The Complete Guide To Bespoke Shirts – Fabrics, Cuts, Collars & Styles

What is a Bespoke Shirt?

Unlike buying shirts off-the-rack, which are mass-produced and designed based on standard general measurements, bespoke shirts are made from scratch, to perfectly fit your measurements. In other words, no fabric is cut until you’ve been measured. From materials, construction, and style to stitching, buttons, and monogramming, with a bespoke shirt, you choose every detail. Bespoke shirts are custom-designed to perfectly highlight your personal tastes and physical features while hiding any imperfections.

How it Works: Initial Consultation

A bespoke shirt is expertly designed, crafted in-house, and made to last much longer than mass-produced shirts. Therefore, the bespoke process is not a rushed one. At Collars & Cuffs, our authentic bespoke shirts are a testament to quality and craftsmanship. Our six-step experience is designed to ensure your order exceeds all of your expectations.

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Bespoke tailoring is about more than the clothes. It’s also about the experience. During this process, you’ll meet with your personal concierge to ensure your bespoke shirt or suit is designed to meet your specific tastes and preferences. Additionally, your concierge will introduce you to the different fabrics and styles to get your order started. Requiring up to 30 hours from start to finish, a bespoke shirt is handmade and will take approximately 2 weeks to complete. During this time, the client will be invited for fittings where he will try on the shirt while it’s being made.

Dress Shirt Patterns

To ensure your bespoke shirt fits perfectly, our master tailors will take your precise measurements to create a dress shirt pattern. They will measure your height, chest circumference, waist circumference, seat circumference, shoulder width, shoulder-length, arm length, neck circumference, neck to waist length, and many more. These measurements will be used to create a custom pattern on a trial shirt and measured on your body in the initial trial before cutting and creating your dress shirts.

How should a dress shirt fit?

Generally speaking, your dress shirt should meet the following in terms of fit:

– Shoulders: The seam where the sleeve attaches to the body of your dress shirt should hit close to the top of your shoulders.

– Collar (Neck): Regardless of the collar type, you should be able to button the collar easily with room for two to three fingers to fit between your collar and neck.

– Chest: A properly tailored shirt should fit comfortably around the upper back, chest, and under the armpits to allow a full range of movement. Any extra bulges or tugging fabric indicate your shirt is too large or too tight (respectively).

– Body/Waist: Dress shirts should taper from the chest to the waist, following the contours of the body to create a clean line with no excess fabric.

– Sleeves: When buttoned, the cuff should fall at the base of the thumb.

– Length: The shirt hem should be long enough for you to comfortably wear your shirt tucked without the fear of it becoming untucked. If the shirt will be untucked the length should be made shorter by about an inch to 2 inches depending on your body size and personal preference. 

Styles of Bespoke Shirts

During the design phase of your bespoke experience, you’ll determine all of the features that will enhance your final design. From fabric type, color, cut, to the number of pockets, buttons, threading, and any other embellishments you might like to add to your design, every inch of your tailored shirt is designed and inspired by you.

And of course, we’ll take your exact measurements to ensure the perfect fit!

– Fabric: With over 1,000 of the finest cotton fabrics and style options to choose from, you’re guaranteed to find something that meets your specific tastes.

– Embellishments: Once you’ve selected your fabric and color, you’ll have a host of choices to further customize your shirt, including buttons, thread, monogramming, and much more.

– Collars: With so many choices it can feel overwhelming choosing the right collar for your body and fit. From point collars, narrow point collars, semi cutaway collars, and cutaway collars to tab collars, club collars, wing collars, eyelet collars, band collars, and button-down collars, we’ll help you choose the perfect collar style.

– Cut: Although your bespoke shirt will be hand-crafted to fit perfectly, you’ll have a wide range of styles to choose from, including:

– Classic fit with relaxed armholes, more room in the chest and shoulders, fuller sleeves, and a relaxed waist.
– Modern fit with relaxed arm holes, more room in the chest and shoulders, fuller sleeves, and a tapered waist.
– Slim fit with higher armholes, slim chest, tapered sleeves, and a slim waist.
– Ultra-slim fit with highest armholes, narrow chest, tapered sleeves, and the slimmest waist.

Collars & Cuff Bespoke Experience

At Collars & Cuffs, we take pride in combining decades of craftsmanship with a truly immersive and one-of-a-kind sartorial experience. Every bespoke piece we design and craft reflects our legacy of the highest quality tailoring imaginable. Designed and crafted by master tailors with over twenty years of experience, our bespoke suits, shirts, jackets and trousers are entirely customizable to your personal taste, body, style, and personality. The result is an impeccable, truly one of a kind design.

For your safety and convenience, we offer both on-site consultations by appointment or a traveling tailor service where we attend to all your wardrobe needs from the comfort of your home or office.

Contact a member of our team to schedule your complimentary appointment.