Man clothes: where do you buy them?

Can't help you I'm afraid - mine's the drill & I've only washed it once.

If only Old Town had a shop in London :(

They regularly(ish) pop up in Spitalfields. Probably worth sending them an email. Labour & Wait have some limited stock, I think?? You can also return stuff if you order it in a standard size (ie. without alteration).

Excellent, I'll check out Labour and wait and send that email. Been putting off getting trousers for months so will do some work in getting what's right for me, for a change

i am (embarrassingly) wearing an entirely uniqlo outfit right now, except for my shoes and undershirt

― max, Friday, 22 January 2010 01:29 (eight years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

feeling this post

Just checked:

Our X-over dress, Unity Suit, Stanley jacket and Vauxhall trousers are on sale in a limited range of fabrics at Labour & Wait, 85, Redchurch St., London E2.

Unity suit, xyzzz! Go full Mao.

I feel like it’s really hard lately to find decently made, reasonably stylish clothing that looks right for an almost 40-yr-old but isn’t in that $200 heritage craft shirt category.

I bought a Laboureur jacket from this garden centre for £59 a few months ago, although they seem to have put the price up a bit now: https://www.greatdixtershop.co.uk/PBSCProduct.asp?ItmID=18433439

Idk how it is where y’all live but those 200 dollar craft build shirts and pants are on sale at smaller (non-brand exclusive ie NOT filson etc) all the time. Generally a half season (temperature-wise; not style-wise) begins but if you are in a temperate clime perhaps it is 4 u

I used to like stopping into Old Navy for basic stuff because it was dirt cheap, but they're expensive now (well, relatively). Bad move imo, the quality is absolute crap and people know it. F'in hoodie $35 and it feels like garbage. Better hoodies at H&M for $25

Just checked:

Our X-over dress, Unity Suit, Stanley jacket and Vauxhall trousers are on sale in a limited range of fabrics at Labour & Wait, 85, Redchurch St., London E2.

― djh, Monday, 1 October 2018 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Unity suit, xyzzz! Go full Mao.

― woof, Tuesday, 2 October 2018 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Cool - really busy this week, hopefully I can get there at the weekend I want to look as good as The Chairman!

I forget that people on here like Old Town.

Anyway, has anyone bought a [French work wear brand] Vetra jacket? I've got a vague idea I've tried one before and they were tiny sizes but the website I am looking at says "true to size". Any ideas?

ohh I think I had something similar with Vetra a while back - there was a linen jacket I tried on that was too small; then when I hunted online it seemed like lots of their stuff didn't seem to exist above about a French 50 (ie UK 40).
But then I look here and I can see XLs with chest measurements to match.

target

I buy shirts, lots of shirts, from whatever stores sell band t-shirts and/or novelty t-shirts, and wear the same 5 pairs of jeans/shorts every day until my ass rips a hole in them

then I wear them 6 more months

Thanks woof. It seems unlikely that a product available in XXXL is, um, usual sizing.

Learn to sew is good. But probably takes both time and space to do though. But great skill to have if you get the option

Can help create garments you can't otherwise find.

I buy Old Navy jeans when they're on sale, and just pick up t-shirts and hoodies along the way when needed from various places. On the rarer occasion that I need shirts with buttons, I usually go to Burlington.

I over thought the whole sizing thing to the point of missing out on the size I needed but (UK-ers) there's some heavily discounted Vetra stuff, here:

https://www.northern-fells.com/collections/sale/products/vetra-5c-short-dungaree-wash-cotton-twill-work-jacket-jade?variant=31668891680817

Those shoulders on that shirt look kind of narrow. I find workwear to be a bit of a crap shoot regarding sizing. I have to wear shoes with steel toecaps at work and different brands can vary drastically between oversized and undersized. My current pair are by Arco and are a UK 10 because they don't do half sizes and I wear a 9 1/2 usually. But when they were delivered it turned out Arco are on the oversized end of the scale. So it's like walking around in steel toecapped clown shoes. I've got used to them now but the first couple of days I was accidentally toepunting stuff.

Also add to that "is it going to be too big or too small" category: boilersuits/overalls and hi-vis vets in XL that are too small to fit over a L sized lightweight rain jacket.

hi-vis vests

hi-vis vets sounds like James Herriott joined the Blue Man Group.

i bought two pairs of speedos for the beach.

