We’re excited to announce that we’ve made some updates to our custom shirt sizing algorithm. Here are the updates, what they provide, and how they will affect custom sizes created prior to the updates.
Tenth Inch (0.1″) Increments for All Dimensions
We’ve changed the increment in which you can adjust all shirt dimensions from 0.25” to 0.1”. This gives you even more control over the fit of your shirt. While 0.1” increments may seem overly specific to some, we think this finer control will be a big help for perfecting dimensions like cuff around and sleeve width.
If you have a saved size that has some dimensions set to values ending in .25” or .75”, these values will not change and you can continue to order in those sizes. Going forward, however, any adjustments made to dimensions with values ending in .25” or .75” will change their measurement increment to 0.1”.
Note: This update does not change the fundamental precision with which the shirts are made. Our sewing tolerances remain the same (and in most cases are 0.25”).
Displaying Front Length, Button Spacing, and Bottom Distance
An important factor in getting the right untucked fit is the distance from the bottom button to the bottom of the shirt. In the past this distance was not specified explicitly, and you were left to guess what would happen as you adjusted the shirt back length and top button placement.
With today’s update, we’re now doing everything we can to make these dimensions extra clear by displaying these values on your saved sizes page.
- Front Length is the measurement from the base of the front collar band to the bottom of the front shirttail
- Button Spacing is the distance between each button (not including the collar button and the 2nd button) measured from button center to button center
- Bottom Distance is the distance between the center of the bottom button to the bottom of the front shirttail
For your convenience, these values are controlled automatically. The update enables you to see them clearly, and see how they change as you make changes to other settings like Shirt Back Length, Neck Posture, and Top Button Placement.
More Consistent Bottom Distance for All Shirt Lengths
Some customers will recall that prior to this update, at certain shirt lengths, increasing the shirt length by just 0.25” would cause the Button Count to increase and the Bottom Distance to become significantly smaller. In practice, we found that Bottom Distance plays a critical role in a shirt’s fit, and having it change in an unpredictable way when other small changes are applied has made getting a perfect fit more challenging.
Today’s update includes changes to maintain a more consistent Bottom Distance for all shirt lengths. We’ve achieved this by adding a third option for spacing between each of the buttons on the shirt front. While buttons were previously spaced at either 3 1/8” or 3 3/8” apart depending on other size settings, in some cases we will now space the buttons up to 3 1/2” apart.
As with many other aspects of our shirt sizes, the Button Spacing setting is controlled automatically, with the primary goal of producing the optimal space between the bottom button and the bottom of the front shirttail.
Changes to Button Counts and Button Spacing
These updates affect the number of buttons on the front of the shirt and spacing between those buttons. For some saved sizes, ordering from today onward may result in slightly different Button Count, Button Spacing, or Bottom Distances versus ordering with the same size prior to the updates. In general, these changes will be minimal and an improvement. We don’t suggest customers adjust their saved sizes to try to compensate for this.
Aligned Front and Back Shirttails for Every Posture Setting
The major change here is that we’ve updated how we adjust a shirt’s pattern when a posture adjustment is applied. We’ve changed this such that the front length of the shirt will always match the back length of the shirt, regardless of posture adjustment.
Prior to the update, if you applied a posture adjustment we did not adjust the shirt front length. This had the advantage of avoiding any surprise changes to the number of buttons on the front of the shirt or the distance to the bottom of the shirt. It had the negative effect, however, that the front of the shirt would not align perfectly with the back of the shirt. For example, if you had Neck Forward 1”, the front shirt tails would hang 2” lower than the back shirt tails. With our updated size system, the front and back shirt tails will always align perfectly.
How to Update Your Size If You Have a Neck Posture Setting
If you’re going to reorder with a saved shirt size that has a posture adjustment and you don’t make any changes to it, you may notice that the shirt’s front length comes out different from that of your previous shirts. For that reason, we would suggest the following adjustments.
- If your size has Neck Forward 1”, we suggest increasing Shirt Back Length by 1″
- If your size has Neck Forward 0.5”, we suggest increasing Shirt Back Length by 0.5”
- If your size has Neck Back 1”, we suggest decreasing Shirt Back Length by 1”
- If your size has Neck Back 0.5”, we suggest decreasing Shirt Back Length by 0.5”
These changes are particularly important if you’re wearing your shirt untucked.
How Can I Tell If My Saved Size Will Change with This Update?
Due to practical user interface factors it can be difficult to present this information clearly, but here is the best way to compare a saved size you are planning to order with, with the dimensions and button counts of an order you had placed prior to this change.
- On the Order History page, for orders placed before or after the update, you can find Button Count, Button Spacing, Front Length, and Bottom Distance in the shirt size according to the logic that would have been used to make the shirt.
- On your Saved Sizes page, however, all saved sizes will show Button Count, Button Spacing, Front Length, and Bottom Distance according to the new logic. The potential confusion is that order–based sizes from before the update will show the newer values if viewed on this page.
To tell if your shirt size is changing, or how it’s changing, you can compare the Button Count, Button Spacing, Front Length, and Bottom Distance from an old order on your Order History page to the same values of the size used for that order on your Saved Sizes page.
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