A good shirt will require as much if not more concentration than a suit.
Yeah I am quoting myself. And I am doing it because it occurred to me to double down on this point.
There are a few very difficult operations in tailoring: making a great back on a jacket, making a good vest, and making a great trouser to name a few. When you have a tailor that can do these things superbly well for you, hold onto them because their skills are rare.
Making a great shirt is every bit as difficult as either or any of these tailoring operations. In fact, it is supremely difficult. And what occurred to me is that the two greatest shirt makers I have known in my life were probably the most sartorially talented people I have ever known. One of them made all of his own clothes as well as his shirts and you should have seen the jackets and overcoats! And he thought making a coat was a breeze. Shirts were a challenge, jackets were child’s play.
And when you think of it, working with thin cotton or linen cloth in the crafting of a perfect 3 dimensional reproduction of a human body that when worn will not interfere with, or mark the garments worn over it, is a masterful accomplishment. I used to have some photos of the fittings these masters did for me, painstaking work that rendered true master works of tailoring, any tailoring.
So I truly want to debunk the myth that crafting a shirt is a simple given requiring a minimum of skill, an undergarment after all, and of little importance. Nothing further from the truth. And that is why so many of you have great clothes and pitiful shirts: its damn hard too make one well. So hats off to the true Masters. My hat is off to them! And I realize what a privledge it has been to have known them and to be served by them.
Cheers