Suit Alterations: What Can Be Changed, What Cannot, and What It Costs

Suit Alterations: What Can Be Changed, What Cannot, and What It Costs

A man usually arrives with the suit over his arm and the question already half answered in his own mind. The jacket pulls across the back. The trousers pool over the shoe. He wants to know whether it can be put right, and what that will cost.

A great deal can be changed. A few things cannot. The line between the two is not where most people expect, and knowing where it falls saves money.

What an alteration genuinely achieves

Almost everything below the shoulder is open to a tailor. These are the changes that earn their keep.

Trouser length. The most valuable hour anyone spends on a suit. The hem sets the break, and the break sets how the whole leg reads. Bring the shoes you mean to wear, because a quarter of an inch matters.

Trouser taper. Trousers can be slimmed from the knee down, or in a gentler line from the thigh where the leg is cut full. This is the change men notice most in a mirror and name least often when they walk in.

Waist in or out. Trousers can be taken in or let out at the back seam, and a jacket at its side seams, but only as far as the seam allowance permits. Most ready-made trousers carry something like an inch and a half either way, occasionally two. Once the cloth in the seam is used up there is nothing left to give, and that is the honest ceiling on altering a suit for weight gained or lost.

Jacket sides and waist suppression. A jacket can be taken in through the side seams and the back seam so that it follows the torso instead of hanging straight from the shoulder. This is the difference between a jacket that looks borrowed and one that looks yours. Taken in greedily it strains the front and pulls the vents open, so the limit is worth respecting.

Sleeve length, from the cuff or from the shoulder. Shortening from the cuff is the quicker route and suits most jackets. But a sleeve tapers towards the wrist, so taking much off the bottom also narrows the opening, and a working buttonhole or a turnback cuff is lost. Shortening from the shoulder means unpicking the sleeve from the armhole, taking the length out at the sleevehead and setting the sleeve back in. It keeps the cuff and the buttonholes and costs more time. Which way we go depends on the jacket.

Collar gap. A collar standing away from the back of the neck is often, though not always, improvable. Where the cause is surplus length in the back balance, the collar can be lifted and reset and the gap closes. Where the cause is a shoulder slope or a posture the pattern never accounted for, we can reduce it and we cannot erase it, and we would rather say so before you pay than after.

What no alteration will fix

Some things are not faults of finishing. They are drafted into the pattern before a piece of cloth is cut. A good tailor anywhere will tell you the same.

Shoulder width and the shoulder seam. Where the seam sits is a decision made on paper. Moving it inwards means removing the sleeve, recutting the shoulder, reshaping the sleevehead and setting the sleeve back in true. That is rebuilding the top third of a jacket. It can be done. It is rarely worth doing.

Armhole height and shape. A high, clean armhole is what lets you raise your arm without the body of the jacket lifting with it. One cut low and wide cannot be raised, because raising it means recutting the front and the sleeve drafted to match it.

Jacket length and balance. Shorten a jacket from the hem by more than a touch and the pockets and the buttoning stance sit wrong against the new proportion. Balance, the relationship between front length and back length, is set at the draft to suit how a particular man stands. It is not a hem job.

Lapel width. Recutting a lapel means opening the front, the canvas beneath it and the collar it runs into. At that point you are making a new jacket out of an old one.

The chest canvas. In a full canvas jacket the canvas is the shape. It is moulded by hand so the chest holds a little life in it. No alteration adds shape that was never built in, which is why two jackets of the same measurements can hang differently.

To check your own suit against all of this first, our guide to how a suit should fit sets out the eleven things to look for in a mirror.

What it costs, and when altering is the wrong answer

Alterations here are $80 an hour, charged on the time the work takes. Most jobs take an hour or less: a hem, a taper, a waist, a sleeve. Turnaround is about one week. We alter garments we did not make, and the detail is on our suit alterations page.

The part worth saying plainly is this. A heavy restructure runs into hours, and hours add up past what some garments are worth. If a jacket needs its shoulders narrowed, its armholes raised and its length changed, the bill can exceed what the suit cost, and at the end you still have a jacket drafted for somebody else. When we think that is where a garment is heading, we say so and you keep your money.

Sometimes a man is better served by a suit cut for him. A bespoke two-piece begins at $1,795, full canvas and made by hand, and every garment we make carries unlimited fittings and one year of complimentary alterations, because a suit settles on a body over the first months and ought to be adjusted as it does. The work is described under custom suits in Los Angeles, and the figures are on our bespoke suit cost page.

Questions we are often asked

How much do suit alterations cost in Los Angeles?

At Mr James, $80 an hour, charged on the time the job takes rather than a fixed price per item. A hem, a taper or a waist is usually an hour or less. We quote after seeing the garment on you.

Can a suit jacket be made smaller in the shoulders?

Not in any way we would recommend. Narrowing a shoulder means rebuilding the top of the jacket. The shoulder is the one measurement to get right when you buy, because everything else can be adjusted around it.

How long do suit alterations take?

About a week. If you have a wedding or a date to meet, tell us when you book and we will say honestly whether it can be met.

Can you alter a suit you did not make?

Yes, whoever made it. We look at it on you first and say what is worth changing.

Is it worth altering a cheap suit?

A hem and a taper on an inexpensive suit are money well spent. Rebuilding one is not. Fused jackets in particular do not take kindly to being opened up, and the hours a serious restructure takes are better put towards a garment cut for you.

Coming in

Bring the garment, the shoes you wear with it and a shirt whose collar you like, and we will look at it together. You can book a time here, or telephone 310-503-3592 and we will find one. We are at 221 Culver Blvd, Playa del Rey, CA 90293, open Monday to Sunday by appointment with forty-eight hours' notice, free parking front and back. Whichever of us is in, Robb or Ben, will see you himself.