1. The Shoulder Into Wall Trick
What it does: Prevents someone from buying a suit jacket or blazer that’s too big
How to do it: Put on the suit jacket, blazer, or sportcoat. With the outside of your shoulder facing a wall, sloooowly lean into the wall. If the shoulder pad strikes first then scrunches up before your shoulder gets there, it’s too big. You risk looking like the jacket is wearing you instead of vice versa. Try a size down. You want a jacket where your shoulder, and the pad (hopefully a slim, minimal pad), strike the wall at almost the exact same time. The less pad overhang the better. Shoulders are key.
Holding up the wall? Nope. Finding shoulders that fit.
2. The Hug Test
What it does: Keeps your torso comfortable and your seams from bursting
How to do it: For shirts, suit jackets, blazers, etc… put the garment on and take a look in the mirror. Fits great, right? Right. Now pretend you’re going to hug someone. If it feels like you’re going to burst a seam and go all hulk-smash, then it’s not a good fit. Try a size up, or, a different brand. Some shirts come with back pleats that help ease movement. Look for those. This is especially useful when you’re getting a jacket pinned up tailoring. Have your tailor pin up the jacket where they’d like to take in the fabric. Do the hug test. If those pins feel like they’re going to rip the fabric, then ease up. And no, don’t try and hug your tailor. That might make things awkward. The air is fine.
3. Curled Fingers for jacket length
What it does: Helps you figure out what jacket length is best for you.
How to do it: With the suit jacket, blazer, or sportcoat on, let your arms hang relaxed at your sides. Curl your fingers as if you were about to grab the handles of a wheel barrow. Your jacket tail should come to rest right in that crevice your fingers have made. If it’s all bunched up, the jacket’s too long. If it’s dangling an inch or so short, it’s too short. Some guys go by the “it should cover your entire rear” rule. But if you have a long torso, you might end up swimming in your jacket. Yet if you have super long arms, the curled fingers method might result in a jacket that’s too long as well. Try both methods and pick whichever works best for you.
The Curled finger method.
4. The fingers for collar size trick
What it does: Prevents strangulation and/or looking like Tony Romo.
How to do it: Button the shirt all the way up and stick a finger or two between your neck and the collar. There’s some debate on this. Some sources claim if you can comfortably fit more than one finger in-between the collar and your neck, it’s too big. Others say two fingers but no more. The goal is to have no noticeable gaps when buttoned, all while not suffocating.
5. Armhole / Handshake test.
What it does: Helps you find a jacket that won’t fight you while you’re wearing it.
How to do it: Plenty of affordable blazers and suit jackets come with absurdly large armholes. Like, flying squirrel large. The lower the armhole dips down on the jacket, the more likely it is to shift and move, as your arms pulls at the body of the jacket. Stand in front of a mirror with the jacket on. Pretend like you’re about to shake someone’s hand. If the jacket raises up and bucks like a marionette with its strings being pulled, then you might want to find a brand with higher arm holes.
Final Tips:
- Wear what you’re going to wear an item with when shopping or getting it tailored.
Looking for a topcoat or trench? Wear a blazer and collared shirt to the store. Getting dress pants hemmed up? Wear a pair of dress shoes, not sneakers, when you head to the tailor. Layers add bulk. Different shoes have different sole heights. Wear dress socks when shopping for dress shoes. Also, it never hurts to wear something that already fits great when you’re out looking for a similar addition.
- Don’t forget about your pants.
A lot of these tricks have to do with the upper body. And maybe we can blame the fact that as men, most of us don’t have a full length mirror in our place. But many a guy has purchased a great suit, got the waist brought in and the arms narrowed, only to leave the pants as they were, and the risk is it could look unbalanced. Most wouldn’t notice, but it is sort of like not combing the hair on the back of your head.
What else? Got any other parlor tricks for finding a great fit? Leave them all below.
I totally concur with the “Wear what you’re going to wear an item with when shopping or getting it tailored” advice. It feels silly to step out of a dressing room in a navy suit and brown Nikes. And wearing your favorite/well fitting clothes reminds you of the standard any purchases should reach. Good refresher post, Joe.
#3 is a fantastic tip. Obviously, there are some differences in length – particularly with regard to the formality of the jacket. The finger curl test is perfect for nailing the jacket length that complements your body proportions.
I wear a 36 usually and JCP had a lot of cool, patterned sport coats this past Christmas that unfortunately only ran as small as a size 38. The sales person saw me browsing and came over a couple times to ask if I needed help, I tried to dismiss her so we didn’t waste each other’s time. She was insistant, however, and onn the third attempt I finally asked her if they had ANY sport coats that were a size 36. We looked, there were none, she offered me some suit jackets that weren’t at all what I was looking for. Finally she goes, ‘let me just see you in a size 38, I don’t think you know your size!” To humor her I put the jacket on, which was obviously much too large, and to my delight the woman expressed loudly, “Why see! You DON’T know your size!!! That jacket looks PERFECT! As long as you do not raise your arms or really move at all. Just keeps your arms down by your side.”
