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A new approach to bespoke patterns- seeking beta testers

RogerC

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I’ve just read this. I’m half an hour away from Amsterdam and so would be interested in receiving more information. Email sent, will report on progress.
 
Last edited:

Clifff

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I'm working on a project and need some help.

For those who don't know who I am, I have worked in the RTW and MTM tailored clothing industry for about 25 years, running pattern design, quality and manufacturing at a number of companies in Canada, the US and Mexico. I also do bespoke tailoring, mostly as a hobby, which I started learning around age seven or eight.

I wrote about this project in more detail on my blog here , but in short, we are developing an algorithm to draft suit and shirt patterns from body measurements, the same way a bespoke cutter would draft (better, in fact). The company, of which I am a partner, is based in Amsterdam so our first round will be for people located around that location. Anybody else who is interested in participating is encouraged to contact us as well as we will be developing a travel schedule based on interest; first Europe, and then soon in the US and maybe Canada (while they are in the Netherlands, I divide my time between Rochester, NY and Montreal, QC).

Here's the offer- get measured by one of our people and get a MTM suit and or shirt, made in Europe, at a deeply discounted price. You must consent to be photographed as we are also testing various forms of body scanning and measuring technology; also, to control for variables, the cloth is limited to a few select colors of one suit quality. We expect that some people will break our system; that is exactly what we are hoping for, because every time it breaks down, we build it back up stronger.

I'm happy to answer questions about the process and our testing, and to sign up contact peter at tailoredby dot eu

Pictures of some of the very first testers; very time we make a garment we improve the algorithm.




All the best,
Jeffery

I also love being experimented on. I also live very close to you, in Den Haag.
 

RogerC

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Reporting back as promised: Peter came by my house the other day to explain the project and measure me up. We had a really good chat, and I had the impression he rather knew what he was doing, which is reassuring. During the beta period, they are testing the model with a very limited selection of worsted sharkskin suitings. That suited me fine as I needed a basic, versatile business suit. I went for a mid grey marle. Pricing at this stage is highly competitive. The order is going into the factory soon, I will keep you posted on further updates. But so far, so good.
 

nevaeh

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This sounds like an exciting venture—melding the traditional (bespoke tailoring) with the new. Out of pure selfishness, I hope you add Chicago to your list. Best of luck!
 

dauster

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curious to see what the end results to this were?!?! It's been a year any update?
 

jefferyd

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Hi all,

It's been a while since we've shared any progress - that's because the first results are just leaving the factory as we speak and frankly for all of us it's been a more than crazy year.

When we initially did this CTA, the world was just coming to grips with a concerning but then still far-from-our-bed virus, and no lockdowns or otherwise had been issued in the west. We've had an outpouring of responses, with the majority of them being from the states. Just a month later, the virus hit globally, and we were left without any options to travel to the majority of interested people. Instead, we assembled a list of around 15 test subjects near/safe enough for us to travel to, and so we did. We measured them, and had initially planned to then just place the orders and get on with the next batch, hoping to hear no more of the virus some time soon. We all know what happened of course, Europe, as well as the rest of the world went into full-scale lockdown, and so did our factory - which ended up being closed nearly 2 months, then being open for a short while, closing for the summer holidays, and then re-opening in early fall.

In the meantime, we prepared basted fittings, to at least keep some momentum going for us as well as our testers, and to improve our algorithm before we could order again. We had some to be expected issues, which these fittings helped solve.

image_2021-01-05_14-57-14.jpg
image_2021-01-05_14-58-48.jpg


At the same time, we were in discussions over a possible partnership with a 3D scanning technology company - 3D scanning being something we had been looking to implement since late 2018, but with the majority of machines on offer either not mobile or downright disappointing, we never pulled the trigger. The company in question though had promising technology - a more accurate-than-usual 3D scanner, semi-mobile, and elegantly integrated into a mirror with a turntable, promising to be able to do a full body 3D scan in just 15 seconds. Initially developed to be an at-home fitness tracker, we saw an opportunity and had one of them shipped over from the states.

