Disclaimer: SuitSupply was kind enough to provide this suit for free for the purposes of this review. Huge thank you to Kirsten and Nish for taking the time to chat with us while getting this suit made!
It is no secret that we are big fans of SuitSupply around these parts. Indeed, who in the modern menswear world isn’t a fan of SuitSupply? They are renown (at this point world-over) for offering exceptional quality for the price point, and are, hands down, one of, if not the single best, value for off-the-rack suiting. Whether you are looking for a first suit, or a 12th, you cannot go wrong with SuitSupply. I myself have owned quite a number of suits from them over the years, and can personally attest to the quality and longevity of each. They have all been, in their own way, some of the favorite suits I have ever worn.
So, that is the pre-review review. The one hole I have long seen in their offerings was that they didn’t have much by way of custom offerings. If you did need a lot of tailoring — which is something I always need a lot of — then you were stuck paying for not only the suit, but footing a large tailoring bill as well. Perhaps just as importantly, if you liked, say, their peak lapels but wanted them on a specific fabric, it simply wasn’t an option. With the rise of stores like Indochino, and much better options like Black Lapel or Proper Cloth, it seemed like an oversight that SuitSupply wasn’t seriously getting into this game. Well, now they have. I spent a couple hours hanging out with Nish De Gruiter (VP of SuitSupply US) who walked me through some of the forthcoming changes and improvements to SuitSupply’s lineup, and answered a whole bunch of questions I have had. Let me break it down quickly for you.
SuitSupply now has 3 tiers of offerings. You can, of course, still purchase OTR starting at a new, lower price, of $349 and going up to about $1,000 for their fully canvassed, super high-end Jort line. Most of these options, though, will sit in the $500-$600 range. On the other end of the spectrum you have full MTM. You must go into a store for this, you sit with a specially trained salesperson, and can pick every detail of your suit. Most importantly, they save a measurements profile for your body so you can order from them in the future without having to walk through the same process again. These are suits made specifically to your pattern, and exactly to your pattern. This offering starts at $1,000 and goes up quickly from there as you select higher end fabrics and options. This is something SuitSupply wants to always offer, but, as Nish assured me, is not the right answer for most clients and so is not something they heavily advertise.
What most guys reading this are going to want is the new Custom Made program (click Custom Made at the top of the site). In truth, it’s not that new. It’s been around for a while. But it’s recently seen a whole lot of upgrades and is now being considered a real mainstay of the SuitSupply offerings. This starts at $499 (but goes up quickly), and lets you customize the design, fabric, and fit of your suit. You can pick button type, lining, as well as fit model from one of SuitSupply’s options. It delivers in 2-3 weeks, and returns are still free like always with SuitSupply. But here is the real key: if you go in to a store you are able to adjust certain elements of the fit. So, for instance, I often have an issue with the front rise being too long and causing bunching. Well, no big deal. For my custom made suit they put in that the rise should be adjusted. They also tweaked the sleeve length, jacket length, and waist suppression. And they did this based off an OTR size 38 so we knew exactly how it would come out.
But here is the absolute best part. Once the jacket comes in, any and all alterations are included absolutely free! So, if you, like me, often spend at least $100 on tailoring, it pays at that point to just get a custom made suit in the first place! You pick the fabric, design, can tweak some hard-to-tailor elements out of the factory, and then just pop in to any SuitSupply store, show them your custom made order, and they’ll tailor it to perfection for you free of charge. That is exactly what we did for my suit, and I have to say, the results are quite excellent. It really is a good system they have here.
For most guys, a full MTM suit is likely too much, and requires too much expertise. This Custom Made option (especially in store) allows you to solve any problems too difficult for a tailor, and then take care of the rest once the suit arrives. You don’t need to fuss with patterns or CAD renderings. It’s all simple alterations. And you get to customize the whole suit too!
When you go in store you get to select fabrics and buttons out of books so you know exactly what you’re getting. I selected a dark grey fabric with a subtle checked pattern. It came out wonderfully. I went with the “Havana” fit because of its softer shoulders which suit me better. When the suit first showed up at the store a few weeks later the fit was okay, but needed work. Their tailors pinned me up, and the final result is an almost perfectly fitting suit. You can see the slightest bunching by the left shoulder (I always have that issue), but that is absolutely excusable in anything but a Bespoke garment. The fit here is nothing short of excellent. And the quality, as ever, is superb. Italian fabric, a half-canvassed construction, and an overall fit, finish, and attention to detail that you feel the second you put it on.
My only complaints are that I wish the online ordering process (which is super clean and well designed, by the way) allowed for the measurement adjustments so you don’t need to go to a store for that (though this would admittedly be super difficult to pull off well), and, more importantly, more customization options! Right now if you want peak lapels on an unstructured jacket, too bad. Or patch pockets and peak lapels? That’s a no-go. You must select from one of SuitSupply’s pre-designed fit options. However, Nish assured me they will be rolling out new customization options soon, so this should be something we can do starting pretty soon.
All in all, I have hardly a bad thing to say here. You’re getting excellent quality, tons of customization options, and essentially free tailoring for somewhere between $500-$700. That is as close to a steal as you can get when you consider you’re getting SuitSupply’s typical quality and excellent customer service to go along with it. The result will no doubt be one of your favorite suits, and it will be for good reason. SuitSupply’s new Custom Made program absolutely has our stamp of approval.