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  1. #1
    Weaboo of the House of Weave
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    Where should I buy a suit? (Fashion thread?)

    Surely someone here is a fashion guru or something relatable. I see no thread even remotely comparable.

    I have no viable suit for real serious events. Only one I was given for a wedding years ago that I have long since grew out of both in beer consumption and, somehow, my arms growing 3".

    I have a budget of around $500 not including the accessories like the shirts and pants.

    The tl;dr version of this post would be: should I go somewhere other than the generic mall stores? Macy's, Dillards, JC Penney, etc.

  2. #2
    Kevin Chang
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    Do you want just one really good one, or would you rather get 3-4 passable ones? I've heard good things about https://www.combatgent.com/ for every day suits

    If you want just one really good suit, try going to an outlet mall and looking for something at a brand store like Hugo Boss. The selection can be sparse, especially factoring in size, but you can get a good deal. Generally the timeless classics won't ever hit the outlets though, like your generic flat blacks or charcoal greys, but you might find a nice blue or lighter grey or a darker suit with a weaver/pattern that never sold.

  3. #3

    Sweaty Dick Punching Enthusiast

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    Do you have a Suitsupply near you? If yes, go there. You wont regret it.

  4. #4
    The Shitlord
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    I don't know enough about the suit scene, but I think Men's Warehouse is mid/low-end and it sounds like that's what you're looking for.

  5. #5
    Shimmy shimmy ya shimmy yam shimmy ya
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    Just go to Men's Wearhouse if you're going for a typical style. Most of the time they have a 2 for 1 special and a ton of cheap shirt/tie combos. I wear a suit pretty much 70-80 hours a week so it's my go to shop. I guess you can go to an outfitter to get a non-generic suit, but I doubt anyone would even notice. I spend most of my days either at the pentagon or the whitehouse and everyone is either rocking a suit from nordstrom or jc penny lol.

  6. #6
    Sea Torques
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    For $500, go to macy's or something along those lines and buy something for about $300 that fits very well in the shoulders and jacket length as well as a relatively close fit to what you want overall (i.e. already relatively slim fitting if that is your look)

    Then you're off to finding a really good tailor (the ones in retail stores are generally meh and charge too much) and have you sleeve length, sleeve width, pant leg and width, and jacket width adjusted so that you look like a million bucks with a relatively cheap suit. It is all about having a good tailor. The off the rack suit should fit close-ish to what you want because extreme alterations can mess up a suit

  7. #7
    Sea Torques
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    Additional tips:

    No black suits. Grey, charcoal, and navy are the staples and guys should start there before experimenting.

    No dark shirts. White or light blue should again be where you start.

    Tie color should always be darker than your shirt (which it is, because your shirt is light blue or white, right?)

    Brown/walnut shoes look great, even with grey/charcoal suits. This is where you can experiment a bit even for your first suit, shoes are awesome.

    If you want to look like a real dope gentleman, match your metals. Set of matched watch, belt buckle, and shoes buckles is an easy way to impress.

    Accessories: tie bars, pockets squares, and lapel pins. Pick no more than two of these to wear. I usually wear at least one (clean white pocket square a la Don Draper looks v good).

    Sorry for the double post.

  8. #8

    Matching or complementary tie and pocket square is the best.

    Different stores in the UK, but general advice about outlet malls holds true. Fortunately I seem to be built along the same lines as Marks and Spencer's suit sizes so I've not had to have too many alterations done.

    If you're ever in East or South-East Asia, getting a handmade tailored suit is definitely worth doing. One of my best suits which I wore for work until the trousers were worn through fit me like a glove and was picked up for about £50/$80 in Nanjing about seven years ago.

  9. #9
    The Shitlord
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gabai View Post
    Additional tips:
    this is the kind of stuff i do actually know.

    match your leathers, too. wearing black shoes? black belt. brown shoes? brown belt.

    White and blue are "business" colors. White is a power color. it's more formal, more assertive. Black suits are the same way. black suit with white shirt is as alpha as suits ever get.. and very, very formal. you're not gonna want a black suit, though, since this is for a wide variety of events. i prefer charcoal grey.

    Blue shirt is acceptable for pretty much every occasion. Your shirt and tie should complement each other, with the tie, as gabai mentioned, being darker. so a light blue shirt with a dark and light blue tie with silver striping or something would be great for most occasions.

    Don't be afraid to wear weird color shirts. As long as you have a tie to go with it, you'll look awesome. I have some purple and maroon shirts that look fucking amazing. But you also need to match your shirt color to the type of event- for interviews and shit, you want a business color, so white or blue. for weddings and theater and stuff like that, you can wear whatever colors you want.

    Wear funky socks. You can match to your shirt, or you can wear clashing colors, it doesn't matter except in the most ultraformal of occasions. Socks are where you get to do whatever you want, and you get bonus points for confidence by rocking funky socks, if anyone sees them. Your socks can be a conversation tool, too. "Let me see your socks! Oh my god, that's funny!"