While doing some initial testing among ourselves, we saw it could work, and decided to call our testers to ask them if they'd be willing to get scanned. They did - and we ended up with 18 3D scanned models of our customers. While we had dabbled in clothing simulation software before, it was never very relevant as we weren't designing RTW garments, and couldn't sufficiently enough alter the standard avatars to mirror our customers' bodies. Now, with the actual avatars of our testers, we finally could do real simulations, and started an enormous effort to get the correlation between 3D and reality just right, as well as constantly improving our algorithm, faster than we ever could do before and with much less resources. This calibration/testing effort took months, but since we were unable to produce the suits in our factory anyway, it was a valuable use of time. Some pics of our correlation efforts (note that the funky cloth mismatch is because they're just basted fittings in scrap fabric to test the 3d output)

comparison-back.jpg

comparison-real-digital.jpg

photo_2021-01-06_06-48-27.jpg

correlation-366.jpg


We finally ordered all the garments on the 2nd of December, nearly a year after we initiated the CTA. Thanks, COVID-19! To date, we delivered, straight-from-factory, 4 suits, as these testers are located in regions we can't travel to right now due to lockdowns or travel restrictions (Germany, Belgium, Italy, USA). The rest of the testers are located in The Netherlands, and we will hopefully be able to deliver the suits when our lockdown ends on the 19th of january.

A disclaimer when viewing these pictures - we are still in this process of having perfect correlation between 3D and real life results, and it seems we've at least made some mistakes here and there, which was to be expected. Nothing unsolvable and nothing fundamental though, which is what we were hoping for. We treated the orders as if they were completely new, had never measured them manually, and only relied on what we got from measuring in 3D and simulating in 3D, then straight to factory. Those that have received garments with mistakes will of course receive either new garments, or we'll alter them for them. When all suits have been fitted and reviewed, we'll adjust the parameters of both our algorithms and simulations, and then hope to have a seriously stable product for phase 2 of beta testing, assuming the vaccine(s) turn out to work and let us all resume a more normal life.

For now, I don't have more real-life results to show. Hopefully, the Dutch Government will lift the lockdown restrictions on the 19th of January, which is a week after we expect the remainder of the suits to arrive from the factory. When and if we have updates - good, or bad - we'll update you again. All in all we're still very excited. Had we known what we know now, the garments would've turned out near-perfect.

One last note, in keeping with "a new approach to bespoke" - what we're able to do through the scanning and simulation effort, is to scan the customer, then discuss styling options and fabrics as usual. But once we simulate, we share the result of that simulation with the customer, so he can see what he'll order before it's ever made, and is allowed to make adjustments (any, from length adjustments to complete restyling). We hope this will also solve the "taste" issue - in that we may believe we have a technically correct garment, a customer's taste may differ and he may want to deviate from that algorithmically defined correctness.

The upshot to all of this is that we were able to accelerate our workflow toward contactless fittings which will also enable remote ordering of garments as long as customers have access to a body scanner, some day to be replaced by the lidar technology currently available on the new iphones. We are hoping that the world returns to some semblance of normalcy soon so we can renew our testing and development process quickly.
 

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nevaeh

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Hi all,

It's been a while since we've shared any progress - that's because the first results are just leaving the factory as we speak and frankly for all of us it's been a more than crazy year.

When we initially did this CTA, the world was just coming to grips with a concerning but then still far-from-our-bed virus, and no lockdowns or otherwise had been issued in the west. We've had an outpouring of responses, with the majority of them being from the states. Just a month later, the virus hit globally, and we were left without any options to travel to the majority of interested people. Instead, we assembled a list of around 15 test subjects near/safe enough for us to travel to, and so we did. We measured them, and had initially planned to then just place the orders and get on with the next batch, hoping to hear no more of the virus some time soon. We all know what happened of course, Europe, as well as the rest of the world went into full-scale lockdown, and so did our factory - which ended up being closed nearly 2 months, then being open for a short while, closing for the summer holidays, and then re-opening in early fall.

In the meantime, we prepared basted fittings, to at least keep some momentum going for us as well as our testers, and to improve our algorithm before we could order again. We had some to be expected issues, which these fittings helped solve.

View attachment 1530039 View attachment 1530040

At the same time, we were in discussions over a possible partnership with a 3D scanning technology company - 3D scanning being something we had been looking to implement since late 2018, but with the majority of machines on offer either not mobile or downright disappointing, we never pulled the trigger. The company in question though had promising technology - a more accurate-than-usual 3D scanner, semi-mobile, and elegantly integrated into a mirror with a turntable, promising to be able to do a full body 3D scan in just 15 seconds. Initially developed to be an at-home fitness tracker, we saw an opportunity and had one of them shipped over from the states.

