread to suit.

Suit’s made from thinner thread than 150’s are real rare, and for a good reason. Pushing past 120’s-130’s, the suit sure looks fantastic, but durability drops as the thread gets thinner. Therefore, suits with a thinner thread than 120’s doesn’t make up for great work wear. A common misunderstanding is that really expensive suits will last longer. They might, but if they’re made from a really fine fabric, they probably won’t. These suits are meant for board meetings, conferences, weddings and other special occasions.

There you go!

When’s the right time to use a tailor and not? Here’s a few tips:

• Rather find the right model from the start. Should you fall in love with a suit that just doesn’t fit, it probably wasn’t meant to be.
• Don’t change too many things, and don’t change too much. It’ll show, and it won’t look good.
• Details made in a coarse thread might leave marks on fine fabric.
• Rather take in than let out. Letting out means that the stitches from the seam might leave marks on the fabric that’ll show.
• There’s no adjusting the sleeve width on suits. It just won’t work.
• Shortening the sleeves? Do not have the space between where the sleeve ends and the buttons start shortened without moving the buttons and all the details up the sleeve accordingly. It’s easily done, but find a tailor that has the right equipment to remake the buttonhole stitches.
• If you’ve got a two slit jacket taken in too much, the bottom rear ‘tail’ might start pointing out towards the sides.
• You can’t make new slits, if you’re not happy with the setup as it is.

That’s all for now!

Wearing a shirt with tie?

There are some do’s and don’ts when it comes to the shirt and tie-combination. I’ll leave colour and patterns out for now, and focus on something equally important: having, and keeping, the top button buttoned.

Unlike what most (mainly Swedish) TV-presenters and ‘celebrities’ will have you think, leaving it unbuttoned doesn’t make you look casual yet dressed up. It makes you look like a slob. It makes you look like a man who hasn’t figured out your shirt neck size yet, who thinks it’s too warm or too uncomfortable looking good.

The top button stays buttoned all the way home, or atleast past midnight. And don’t even think of incorporating the unbuttoned shirt and tie-combination into a party outfit. That’s an Oh-no-don’t-do-it.

Time for some constructive tips:

• Figure out your shirt neck size. Ask for help in any place you can buy formal shirts, or ask a friend to take your measurement around your neck. It’s either in inches or centimetres.
• Leave perhaps 1 cm or 1/2 of an inch for shrinkage, unless you’re buying a slightly more expensive shirt. Those are usually properly pre-washed.
• If the size around the neck fits, but the rest of the shirt is either too big or too small, you’ve been trying the wrong model on. Ask for a slimmer or less slim model.

Remember, the cheaper the shirt, the less comfortable and warmer it’ll probably be. This due to cheaper chemical finishes, cheaper fabric made from synthetic materials, poor weave construction or all of it.

Happy buttoning!

Oscar Jacobsson - AW2009

I scavenged the web looking for proper images of the one suit model I wanted to present, but ended up hi-jacking these two from the Oscar Jacobsson website. They sure look like Floyd. Floyd is a semi-slim model, with classic elements. It’s been around for a while, and for a good reason. It’s got spacious sleeves with much room for big arm muscles as well as quite a good drop down towards the waist.

Being a classic OJ model, it leaves you the option - on some of the carry-over fabrics - to split the suit. This is an excellent benefit should the size of your trousers not ‘match’ the size of your jacket.

All in all, this is a great model for the well trained, well built, broad shouldered man who wants a comfortable suit without looking like a nightclub bouncer. It’s slimming, yet leaves room for all those muscles.

A real oh-no-don’t-do-it

A word of caution: black bottom with widely spaced thin white pinstripes is a real no go. It’s not cool, it doesn’t make you look like a man of the world, and there’s no transfer of value between you and the characters featured in the Godfather-movies what so ever. Add a matching hat and people will be turning on the street for the wrong reason. Got it at home? Do hand it over to the flames, as the wool fibres will be spent (or eaten) before that’s ever fashionable again.

How to dress down like a legend

One thing that Chet Baker had that was just about as smooth as his voice was his impeccable style. How does such a man dress down to relax his neck from all those collars? The key seems to be keeping things very basic, and adding an accessory that gives some sort of credibility to ones character. Here’s the break-down:

• Some degree of smart wear still needs to be present. Preferably the trousers, which should be at least pleated or smart. No low waists.
• The top should be either a white t-shirt or tank top stuffed into the trousers, or nothing at all.
• The hair still needs to be perfect, in a sloppy way. Very important.
• The accessory: here’s where you add personality to the outfit. Trumpet, woman, or anything that says something about your character.

A thirst

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