    For accessories, I like pocket squares and a tie chain. Tie chain keeps my tie out of my food and looks nice doing it, and pocket squares just look fuckin nice. Match your pocket square to your tie and shirt.

    Oh, another thing about business colors in business: generally, you're gonna want to go with blue. power colors like white are for The Boss. If you're not The Boss, it comes across as... ambitious? more assertive? idk, hard to explain, but it's called a power color because it ties in to authority.


    edit: also, as long as you follow the matching rules, pretty much any color you wear is going to look awesome. so be confident. stand up straight, shoulders back, move with purpose. wearing a suit is as much about posture as it is about the actual suit. confidence can make the difference between shabby-looking and fuckin sharp. the best suit in the world will look shabby on someone who is slouching.

    Also, bitches love confidence. And by bitches, I mean literally everyone.

  10. #10
    Kevin Chang
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    A lot of people shit on black suits because it's considered ultra formal and many people think that they would never use them except for funerals, but black is perfectly acceptable for evening events. Plus a lot of darker charcoal greys are virtually indistinguishable, so you can probably get away with it during daytime too if you want. Fit of the suit matters much more than being one or two shades darker.

    White and light blue are considered the standard for dress shirts in business/professional context. Other colors are fine in other contexts, but if you go with a darker color shirt to get something with striping or another pattern (black is the exception to this). Flat dark blue or dark red dress shirts are a hard look to pull off most of the time.

  11. #11
    I'm almost as bad as Mazmaz
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  12. #12
    Atheist Douchebag.
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  13. #13
    Relic Shield
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gabai View Post
    For $500, go to macy's or something along those lines and buy something for about $300 that fits very well in the shoulders and jacket length as well as a relatively close fit to what you want overall (i.e. already relatively slim fitting if that is your look)

    Then you're off to finding a really good tailor (the ones in retail stores are generally meh and charge too much) and have you sleeve length, sleeve width, pant leg and width, and jacket width adjusted so that you look like a million bucks with a relatively cheap suit. It is all about having a good tailor. The off the rack suit should fit close-ish to what you want because extreme alterations can mess up a suit
    This is the best advice.

    A $300 suit that's been properly tailored will look better than an off the rack $500 suit.

    Sent from my VS880 using Tapatalk

  14. #14

    Sweaty Dick Punching Enthusiast

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    Quote Originally Posted by Zetanio View Post
    Suitsupply is the fucking truth.
    Thank god I'm not alone... was losing my mind at these Men's Warehouse recommendations.

    Also, for accessories might I recommend www.thetiebar.com/

  15. #15
    D. Ring
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    Don't be afraid to wear weird color shirts. As long as you have a tie to go with it, you'll look awesome. I have some purple and maroon shirts that look fucking amazing. But you also need to match your shirt color to the type of event- for interviews and shit, you want a business color, so white or blue. for weddings and theater and stuff like that, you can wear whatever colors you want.
    This. Every single time I wear that royal purple dress shirt or something else that's an odd color with the right tie, *everyone* has something good to say: From colleagues to like..senior level people above me. Also, depending on your skin tone, there are certain colors you can pull off well.

    This is the best advice.

    A $300 suit that's been properly tailored will look better than an off the rack $500 suit.
    Also truth: One of the first things I did when I dropped weight some years ago was get some old suits tailored. I also went to Men's Wearhouse to get the suits I wore to some finalist interviews. ..People commented on them both time ("Wow, nice suit, where'd you get it?")

    ..Got offers for 2 out of 3, so hey.

  16. #16
    D. Ring
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    ..And neat, we're getting a SuitSupply down the street from me.

  17. #17

    Men's Warehouse has done well with my suits.

    I have a lavendar shirt, light blue, and white shirts that I wear.

  18. #18

    well..go to the mall..walk in the first clothing store, if nothing there, go to the second one and do it till you find something you like..

  19. #19
    a p. sweet dude
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    If you get anything that isn't custom-made, I'd take it to a tailor (not the in-store one) along with any shirts you buy to have alterations made. A well-fitting suit is the best thing you'll ever own. The important off-the-rack fitments are the shoulders and sleeve/pant length. It'll be way cheaper/easier for a tailor to take things in.

    And in addition to all the other tips, one I didn't see mentioned was matching your metals. Gold belt buckle? Gold tiebar/watch. Silver belt buckle? Silver tiebar/watch. If your watch has a leather band try to match it to your shoes/belt.

  20. #20
    Atheist Douchebag.
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    Quote Originally Posted by steph33 View Post
    well..go to the mall..walk in the first clothing store, if nothing there, go to the second one and do it till you find something you like..
    Thanks for contributing.

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