Suit pocket flaps, or not?

[LARon]

Do you prefer your jackets to have flaps, or not? Why/not?

 

[Soph]

Originally Posted by LARon

Do you prefer your jackets to have flaps, or not? Why/not?


Sportcoats for sure, sportcoats look like suit jackets without those dandy pockets and/or bolder designs.

Other considerations are your height, and whether you want to appear shorter or taller. Pockets put slighly lower than the lower button hole and without pocket flaps along with cuffless pants will definitly make you look taller/thinner and vice versa.

I personally like ticket/cash pockets:
1. they are useful and quite practical 2. they send a message that this jacket has got a little extra.

 

[edmorel]

I am developing a real love affair with patch pockets, which I would assume are considered more casual than flapped or jetted pockets but I just like them. I have them on all my sportcoats and I would like to get a suit with them.

 

[Cantabrigian]

If you go for patch pockets on a suit, I think it really has to be very obviously Neopolitan-ly styled.

Personally I much prefer flaps on suit pockets (minus the chest pocket) though I am neither particularly tall or thin.

 

[edmorel]

Originally Posted by Cantabrigian

If you go for patch pockets on a suit, I think it really has to be very obviously Neopolitan-ly styled.


Yep, I'm thinking Isaia, Borrelli or the like. Interestingly enough, I am not crazy about the patch chest pocket on a suit.

 

[LARon]

Originally Posted by Cantabrigian

Personally I much prefer flaps on suit pockets (minus the chest pocket) though I am neither particularly tall or thin.

Does this mean you don't like chest pockets or that you don't like flaps on chest pockets (which I've never seen anyway)?

 

[Soph]

Originally Posted by edmorel

Yep, I'm thinking Isaia, Borrelli or the like. Interestingly enough, I am not crazy about the patch chest pocket on a suit.

I concur, unless the suit is strictly casual wear, then maybe.

 

[itsstillmatt]

Patch chest pockets for linen only imo.

I love patch pockets and have them on several suits.

 

[whoopee]

I like flapless patch pockets on summer suits and blazers. I think the chest patch works only for blue sport coats, and even then should be done delicately, lest the left side of the jacket be too cluttered. I am wavering between flapped patch pockets (with bellows) and flapless patch on a medium weight tweed suit project.

In regards to the original question, short of formal wear, always flaps on my besom pockets.

 

[lawyerdad]

I strongly prefer flap pockets on hip pockets. Purely an aesthetic preference. I also may have been influenced by the fact that here in L.A. I have seen far too many poorly-constructed (and poorly worn) Armani-ish suits with flapless pockets. This is especially so when people are in the habit of putting cell phones, wallets, etc in these pockets, causing them to frogmouth open.

 

[Cantabrigian]

Originally Posted by LARon

Does this mean you don't like chest pockets or that you don't like flaps on chest pockets (which I've never seen anyway)?

I prefer a welt chest pocket even with patch lower pockets. I've seen the patch chest pocket done well on some blazers, sportcoats and linen jackets but I've seen it done poorly much more often.

Even on the most rustic of tweeds, I don't think I'd ever opt for a flapped chest pocket.

 

[Will]

My city suits are mostly without flaps. Welted pockets on country suits are usually flapped. Patch pockets on country clothes are a mix of flapped and unflapped.

 

[Tomasso]

Originally Posted by LARon

flaps on chest pockets (which I've never seen anyway)?

 

[itsstillmatt]

I agree 100%.

Patch pockets are difficult to cut well. When you have one front and center like a chest patch, you will notice if it is not really great.

Alden wrote something about this on the London Lounge once about how difficult patch pockets are to do well in general. I prefer them to be a bit rounded and smaller at the top than the bottom.

I do not like much of what Borrelli does, but they cut a great patch pocket. Anybody looking to have a coat made with PP should visit a Borrelli shop.

 

[LARon]

Originally Posted by Tomasso

Leave it to Tomasso -- always has the right photo/sound patch ready. Yes, I have seen these. Do people still wear such jackets? Aren't they really more for fox hunt jackets? Have they ever really caught on with Americans?