Guides
Ready to wear, or cut to your measurements?
The same design, two ways to buy it. What each one actually gets you, and how to tell which one you want before you order.
29 July 20264 min read
Every design on this site can be bought two ways: stitched in our standard sizing and shipped this week, or cut to your own measurements through Silai. Neither is the better one. They answer different questions.
Standard sizing is a block, not a guess
Our XS to XXL run on one house block — a relaxed shoulder, a straight shirt, a full-length sleeve — with two to three inches of ease over the body measurements in the size chart. If your bust, waist and hip land within one size of each other, the block will fit you the way it fits the photograph.
It also fits a deadline. Ready to Wear leaves the studio within 48 hours because the piece is already made; nothing is waiting on a tailor's table.
Measurements are for the body between two sizes
Most people are not one size. A 38 bust with a 32 waist, a longer arm than the block allows, a shirt length that has to clear a particular trouser — these are the cases where a standard size can be made to work but will never be right. Silai is for those, and for anyone who has already had to have every shirt they own altered.
It takes seven to fourteen days for most orders, and the alterations after it are free, for as long as you own the piece.
How to decide in one minute
Take the size chart. If one row is within an inch of you across bust, waist and hip, order that size and let the ease do the rest. If two rows are fighting over you, send measurements — we cut the shirt to the larger and the trouser to the smaller from a single order.
If you cannot measure yourself
Post us a shirt that already fits you well. We copy it seam for seam and send it back with the new piece. It is the most accurate set of measurements anyone can give us, because it is not a set of numbers at all.
