The Hong Kong Tailors Thread

[freshmen]

I spot this on one of the Chinese blog, this is from his weibo. He is also from Hong Kong now station in Shanghai.

 

[luminance999]

Has anyone tried any of the tailors in Hollywood Centre, Mong Kok?

 

[originaljy881]

Stay away from Il Sarto in Central.

I just picked up my suit today and I haven't worn it out yet. I am not complaining about their quality since my suit has not been worn yet.

But I am really pissed off by the sales guy. There are three sales people there:
1) a lady in her 30's
2) a young man in his 30's
3) older guy in his 50's

I was served by the older guy. All I can say is that his attitude is absolutely terrible. Every time I made a request, he would ridicule me.

For example, I though the sleeve for the dress shirt was too long - and it was quite obvious it was way too long. He would say "What? No way. REally? That's the standard! Nobody wears it any shorter" And then he would say "it's no problem, we can shorten it...it's no big deal."

If it's a custom suit, should the tailor not adhere to our requests? Should we be ridiculed for every request we make?

During the last "fitting", I tried on the suit. Before he even looked at it, he said "It fits, get the bag ready." I was thinking to mysef "You didn't even look..."

Seriously, the guy is absolutely terrible. Stay away from this place!!!!!! What a horrible experience.

By the way, the jacket sleeves are too long. But he rushed me out of the store. Before I left, he said I can come back and shorten the sleeves.

I don't want to see the guy anymore....

 

[Fishball]

I don't know why this thread was full of posters who are just posting 1 or 2 posts, and all their posts are on this thread!

 

[add911_11]



Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

I spot this on one of the Chinese blog, this is from his weibo. He is also from Hong Kong now station in Shanghai.

That looks really nice albeit the very high button positions. I also like the inner glasses, this is not something I see in Hong Kong everyday. They are very popular amongst the old style Japanese bespoke tailors. Hey Fishball, show us some of the deal breakers you owned, given your apparent authority in the HK discuss forum.

 

[Fishball]



Hey Fishball, show us some of the deal breakers you owned, given your apparent authority in the HK discuss forum.

Deal breaker? You better ask Classic Car, hahaha ;P

 

[add911_11]



Deal breaker? You better ask Classic Car, hahaha ;P

After a chat with clasaic car, I admit I truly underestimate the power of group buy in HK....

 

[Fishball]



After a chat with clasaic car, I admit I truly underestimate the power of group buy in HK....

haha

 

[borbor]

Fresco baby!!

 

[GBR]



After a chat with clasaic car, I admit I truly underestimate the power of group buy in HK....

 

[GBR]

...

That looks really nice albeit the very high button positions. I also like the inner glasses, this is not something I see in Hong Kong everyday. They are very popular amongst the old style Japanese bespoke tailors.


"Inner glasses"? What do you mean - the additional pocket in the facing which I think is a Japanese convention?

 

[add911_11]

...

That looks really nice albeit the very high button positions. I also like the inner glasses, this is not something I see in Hong Kong everyday. They are very popular amongst the old style Japanese bespoke tailors.


"Inner glasses"? What do you mean - the additional pocket in the facing which I think is a Japanese convention?

yes you are right. Thx for the correction.

 

[GBR]



yes you are right. Thx for the correction.

Thanks, I have not yet tried one but like you I like this idea - I think I will incorporate it in the future.

 

[Isolation]

Thought I'd post about my experience at Moda Republic, although I really wish I could give more as I only got 4 shirts from them. This is me wearing one of them the other day. As you can see I haven't had the chance to iron it and it was an entire day of wear so it's quite wrinkly. I know the picture isn't saying much, I can only say that the fit is good and it feels nice to wear.




Here's another outfit from another day but the shirt doesn't actually show much, but whatever:





I got the waistcoat from Jantzen btw, which I really quite liked.

Here's another shirt, again you don't see much unfortunately:





Earlier I posted a bunch about Jantzen so I'll use them as benchmark. I will say that Moda's shirts is as good or better as them at a slightly higher pricepoint. I suspect that it's better, as some of my Jantzen shirts have small problems with loose strings and such, to a degree that is not a problem at all, but still noticeable (not a problem to just snip some loose bits off and usually they are on the inside, etc. I have not noticed this in Moda's shirts but I honestly have only worn them in a couple of occasions. The farbic possibly is better as they have told me. This is true for at least some of the materials, but this could be unfair as I'd be comparing the more expensive fabrics I got with Moda with the worse of the Jantzen offerings, and which are cheaper (350 as opposed to 500, both quite cheap really but when you compare it in % is something of a difference).

For those interested in my quick personal opinion on "which is better" and what not, I'd say that I'm likely to use both tailors for shirts in the future. I like having a larger array of fabrics to choose from, and if in the future I decide that I prefer one over the other I will mention it. I will say that the slightly price difference factors into this somewhat, so hey.

Also I'm interested enough that I want to see more of Moda's offerings, and I plan on getting a suit made by them and a wasitcoat next time I get the chance, and when I do I will post some pictures and thoughts.

Lastly I want to mention the customer service. I want to note that I've been invited specifically by their representatives on this site. On one hand I want to thank them a lot for their help/messages (more on that later) but on the other I want to say that it's somewhat unfair to compare the attitude they take with a customer whom they know will voice their opinions on the internet, with the attitude Jantzen took with me as a rando who walked in. Again I want to say again that my experience with Jantzen (despite some negatives experiences from other posters) was largely positive. While they were very busy and seemingly brusque, they've in where it counts, been pretty good with their service, willing, not rude (just rushed), and are willing to give useful input and help with styling choices. I enjoyed my relationship with them.

And it is with this in mind that I say that Modas has good service. Chris and Alex in particular were helpful with my questions via email, and after I had left HK I emailed them to ask for a somewhat less common fabric color (hot pink, duhhh) they were very willing to help me search for it, and when they were unable to find it from their usual sources, were willing to seek out less familiar sources, and even looked up some other OTR sources.

I will say however that on my FIRST trip here, a bit devious or just lazy, I went in without mention that I was contacted on the forums to see how they treat a normal customer walking in. They were polite and good, but admittedly not quite as forthcoming with help as later on, mostly because they were quite busy with several customers. I will add that the person attending me didn't have as good English as the others who helped me later (Alex/Chris), who spoke fluently and were very friendly.

Moda's price is I believe 400 or 450 and up (forgot which), whereas Jantzen is 350, and at the 350 point there are I think quite a few decent shirts I've had made and worn quite often, so it's not like it's just trash. Moda also charges 50 extra for thicker MoP buttons, and they used plastic ones as default. I like the plastic, it's nice, but I do prefer MoP, and when you put the price of the shirt in perspective an extra 50 HKD need to be accounted for. Their reasoning for the price is that they use better MoP than other companies, presumably Jantzen as a notable competitor. I'll be honest, I don't care too much about the thickess of the buttons. I actually like buttons even thinner than the Jantzen ones, which I quite like already, and I actually DO think the thick buttons make it a bit hard to button, but that's purely a personal preference I am sure most people prefer these ones.

But all in all I think it's possible to get nice shirts I want to wear often at a cheaper price at Jantzen than Moda, this is the fact. There are however, more than enough reasons for me to get some other shirts from Moda as well.

 

[add911_11]

i start to like the idea of a burgundy or jockey red blazer.