While doing some initial testing among ourselves, we saw it could work, and decided to call our testers to ask them if they'd be willing to get scanned. They did - and we ended up with 18 3D scanned models of our customers. While we had dabbled in clothing simulation software before, it was never very relevant as we weren't designing RTW garments, and couldn't sufficiently enough alter the standard avatars to mirror our customers' bodies. Now, with the actual avatars of our testers, we finally could do real simulations, and started an enormous effort to get the correlation between 3D and reality just right, as well as constantly improving our algorithm, faster than we ever could do before and with much less resources. This calibration/testing effort took months, but since we were unable to produce the suits in our factory anyway, it was a valuable use of time. Some pics of our correlation efforts (note that the funky cloth mismatch is because they're just basted fittings in scrap fabric to test the 3d output)

View attachment 1530042
View attachment 1530043
View attachment 1530044
View attachment 1530045

We finally ordered all the garments on the 2nd of December, nearly a year after we initiated the CTA. Thanks, COVID-19! To date, we delivered, straight-from-factory, 4 suits, as these testers are located in regions we can't travel to right now due to lockdowns or travel restrictions (Germany, Belgium, Italy, USA). The rest of the testers are located in The Netherlands, and we will hopefully be able to deliver the suits when our lockdown ends on the 19th of january.

A disclaimer when viewing these pictures - we are still in this process of having perfect correlation between 3D and real life results, and it seems we've at least made some mistakes here and there, which was to be expected. Nothing unsolvable and nothing fundamental though, which is what we were hoping for. We treated the orders as if they were completely new, had never measured them manually, and only relied on what we got from measuring in 3D and simulating in 3D, then straight to factory. Those that have received garments with mistakes will of course receive either new garments, or we'll alter them for them. When all suits have been fitted and reviewed, we'll adjust the parameters of both our algorithms and simulations, and then hope to have a seriously stable product for phase 2 of beta testing, assuming the vaccine(s) turn out to work and let us all resume a more normal life.

For now, I don't have more real-life results to show. Hopefully, the Dutch Government will lift the lockdown restrictions on the 19th of January, which is a week after we expect the remainder of the suits to arrive from the factory. When and if we have updates - good, or bad - we'll update you again. All in all we're still very excited. Had we known what we know now, the garments would've turned out near-perfect.

One last note, in keeping with "a new approach to bespoke" - what we're able to do through the scanning and simulation effort, is to scan the customer, then discuss styling options and fabrics as usual. But once we simulate, we share the result of that simulation with the customer, so he can see what he'll order before it's ever made, and is allowed to make adjustments (any, from length adjustments to complete restyling). We hope this will also solve the "taste" issue - in that we may believe we have a technically correct garment, a customer's taste may differ and he may want to deviate from that algorithmically defined correctness.

The upshot to all of this is that we were able to accelerate our workflow toward contactless fittings which will also enable remote ordering of garments as long as customers have access to a body scanner, some day to be replaced by the lidar technology currently available on the new iphones. We are hoping that the world returns to some semblance of normalcy soon so we can renew our testing and development process quickly.

The results in the photos you shared truly speak for themselves. This sounds (and looks) incredibly promising! Thank you for this update—the behind the scenes look, so to speak, is interesting and kudos on this progress, even during COVID–19.

A question: how do you ensure that the customers are in their natural stance and posture during scanning? Because, sometimes, I’ve noticed people get into an artificial posture—one they think is more proper than their natural stance—when being photographed. Or ... since you have a full 3D scan, that doesn’t matter as much?

Regardless, I am looking forward to future updates. And perhaps being a Guinea pig and customer some day, ideally sooner rather than later.
 

ruvort

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I also think this is interesting and is an approach that I considered as well. I'd be interested in participating if the chance comes along.
 

Noblekostas

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Hi all,

It's been a while since we've shared any progress - that's because the first results are just leaving the factory as we speak and frankly for all of us it's been a more than crazy year.

When we initially did this CTA, the world was just coming to grips with a concerning but then still far-from-our-bed virus, and no lockdowns or otherwise had been issued in the west. We've had an outpouring of responses, with the majority of them being from the states. Just a month later, the virus hit globally, and we were left without any options to travel to the majority of interested people. Instead, we assembled a list of around 15 test subjects near/safe enough for us to travel to, and so we did. We measured them, and had initially planned to then just place the orders and get on with the next batch, hoping to hear no more of the virus some time soon. We all know what happened of course, Europe, as well as the rest of the world went into full-scale lockdown, and so did our factory - which ended up being closed nearly 2 months, then being open for a short while, closing for the summer holidays, and then re-opening in early fall.

In the meantime, we prepared basted fittings, to at least keep some momentum going for us as well as our testers, and to improve our algorithm before we could order again. We had some to be expected issues, which these fittings helped solve.

