Custom Suits for Tall and Big Men in Los Angeles
If you are tall, broad, long in the arm or heavy in the chest and light in the waist, you already know what the shops do. A jacket that reaches your wrist is a tent across the body. A jacket that fits the chest stops short of the hand. A trouser that fits the seat gapes at the waist. Nothing is wrong with you. The problem is that ready-made clothing is cut for an average, and the further you sit from that average the less of the garment is actually yours.
Mr James is a bespoke house. Every garment we make is cut from a pattern drawn for one person, made full canvas, and sewn by hand by Max, the house atelier, in Southern Brittany, France. We have been doing this since 2010 and have been in Los Angeles since 2015, in Playa del Rey since 2021. We do not offer made-to-measure, which is the adjustment of an existing block, and that distinction matters a great deal if your proportions are not what the block assumes.
Why off the peg fails at the edges
A ready-made suit is built on a drop, the fixed difference between the chest measurement and the waist measurement. Most makers work to a drop of six or eight inches. If your own drop is twelve, you buy the chest and then hire somebody to remove four inches from the waist, which moves the side seams, narrows the armhole and pulls the vents open. If your drop is two, you buy the waist and live with a chest that pulls across the front button.
Height is worse, because length is not applied evenly. A long man is usually long in the leg and in the arm but not proportionally longer in the body, or the reverse, and a "long" size simply adds to everything at once. Short and regular sizes do the same in the other direction. There is a fuller explanation of what 38R, 40S and 42L actually mean in our journal, and the short version is that they are three points on a single curve that most bodies do not sit on.
A bespoke pattern has no drop and no length category. The chest, the waist, the seat, the shoulder slope, the arm and the leg are each measured and each drawn, and the relationships between them are whatever yours happen to be.
What we change for a tall frame
Length is the obvious part and the least interesting. These are the decisions that actually make a tall suit look right.
Button stance. The front button sits at the natural waist, and on a long torso that is lower than a standard pattern puts it. Getting it right is most of what makes the jacket read as proportioned rather than merely long.
Jacket length against leg length. The skirt of the jacket should finish where it covers the seat, and on a tall man with long legs that point is reached before a long-size jacket would stop. Cutting the body to the proportion rather than to the height keeps the leg looking long instead of making the jacket look like a coat.
Lapel and pocket scale. A narrow lapel on a broad, tall chest looks stingy. We widen the lapel and raise the gorge a little, and a ticket pocket can help by giving the long front of the jacket a horizontal line to break it up.
Trouser rise. A long body needs a higher rise, otherwise the waistband sits on the hip bone and the crotch hangs low. A proper rise also means the waistcoat on a three-piece can reach it without being cut absurdly long.
What we change for a broad or heavy frame
Shoulder slope and blade room. Broad shoulders are rarely level. We measure each side and draw each side, and we add room across the shoulder blade so the jacket does not bind when you reach forward. This is the single most common fault on an altered off-the-peg jacket, because a tailor working on a finished garment cannot add cloth that was never cut. How a shoulder is built, and how to judge one, is set out in suit shoulder construction.
Waist suppression that follows you. Rather than taking a standard body in at the sides, the shaping is drawn into the front darts and the side seams from the start, so the jacket comes in where your waist is rather than where the pattern assumed it was.
Front balance. A full chest or a forward stance needs more length in the front panel than in the back, or the jacket rides up at the front and the lapels fall open. This is set at the pattern stage and cannot be corrected afterwards with an iron.
Trouser seat and thigh. Athletic thighs and a full seat need their own measurements and usually a deeper rise, a slightly wider thigh and a clean taper below the knee. Done properly the trouser does not pull across the seat when you sit and does not billow when you stand.
Vents and armholes. A higher armhole gives more movement, not less, and double vents let the jacket release over a fuller seat. Both are cut, not adjusted.
Cloth that helps
Cloth does real work on a larger frame. A mid-weight worsted with some body holds a line better than a soft, light cloth that clings. A clear-finish worsted and a plain weave are kinder than a high-shine or a loud check. Darker grounds recede, and a chalk stripe or a fine herringbone draws the eye vertically, which helps a broad chest more than any cut can. In Los Angeles heat an open weave, a fresco or a high twist wool will breathe while still standing away from the body, which is exactly what you want.
