jantzen VS chan and in general jantzen quality

[dibenetto]

Really want to understand why WW CHAN gets so much praise for his suits
and jantzen so much for his shirts (i know and understand they are cheap and great value) but still at the end of the day where is jantzen standing on the quality side for the suit tailoring,hand working,finishing etc (not the styling part!! we all understand they never get what you REALLY wanted and all the little details they don't get right {they're not Italians after all})
and comparison with the full ''shanghai'' tailoring from WW CHAN that is suppose to be incredible and entirely done by hand.
BTW after 2 years of lazy research and pushy questions with a lot of tailors in Hongkong and shanghai, i got to some pretty clear conclusions:
the shanghai tailoring is pretty literally DEAD. Beside WW CHAN store i haven't heard of anybody doing a proper handmade full bespoke, let alone an English speaking fella' to talk to........most of the tailors trained in the golden era are dead or retired or flew to hongkong with the revolution and the MAO shirts became fashionable....
in hongkong the work is internally judged as follow:
-Cantonese work (the cheapest) is pretty much a flat construction.the lapel have minimum work done and little roll......this work is typical and widely used and available locally and for export. (after all too few customers know what to look for..........)
-shanghai work which will cost you about 50% extra over a Cantonese coat. (the pants seems to be quite similar for everybody any infos on it is welcome) the work is hard to get take more time and is always outsourced to individual tailors. the extra work include but is not limited to: those hundreds of stitches on the lapel (over a 1000 no?) which are done 2~3 rows at a time ironed,left to rest to take shape,then another 2~3 rows;
the fabrics and canvassing are strictly shrunken in water 24 hours to make sure no shrinking afterward will destroy the suit (how can a tailor do a proper suit in 24~48hours!!)
-the last work quality is called shanghai A+ and those capable of doing it are rare,expensive,long.
virtually all tailors capable of doing this kind of work were trained in shanghai before the revolution. ALL of them are old,many dead. Those people will work to the last breath,many do it from home.
also most if not all of them are controlled by big names in hongkong, including WW CHAN and others,smaller,lesser known operations. more for the local hongkong tycoon than for the American businessman visiting and pressing for time....

 

[Henry Boogers]

I don't know that Jantzen gets that much praise for their suits. Their shirts on the other hand can be quite well constructed using very nice materials if you know what you are doing.

 

[dibenetto]

it is exactly my point why jantzen shirts are amazing and not their suits
and CHAN has great tailoring for his suits but no word on his shirts.........

 

[DocHolliday]

Originally Posted by dibenetto

it is exactly my point why jantzen shirts are amazing and not their suits
and CHAN has great tailoring for his suits but no word on his shirts.........

Jantzen gets praise because it's a good quality MTM shirt at a very good price. Many forumites have tried them, so there's a lot of chatter. But Jantzen doesn't offer the same service for suits as it does for shirts -- IIRC, they require in-person fittings for suits. So most forumites have never seen a Jantzen suit, limiting the amount of discussion. The posters who have tried some other long-distance MTM have had, shall we say, mixed results.

Similarly, a smaller group of forumites have tried Chan than have tried Jantzen, or so I would think. Chan operates differently, and the shirt prices aren't as inexpensive as Jantzen's.

 

[Tomasso]

Sorry but I find it difficult to read your post due to the lack of punctuation and capitalization.

 

[Vintage Gent]

Originally Posted by dibenetto

it is exactly my point why jantzen shirts are amazing and not their suits
and CHAN has great tailoring for his suits but no word on his shirts.........

It's no secret that I'm one of SFs most vehement Chan apologists, having purchased several suits over the past three years. I think the shirts--of which I own 14 (with two more on the way)--are equally deserving of approbation. The fabrics, if not exceptional, are more than reliable. And the construction is solid with nice pattern matching. Even at the current price of some $120US per, I think the shirts are a very good value.

 

[dibenetto]

i apologize for my poor punctuation i tend to write a lot if not too much........and too fast

for CHAN shirts let me get it straight value is not put into question here it is certainly a great product too the only issue though is that hongkong has guess who? JANTZEN
and well to beat this guy on the price you've got to give something extra
so again my question who is better overall, in price, construction,delivery etc
i live in hongkong i know many many tailors who have been cutting suits ans shirts for a lifetime and still many dont impress me and their work even less........

 

[dibenetto]

i start to get the picture........basically its all in the scale on the forums......
and CHAN being smaller in scale we hear less of him which doesn't mean he's lesser quality at all.....but still as somebody points out 120$us is not the cheapest .....
personally im part of an underground buying group which used to buy JANTZEN and now buy somewhere else....suits are paid full price but on shirts its 36 us$

and believe me the quality is outstanding!!!

 

[lawyerdad]

Originally Posted by dibenetto

i apologize for my poor punctuation i tend to write a lot if not too much........and too fast

for CHAN shirts let me get it straight value is not put into question here it is certainly a great product too the only issue though is that hongkong has guess who? JANTZEN
and well to beat this guy on the price you've got to give something extra
so again my question who is better overall, in price, construction,delivery etc
i live in hongkong i know many many tailors who have been cutting suits ans shirts for a lifetime and still many dont impress me and their work even less........

Instead of apologizing, try just using proper (or at least some) capitalization and punctuation. Otherwise a lot of people who might otherwise provide you with useful information aren't going to read your posts. If it's not worth your taking the extra 22 seconds to add periods, capitals, etc., it's probably not worth someone taking the time to decipher it, either.

 

[dibenetto]

my bad. years of AIM have left terrible wounds on my writings skills.........

 

[lee_44106]

I really hate all this rambling. It only takes less than a second to put in punctuations.

 

[lawyerdad]

Originally Posted by dibenetto

my bad. years of AIM have left terrible wounds on my writings skills.........

Ha, no worries.
But when you move from short IMs to actual paragraphs -- especially without paragraph breaks, etc. -- it gets really hard to read. Especially for those of us old-timers approaching the age of bifocals.

 

[dibenetto]

here is one place the young is properly EDUCATED!!
how to dress,talk,write,and behave!
i really start to like this place......

 

[Gong Tao]

I have some sportcoats from Jantzen. The quality is OK. Taking into consideration the fit (excellent), quality, and price, I am satisfied and plan to get more the next time I am in HK. If I had more money to spend I would go to Chan. It is impossible to say that "Chan is a better value than Jantzen" or vice versa, because the answer depends on individual priorities and resources.

 

[Fishball]

I think one of the reason why many folks talking about Chan is because they also go to States to take the measurments.

As dibenetto said, HK do have some, less known tailors.
The outsiders just don't know it.

I always want to try Kiwa in Prince Bldg. I never see any customer in their shop, but they stay in Prince for more than 20 yrs as I know.