I think I mentioned this on another thread but I had good luck recently with Marine Layer short sleeve button shirts (one hemp and one sort of lineny cotton). They are targeted to my demographic (exurban dads who don't want to completely let go of pathetic attempts to be "cool" but also get that it's a bit pathetic and don't want to try too hard), they fit well, they're well made.

dads of instagram

A sixteen year old has asked for "a cool t-shirt" for Xmas. I know it's subjective and what they think of as cool is going to change the answer but ... any hints?

they're kind of dumb, but I like these:

https://i.pinimg.com/474x/1c/18/2c/1c182c80c8b51fedbd46f706dde02b66.jpg

I got an ad for some goodlooking band and music tshirts on FB, but I haven't seen what teh actual shirts look like or if tehy are actually more real than images on a web[age. But god, they have some nice ones if they are legit.
https://www.cuptees.com/collections/3d-full-print-msd-collection/products/msd-bitches-brew-all-over-shirt
https://www.cuptees.com/collections/3d-full-print-trc-collection/products/trc-mr-fantasy-all-over-shirt
https://www.cuptees.com/collections/3d-full-print-rch-collection/products/rch-hallellujah-i-love-her-so-all-over-shirt
https://www.cuptees.com/collections/3d-full-print-tas-collection/products/tas-animalism-all-over-shirt
https://www.cuptees.com/collections/3d-full-print-xds-collection/products/xds-the-slider-all-over-shirt
https://www.cuptees.com/collections/3d-full-print-jea-collection/products/jea-after-bathing-at-baxter-s-all-over-shirt
are a few of them, each band represented there has possibly another 5 or 10 designs on the site. & if they're not real would be a good idea to duplicate what the image suggests as a real shirt.

https://image.uniqlo.com/UQ/ST3/us/imagesgoods/428166/item/usgoods_00_428166.jpg

Where would you buy a suit that wasn't for a wedding/christening/funeral? (UK)

Also, strangely panicked that Old Town is closing.

Isn't a suit that you'd wear to a wedding/christening/funeral just the same as any other suit?

Funny, I just saw some recommendations somewhere else. Something called Suitsupply, something called Indochino, something called Nicholas Joseph, and something called Balani. Dunno what the prices are, or where these places are located. I saw other people suggest (dunno how seriously) that if you want a nice suit, it could weirdly be cheaper to fly to Vietnam or Thailand and get something custom there.

You don't need to do that. There are tailors based in Singapore and Hong Kong who travel around the West for business. You meet them, they show you their samples & take your measurements. They go home, make you your suit and mail it to you. You get a made-to-measure suit for the price of an off-the-peg one.

Where do you find these
Nomadic tailors

There's lots of them, search Hong Kong trunk shows.

Also, strangely panicked that Old Town is closing.

so it looks like they’re closing their shop and just taking orders from existing customers? (and reducing their range).

There's currently a waiting list to *place an order*, distinct from the wait for the clothes to be made.

My understanding was that they're retiring at the end of the year though that may have changed?

no, i think you’re right on further googling :(

They have been saying for a while that they've struggled to find staff locally.

Oh, I'd missed that bit. I'd had a weird hope that someone might be able to throw some money that way to keep *local staff* employed still. Well, when I say someone, I was thinking Celebrity Old Town Wearer Monty Don.

Reframed question: where would be your second favourite place for buying a suit in the UK be after Old Town?

Drakes, if I could afford it.

That's a good shout.

Caveat - I am out of the game - it's 8 years since I thought hard about suits and casual investigation lately has made me feel like prices at off-row tailors like Chris Kerr have got a bit too much for my cost-of-living and deterred me from digging deeper.

That said

At Drake's prices for coat and trousers I'd think about a travelling tailor as mentioned earlier, one of the MTM tweed companies that cut overseas like tweed addict or stepping up to sort-of-bespoke at Cad and the Dandy or made to measure at Gieves or another row tailor. Choosing your cloth does make the suit feel yours.

Off the peg, something like Paul Smith & take it to an alteration tailor.

For that agricultural old town feeling… I dunno, it feels like putting together matching separates - could you do that with Vetra or someone?

tho can you say a bit more - what's it for, what kind of cloth/cut are you picturing & what's your budget?

Mix and match at carrier company?

They do suits

https://www.carriercompany.co.uk/products/boiler-suit