Would you rather make a shirt that looks like it costs $300 or a cheap looking one? Short of going to a fancy men’s store and looking over the details of men’s shirts, how would you know the difference? I tripped over a good newsletter for men, The Gentlemen’s Gazette, whose mission is: “help men to look and feel their best”.  While looking for some information on making shirts, I found one of their articles about what constitutes a man’s expensive shirt. Since I, and many others, am making tailored shirts these days, I thought I’d read it and see if it could add anything to my sewing repertoire. Heck, if it’s good enough for men then it should be a piece of cake for women.

I found some really good information that I will break down into 2 posts. The original article wasn’t long, but to get in all the details, with comments, it would be too long for just one.

Did you know that a bespoke, Bond Street-type shirt can cost around $600 (Choke, Cough!). Frankly, I can’t tell the difference between a $300 and a $40 shirt, but that’s because I did not know where to look. Thanks to Sven Raphael Schneider, founder and CEO of The Gentleman’s Gazette, I do now. Many sewers are making shirts these days and if you are going to all the trouble to make a custom tailored shirt, you may as well make a good one. You will want to review these seven (7) details outlined by Raphael in his newsletter, and create a shirt that’s worth closer to a $600 Brioni shirt from Saks Fifth Avenue than a $30 special from Target. (This article assumes you are using good fabric, because that’s the most basic item of a well-made shirt.)

Element #1: Matching the pattern
This is the first one because it is so obvious. “If the maker of the shirt was paying attention and went to the trouble to match the shirt pattern, chances are the rest of the shirt is also higher quality.” I don’t necessarily agree with this because I bought a shirt from Old Navy that had a perfectly matched plaid, but I also bought one from Nordstrom Rack that was a mess. (I was in a hurry, saw the shirt on the rack, liked the plaid and grabbed it without even looking.  It’s now my painting, housework, haircolor shirt)  In any case, make sure your plaids, stripes or patterns match.

Element #2: Stitching and Stitch Density
This is interesting detail because I never thought much about it. The more expensive the shirt, the denser the stitching, so that a shirt from Target may have only 3-4 stitches per cm, a high-end shirt will have 8 – 10. You do not want your shirt to have a greater density than 10, however, because it can destroy the fabric. Note: this rule of thumb does not necessarily hold true for open weave summer shirts. These too have lower density stitching by necessity

Another detail regarding the stitching is its consistency. When making the bottom hem where the edge is round, the stitch should be a consistent distance from the edge. That has been a big problem for me. Do you have trouble with this?

Now here’s one that surprised me. “A quality shirt will always have single needle stitching”. I always thought shirt side and arm seams were double seams. According to Raphael, the single seam gives the shirt a “cleaner” look. In addition, because the fabric and thread are different materials, the double seams pucker after washing and no amount of ironing can get them smooth again. Have you ever noticed this on shirts, how the seams pucker? This is an easy way to spot a less-expensive shirt and something to keep in mind when making yours. (And I went to all that trouble to double stitch last year’s Christmas shirts because I thought it was the right thing to do. Grrrr. but I do prefer the double seam pucker on casual shirts.)

Element #3: Collar and Cuffs
A lower end shirt typically has stiff, fusible interfacing in the collar. This is not to say you can’t use a fusible interfacing if you prefer a stiffer collar, but higher end shirts use something a little softer (like muslin?, organza? or the shirt fabric like David Page Coffin? ) to make the collar more comfortable on your neck. (The article did not specify, so these alternatives are just a guess.)  In some cases, like for casual shirts, there is no interfacing at all. Shirts with no interfacing in the collar and cuffs are more time consuming to maintain. Ironing them can be a real pain. Hint: unless you iron your shirts, do not take a non-interfaced shirt to the dry cleaners. They take too much time to iron properly, and you never know if the cleaners will do it right.  How do you typically interface your color and cuffs?

Calvin Klein Shirt – Fusible Interfacing Bubbles

One problem I have had with iron-on interfacing is that between the wash and the hot iron, the interfacing sometimes shrinks differently than the shirt fabric creating many little bubbles. Grrrrr. (This happened on a Calvin Klein shirt I bought and I was mad.) I have tried pre-washing my fusible interfacing, by briefly and gently swishing it in warm (not hot!) water and then hanging it to dry. I have never had a problem using this method and I hope this procedure eliminates any bubbles for you too. I have heard experts say however, that preshrinking interfacing is a bunch of hooey and not needed at all. If you prewash your shirt fabric, you don’t have to preshrink your interfacing, because the bubbling is due to poor fusing and not shrinking. Judge for yourself. Do you pre-wash your interfacing?

Element #4: The Yoke
It used to be that the shirt yoke was split in half because most people have one shoulder sloped differently than the other. Now however, shirt makers do not consider this unless it is a very high-end bespoke shirt. If you do have different shoulder slopes, remember that the shoulder seam is a dart, so you can adjust it a bit for the difference. (You don’t want your shoulders appearing to be obviously different, so adjustments should only be small)

Here’s where I will end today and then we can pick-up on buttons, next time. Of course buttons are a very important shirt element because they are so obvious. We’ll talk about button composition, shank vs. no shank, and handmade vs. machine made buttonholes. Another important element of an expensive shirt is the sleeves and armholes, and finally, we will look at shirt gussets. ‘Till then, thanks for reading and please leave a comment about your shirt making experiences.

Cheers,