We work from the English and Italian mills, including Drago, Zegna, Holland and Sherry and Loro Piana, and we will put the books in front of you and talk through weight before pattern. Cloth is also what the commission is priced from, and we are straightforward about that at the table.
How the commission works
The consultation runs one hour and is free. We take around thirty measurements and three photographs, front, side and back, because photographs record posture and stance in a way a tape cannot. You will meet Robb or Ben; a client always meets one of us. We talk through cloth, silhouette, lapel, pockets, lining and trouser details, and we are happy to tell you when we think an idea will not flatter you. Buttons are part of that conversation, and suit buttons in horn, corozo and mother-of-pearl are described in the journal.
From there, four to twelve weeks, depending on the cloth and the time of year, because every garment is made by hand. Fittings are unlimited and included, usually three counting the consultation, and that matters more at the extremes of size than anywhere else, because the first fitting on an unusual frame almost always teaches us something. One year of complimentary alterations on garments we made is included with every commission.
If you would rather not come to us, we come to your home or office across the Los Angeles area. If you want the longer read on the fit problems themselves, our article on custom suits for tall, big and athletic men goes through them in more detail, and how a suit should fit gives you eleven checks you can make in a mirror before you speak to anyone.
Where to find us
We are at 221 Culver Blvd, Playa del Rey, CA 90293. It is a storefront, no suite number, with free parking front and back. We are open Monday to Sunday by appointment, roughly nine to six, and we ask for forty-eight hours of notice. Call 310-503-3592, book a fitting, or take a slot in the diary at calendly.com/info-robbp/bespoke-mr-james-fitting.
There are good tailors in this city and we are glad to share it with them. If you want to understand the wider offer first, start with custom suits Los Angeles, read what we say about bespoke suit cost Los Angeles, or see what to expect from a custom tailor Los Angeles.
Questions we are often asked
Where can a tall man get a suit that actually fits in Los Angeles?
A bespoke house is the honest answer, because the problem for a tall frame is proportion rather than length, and length is the only thing a long size adds. At Mr James the jacket length, button stance, rise, sleeve and lapel scale are each drawn for you from your own measurements. We are at 221 Culver Blvd in Playa del Rey and we also travel to your home or office anywhere in the Los Angeles area.
Do you make suits for big and tall men?
Yes, and there is no size range, because there is no size. Every garment is cut from a pattern drawn for one person and made by hand in our atelier in France, so a fifty-four chest with a long body and a thirty-six waist is simply a pattern, not an exception. We make for men and for women, and we do not keep a block that anybody has to fit into.
Why does the shop have to take so much out of the waist of my jacket?
Because ready-made jackets are built to a fixed drop, usually six or eight inches between chest and waist. If your own drop is larger, the only way to make the chest fit is to buy up and then cut the waist down, which moves the side seams, tightens the armhole and pulls the vents apart. A drawn pattern has no drop, so nothing has to be removed afterwards.
Is a bespoke suit worth it if I am an unusual size?
It is where bespoke makes the biggest visible difference. A man close to the average can get a decent result off the peg with a good local tailor. A man who is six foot five, or who carries a forty-eight chest over a thirty-four waist, is paying for alterations on every garment he buys and still not getting a clean shoulder or a sitting collar. The commission is priced at consultation and follows the cloth, and we will tell you plainly what we think you need.
Do you offer made-to-measure for larger sizes?
No. Made-to-measure is the adjustment of an existing block, and it is a reasonable service, but it is not what we do. Every Mr James garment is fully bespoke and full canvas, drawn from scratch. For an unusual frame that is the whole point: there is no block to argue with.
How many fittings will I need?
Usually three, counting the free one-hour consultation, and they are unlimited and included either way. On a larger or longer frame we often use the first fitting to learn something the tape did not tell us, so we would rather see you an extra time than send a garment out early. Turnaround is four to twelve weeks from the consultation.
Can you alter a suit I bought elsewhere?
No. We no longer take alterations in as a separate job, and we do not work on garments made elsewhere. One year of complimentary alterations on garments we made is included with every commission, and we go on looking after our own work after that year.