Modern Tailor - Sizing Technique

[johnteachl]

I searched about a million modern tailor postings with no answer to my question so bare with me if this ? was previously addressed on the forum (If so no need to answer, a quick link would be great).

I am ordering my first shirt and would love to hear different techniques to measure ones self. I understand many people add or subtract measurements from areas to compensate for modern tailors way of adding measurements for the slim, normal and loose fit. So any input to make my first go around a success would be GREATLY appreciated,

Thanks in advance for the help guys!

(FYI measuring a shirt that fits great is not an option, I have slim build and have not found a shirt that fits excellent)

 

[musicguy]

Just follow the guide perfectly. Wear well fitting clothes when you do it. It helps if someone else can measure you. The measurement suggestion for the sleeve is wrong though. I just measure from where I the shoulder/arm seam starts to where my thumb starts jutting out (where I want the cuff to end).

 

[imwithtuxedo]

I would recommend not going the body measurement route. This never seems to go well for online MTM.
Take your best fitting shirt, get yourself some small pins and pin the loose parts up and make your shirt fit better. Then measure your shirt with the pins still in. I find it hard to believe that you are considering MTM and you don't have a shirt that would only require a few tweaks to get it to fit great.
On my first order I took my best fitting shirt and adjusted the measurements to what I thought would work out best for a better fitting shirt. I didn't get it exactly right, but that shirt still fits better than anything else I had in my closet. Find a fabric on the sales page that you could see yourself wearing, and order a 'test' shirt based on your guesses of what adjustments should be made.
Use the coupon code: moderntailor20sf and save even more.

Browse through this thread: http://www.styleforum.net/showthread.php?t=137774 and the consensus is that measuring one or more shirts that fit you well is better than the body measurement route.

 

[joegrec]

Originally Posted by johnteachl

(FYI measuring a shirt that fits great is not an option, I have slim build and have not found a shirt that fits excellent)

I have not been able to find a perfect fitting shirt either. But what I did is use a combination of shirts I have that fit well in diffrent areas and take measurements. or if worst comes to worst have someone pin up a shirt you have so that it fits the way you want it and measure it up.

My shirt came out perfect except for the arm hole measurement but I'm pretty sure I screwed that one up on my own.

 

[Don Carlos]

I've recommended this to folks before, but it's been dismissed every time. Nevertheless, here is the advice once again. Get an OTR shirt tailored to perfection by a good alterations tailor. Now you've got one perfect-fitting shirt (more or less). Use this shirt and its measurements as your online MTM template.

This is a much better, and net-cheaper, alternative than the usual trial and error process of dialing in a fit after 2 or 3 orders through the MTM tailor.

 

[jimmyv]

Originally Posted by Arrogant Bastard

Get an OTR shirt tailored to perfection by a good alterations tailor. Now you've got one perfect-fitting shirt (more or less). Use this shirt and its measurements as your online MTM template.

+1

This is what I did too. Get a tailor's tape and take measurements from your newly tailored shirt. From there you can make fine adjustments +/- 1 cm if the shoulders or the armholes aren't quite right. Don't go overboard. Your first shirt will then at least be wearable, even if you want to make a couple more minor tweaks for shirt #2.

 

[Kurtz]

Originally Posted by Arrogant Bastard

I've recommended this to folks before, but it's been dismissed every time. Nevertheless, here is the advice once again. Get an OTR shirt tailored to perfection by a good alterations tailor. Now you've got one perfect-fitting shirt (more or less). Use this shirt and its measurements as your online MTM template.

This is a much better, and net-cheaper, alternative than the usual trial and error process of dialing in a fit after 2 or 3 orders through the MTM tailor.

I also took AB's advice and had one of my ill-fitting shirts tailored to be an online MTM template. This really isn't all that expensive, and once you have a shirt that fits well you can take most of the guesswork out of nailing your fit on the first try.

I still made some minor adjustments from my template shirt (armholes, cuff size, etc), but these shouldn't be too hard to make as long as the shirt fits you pretty well to begin with.

 

[StopPolloition]

I did the measuring off a shirt thing and modified the numbers a tiny bit to make it fit more the way I wanted it to. That was with Jantzen though, and it worked really well. I'm always wary of how people will interpret body measurements. I had a Turkish tailor make me a MTM suit, and it was kind of a disaster. The shirt that was included was also like a garbage bag in size, and when I asked for it to be made slimmer, it was so slim that I could barely button it up. Now I just tell tailors what measurements to make the clothes.

 

[johnteachl]

Thanks guys,

This thread was also very helpful:

http://www.styleforum.net/showthread...=176575&page=7

I think I am going to go with the pin up measurement technique/good fitting areas from various shirts.

One more quick question, anyone add measurements to compensate wash/drying shrinkage?

Thanks again

 

[joegrec]

Originally Posted by johnteachl

Thanks guys,

This thread was also very helpful:

http://www.styleforum.net/showthread...=176575&page=7

I think I am going to go with the pin up measurement technique/good fitting areas from various shirts.

One more quick question, anyone add measurements to compensate wash/drying shrinkage?

Thanks again

I did not add anything for mine as they said that they add a bit to compnesate for shrinkage.

 

[Kurtz]

As long as you cold wash and hang dry there's no need to add any compensation (since they shrink very little and MT adds a little for you).