View attachment 1530039 View attachment 1530040

At the same time, we were in discussions over a possible partnership with a 3D scanning technology company - 3D scanning being something we had been looking to implement since late 2018, but with the majority of machines on offer either not mobile or downright disappointing, we never pulled the trigger. The company in question though had promising technology - a more accurate-than-usual 3D scanner, semi-mobile, and elegantly integrated into a mirror with a turntable, promising to be able to do a full body 3D scan in just 15 seconds. Initially developed to be an at-home fitness tracker, we saw an opportunity and had one of them shipped over from the states.

While doing some initial testing among ourselves, we saw it could work, and decided to call our testers to ask them if they'd be willing to get scanned. They did - and we ended up with 18 3D scanned models of our customers. While we had dabbled in clothing simulation software before, it was never very relevant as we weren't designing RTW garments, and couldn't sufficiently enough alter the standard avatars to mirror our customers' bodies. Now, with the actual avatars of our testers, we finally could do real simulations, and started an enormous effort to get the correlation between 3D and reality just right, as well as constantly improving our algorithm, faster than we ever could do before and with much less resources. This calibration/testing effort took months, but since we were unable to produce the suits in our factory anyway, it was a valuable use of time. Some pics of our correlation efforts (note that the funky cloth mismatch is because they're just basted fittings in scrap fabric to test the 3d output)

View attachment 1530042
View attachment 1530043
View attachment 1530044
View attachment 1530045

We finally ordered all the garments on the 2nd of December, nearly a year after we initiated the CTA. Thanks, COVID-19! To date, we delivered, straight-from-factory, 4 suits, as these testers are located in regions we can't travel to right now due to lockdowns or travel restrictions (Germany, Belgium, Italy, USA). The rest of the testers are located in The Netherlands, and we will hopefully be able to deliver the suits when our lockdown ends on the 19th of january.

A disclaimer when viewing these pictures - we are still in this process of having perfect correlation between 3D and real life results, and it seems we've at least made some mistakes here and there, which was to be expected. Nothing unsolvable and nothing fundamental though, which is what we were hoping for. We treated the orders as if they were completely new, had never measured them manually, and only relied on what we got from measuring in 3D and simulating in 3D, then straight to factory. Those that have received garments with mistakes will of course receive either new garments, or we'll alter them for them. When all suits have been fitted and reviewed, we'll adjust the parameters of both our algorithms and simulations, and then hope to have a seriously stable product for phase 2 of beta testing, assuming the vaccine(s) turn out to work and let us all resume a more normal life.

For now, I don't have more real-life results to show. Hopefully, the Dutch Government will lift the lockdown restrictions on the 19th of January, which is a week after we expect the remainder of the suits to arrive from the factory. When and if we have updates - good, or bad - we'll update you again. All in all we're still very excited. Had we known what we know now, the garments would've turned out near-perfect.

One last note, in keeping with "a new approach to bespoke" - what we're able to do through the scanning and simulation effort, is to scan the customer, then discuss styling options and fabrics as usual. But once we simulate, we share the result of that simulation with the customer, so he can see what he'll order before it's ever made, and is allowed to make adjustments (any, from length adjustments to complete restyling). We hope this will also solve the "taste" issue - in that we may believe we have a technically correct garment, a customer's taste may differ and he may want to deviate from that algorithmically defined correctness.

The upshot to all of this is that we were able to accelerate our workflow toward contactless fittings which will also enable remote ordering of garments as long as customers have access to a body scanner, some day to be replaced by the lidar technology currently available on the new iphones. We are hoping that the world returns to some semblance of normalcy soon so we can renew our testing and development process quickly.
Good luck! Nice write up. Maybe cover the URL of the Dutch Gerard chap for privacy.
 

Daraven

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Soooo excited for the lockdown to end and to see the results! At the basted fitting I was most impressed with how clean the trousers fell, I have high hopes for this project.
 

radicaldog

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Exciting. I'm in Amsterdam so let us know when Beta2 starts! (Haven't seen my tailor in Italy for over a year, have two jackets in the works but who knows when I'll be able to have a fitting!)
 

jefferyd

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A question: how do you ensure that the customers are in their natural stance and posture during scanning? Because, sometimes, I’ve noticed people get into an artificial posture—one they think is more proper than their natural stance—when being photographed. Or ... since you have a full 3D scan, that doesn’t matter as much?

We face the same challenge when fitting in real life. Right now the best way of working is to get two scans- one in what is known as the A Pose, with arms at an angle, which is easier for rigging the garment in 3D, then another with arms to the side for the actual fitting. Getting the two avatars to morph from one pose to the next adds work to the process but is more accurate. We hope the next generation of body scanners, which we are led to believe is due out in under a year, will take care of many of these issues.
 

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