Just bought a couple shirts from the BB F&F sale that are a half inch too big in the collar. Could I possibly shrink it?
Well, who’d actually want to move in their clothes?? Good grief. That story is something. Good on you for being tactful.
Great tips here, but #4 is un fortunately irrelevant to me as I have never found a shirt that comes close to fitting where I can get 2 fingers into the closed neck. I’m lucky if I can just close it without my face turning purple. Best I can do is an XL slim fit, or better an XXL that is a very slim fit. Mostly I just wear a large and leave the collar open.
Do you not purchase shirts by neck/sleeve size (e.g. 16 – 35)?
I find all of these helpful. As a newby who is trying to start dressing like an adult, this is definitely something I will keep in mind to prevent from some random salesclerk or untrained eye from convincing me to buy something that clearly doesn’t fit right. Thanks again!
My neck is 17 1/2″, & my chest is 42″. Basically, my neck size corresponds to XXL, but the rest of my torso corresponds to large. So if I purchase by neck size I am wearing a tent. When I’ve tried to get help in men’s stores they’ve put me in a tent, and said it looked good. I figured out on my own I need to get a slim fit, and size up a couple of sizes. I’ve taken in the sides on my own shirts, but never had one tailored. I think I could get a pretty good fit from a well tailored slim fit XXL. So far I have not found a shirt with a neck labeled 17 1/2 or larger that came close enough to fitting to even be within altering range. You can’t take the chest in if the sleeves look like wings.
Yeah, I have a 16″ neck and a 42″ chest, and I’m lucky enough to have a lot of slim-to-extra-slim shirts fit off the rack. You’re right, though. As long as the neck and shoulders (generally) fit, you can get the rest of that material removed (or darted), and have a well-fitting shirt. Needless to say, this is an annoying added expense.
I’m a 16″ neck and 38 chest, and a 30 waist.
Oh, and 32″ sleeves.
I’m so screwed off-the-rack. I just custom make everything now. Pricey but worth it.
Great tips, gents.
One thing I hate, the perfectly fitting, comfortable collar…only to wash it (per shirt’s directions) only to have the collar shrink slightly, and thus no longer comfortable. So of course, next time you buy it with a larger collar, only to wash it and have the collar NOT shrink. That’s 2 shirts you now have that can’t be worn with a tie. *sigh*
This times a million. Good stuff.
Is the photo in the curled finger test supposed to be accurate? I always keep my palms parallel to my sides, not kipped in like the photo shows.
Interesting note about wearing the right shoes when having the tailor mark for hems. My tailor marks me without shoes on, which seems like it would be the best approach.
There’s hair on the back of my head?!?
Doubt it. Collars rarely shrink.
Well done.
I have a low tolerance for sales associates, especially in department stores (Macy’s always seems to be the worst). If polite “no thank you”-s don’t do the trick, I’ve been known to fake a phone call.
And sleeve length on jackets? There’s a discussion going on in the Threads suggesting a jacket needs its sleeves shortened that looks perfectly fine to me.
What rule of thumb do you go by for proper sleeve length?
I think it looks fine as well. Maybe 1/8″-1/4″ shorter, but definitely not anything to actually spend money to “fix.” My two sport coats and suit jackets hit pretty much exactly where Sandpointe’s suit jacket sleeves hit. It isn’t worth $15-$20 to fix IMO, it would have to be at least nearing the 1″ too long mark for me to chip over the money.
This is a great article, nice work. I often have friends who are just getting interested improving their wardrobe and updating the fits of some of their clothes ask me about fit and what does “the right fit look/feel like”. It was actually surprisingly hard to describe initially, I think it’s more you know it when you see/feel it but these simple tips are excellent.
I was disappointed when I clicked on that pic of Tony Romo. I thought he would be choking.
But I guess I can pick and choose the “and” of the “and/or”.
Dillard’s and Nordstrom are better (depending on location). Neiman Marcus is good, but who can afford that? I always find it best to dress up when I go in. They take me more seriously. But yeah… Macy’s is terrible, and forget abotu JCP if you need knowledgable help.
Last time I went to a NM Last Call store, I had to avoid a very flirtatious woman who could have been my mother’s age.
Ech.
The choking came first. Then he put the shirt on.
The curled fingers used to see if the jacket is too long or short work
fine,. But there´s another test that works even better, it´s called the
thumb test. To do this test put on your jacket and stretch your thumbs
down pointing to the floor, if the jacket ends exactly at the same level
where the point of your thumbs end then you have a perfect fit, if it
surpasses that limit then it is too long, if it ends before that point
then it is too short.