Shopping for men 5'8 or under, NY Times article

[von Rothbart]

An interesting article from today's NY Times Styles Section.

....shoulders tend to be scaled to linebacker dimensions on suits whose labels say 38 Small, where blazers have armholes the size of ****** pools, where shirt pockets float just above the waistband and where belts often wrap around one's waist like a lariat. ....shirttails hang so ridiculously long that short men are sometimes forced to tuck them beneath the crotch in the manner of onesies. Zippers on jeans are so long that waistbands ride above the navel, geek style. Inseams droop so that they leave a wearer with little choice but to roll and cuff like Howdy Doody or else to hack at the hems with the manic vigor of Edward Scissorhands. "Basically it has driven me into the whole bespoke category, as expensive as that may be," said Robert Burke, the fashion director for Bergdorf Goodman, who stands 5-foot-6 and is given to wearing double-vent suits luxuriantly molded to his trim frame. In the industry Mr. Burke is known as a particularly natty dresser. He should be, considering that much of his wardrobe, shoes included, is custom made.

Is it my imagination that even the regular sizes are getting longer and longer?

 

[Kent Wang]

I think the real issue is wider and wider.

 

[johnnynorman3]

" . . . Mr. Au, a genial native of Hong Kong who moved to the United States to study at Brigham Young University in 1959 and who has shrunk a bit from his original height of 5-foot-3."

His original height was 5'3"...???.. I feel bad for his mother.

 

[retronotmetro]

Jimmy Au's may be the longest surviving independent mall store I have ever seen. VH1 sent Flavor Flav shopping for a suit at Jimmy Au's on one of their reality shows. It would have been decent publicity for the store except that someone else on the show complained about being dragged to the "ghetto mall." Not that the Glendale Galleria is upscale, but I've been to far worse . . .

 

[aybojs]

I'm right at 5'8" and I definitely have to agree that length is often as much of or more of a problem than girth.  I'm fortunate in that I am at least proportioned in a lanky manner without stubby limbs, and I am just able to fit in 38R without having to go short, but outside of suits and sportcoats, it's a real hassle.  Length is the main reason that I avoid off the rack dress shirts (let alone when I'm looking for shirts to wear untucked), and it has also made buying jeans a royal pain, especially since I hate the cuffed jeans look.  For the most part, I'm in a pretty convenient spot as far as sizing goes, but if I still have annoyances with height/length issues, I'd hate to imagine what someone 5'3" must have to deal with.

 

[Alias]

I'm 5'4", but here in Asia it's not so bad.

 

[alchimiste]

I'm 5'4", but here in Asia it's not so bad.

Yeah, the problem in Asia is when you are tall. Asian are so short that some "long" sleeve shirts have sleeves ending in the middle of my forearm, buses have less leg room than planes and I keep bumping my head to the top of the door when I get off.

 

[gardel]

aybojs, you can get your jeans hemmed. Some jeans but not all have some distressing at the hem and you'd lose that. I purposely leave my jeans longer than I do my dress pants so the look isn't too fussy. I remember seeing some pictures of John Kerry during the campaign and he clearly was wearing perfectly-tailored jeans. They didn't look right.