Button Stance and Gorge Line

[Forrester]

I have been lurking on the LL for quite some time, but just recently joined and would appreciate any advice that members might have on a suit that is currently being commissioned (navy SB, 3/2 roll-through).

In his book, Manton states that a higher buttoning point is more flattering to someone who is either short or overweight (of which I am both). My tailor says the opposite, arguing that a lower buttoning point (around the level of the belly button) creates a longer vertical line with the lapels. My current OTR suits button around 4" above the navel and I think this might be a bit too high. I've been standing in front of a mirror for hours playing with the lapels on one of my suits (my wife thinks I'm nuts by the way), and I can see both points of view. I'm tempted to split the difference as this would cover my belly a bit, but give a slightly longer vertical line than I have now.

Manton also states that a high gorge line is flattering to people like me. My tailor thinks it's irrelevant and a matter of personal taste. Try as I might, I can't even recognize a high gorge line when I see one. I've been scrutinizing pictures on the LL as well as the suits of people I see on tv or the street, but the lapels always look to be at roughly the same height to me. Does anyone have pictures of suits with high, low and average gorge lines that they could post, so I could see the difference?

Thanks in advance for your help.


Doug

[alden]

Doug

Do yourself (and your wife) a favor and listen to your tailor. He is the one who can see you and most likely knows what he is doing.

Here is an explanation. Its a question of cause and effect. The higher button point is often the result of having the gorge placed higher on the chest. If the gorge is high on the chest and the button is low, the lapels start to look very long and the section of the coat below the button looks abbreviated. (That is one of the few criticisms I have of the Rubinacci cut of coat.) This creates an imbalance. The cure is to raise the button point to a position that gives the lapels slimming length but also provides balance below the button.

On the other hand, if you have a standard gorge position and a high button point, the lapels look short and the area below the button too long. This combination will put 30 lbs on a scarecrow. It widens the look of the coat.

Ideally you need someone with a good eye to cut a goodly amount of lapel length from a higher than normal gorge and a button point about half an inch above your natural waist. Your tailor is that someone.

Here is Toto (who was five feet tall) with an average gorge height.



In these photos the gorgeous higher and very flattering to Toto's figures.





After seeing these pictures, that you should not share with your wife, but happily share with your tailor if you desire great work from him, you will, like most men choose a higher gorge.

Cheers

Michael

[Forrester]

Thank you Michael. Your explanation about the buttoning point makes a lot of sense.

I agree that the last 2 photos look better than the first, but I still can't quite put my finger on what constitutes a high gorge. The high gorge lapel does seem to be closer to his shoulder than the average one, but when I draw a line between the center of the notches (I can't figure out how to upload this) on the first picture, the line comes to a point just below the bottom of his tie knot. If I do the same with the last picture, it seems to fall exactly at the bottom of the knot. I know that I'm somehow looking at this incorrectly, but I'm not quite sure what I'm missing.

You can be sure that I won't share any of this with my wife. I know that many people don't particularly like John T. Molloy, but I received a great piece of advice from his book back in 1979. I had just graduated from college and gone through dozens of job interviews feeling very uncomfortable in a suit chosen by my mother. Molloy said that the biggest mistake men make is letting women choose their clothes. I took that advice to heart and have never let a woman choose my daytime attire since.

Thanks for your help. I can't begin to tell you how much I've learned from reading the posts here.


Doug

[alden]

HI Doug

Take a tape measure. Place one end deep in the fishes mouth, the point where the collar and lapel meet. Run the measure up to the shoulder seam at a ninety degree angle. If the measure is 10-10.5 cms it is a high notch. If the measure is 12-12.5 cms or so it is an average notch height, if the measure if anything greater than 14 it is on the low side.

I have always been happy to let women dress me, if they are particularly good at it. I just never let them choose my clothes.

Cheers

Michael

[hectorm]

The high gorge lapel does seem to be closer to his shoulder than the average one, but when I draw a line between the center of the notches (I can't figure out how to upload this) on the first picture, the line comes to a point just below the bottom of his tie knot. If I do the same with the last picture, it seems to fall exactly at the bottom of the knot. I know that I'm somehow looking at this incorrectly, but I'm not quite sure what I'm missing.

Forrester, a couple of things that add up and you might be missing:
First, Toto´s stance is very different in the pictures. He´s almost crouching in the first photograph but he´s pulling back in the others (may be for looking taller in good company). Get him in neutral stance and the gorge lines would show a much larger difference in their placements.
Second, Toto´s jacket has notch lapels in the first picture, and peak lapels in the others. That makes it difficult for comparing "centers of the notch" because with peaked lapels you don´t really have a notch but a slit where collar and lapel kiss. If you measure the second jacket from where the outlines of collar and lapel meet, then the difference between gorge line levels is larger again.
In any case, we are talking very few inches here (which notwithstanding make a flattering difference for the body type).

[JCH]

Interesting. The following no doubt reveals again my empty headedness. I have neither thought about it much nor taken a tape measure to my jackets for this before, but by Mr. Alden's outline it appears that on the few a checked my notches are high. Nevertheless I also noticed that for example a city suit contrasted with a Harris Tweed odd jacket in that the Harris notch while still high is a couple of centimeters lower than the city suit's. When I get a chance I will ask my tailor what his thinking is along these lines. But until then I am wondering if it is conventionally so for something like the Harris. (Or maybe the shoulder seams aren't quite in the same place. Maybe the lapels and buttoning points are ever so slightly different too. I’m not sure. Both are two-button.) In any event, assuming a two-button cut (or maybe I shouldn’t), is this type of thing sometimes or often different, the one from the other, for city, country, or rus in urbe jackets while of course staying under the balance rubric mentioned by Michael? Or is it just that a tailor however beloved may have argued with his wife in the morning before cutting.

[Forrester]

Thanks Michael & Hectorm. I know I'm being overly picky here, but should I be measuring at a 90 degree angle to the bottom of the coat or the bottom of the notch? There isn't a big difference either way I measure it, but I'm kind of a precise mathematical type. Also on my current OTR suits, the buttoning point (SB, 3/2 roll-through) seems to fall precisely at the midpoint between the notch and bottom of the coat. Is this the type of balance I should be looking for or is it something that the tailor normally just eyeballs?

Doug

[alden]

Doug

Ninety degrees from bottom of notch to the shoulder seam.

[NJS]

Ahem! Michael, The 'gorgeous' are indeed higher aren't they! Was that a deliberate pun or a Freudian slip? Either way, quite wicked
NJS

[hectorm]

Take a tape measure. Place one end deep in the fishes mouth, the point where the collar and lapel meet. Run the measure up to the shoulder seam at a ninety degree angle. If the measure is 10-10.5 cms it is a high notch. If the measure is 12-12.5 cms or so it is an average notch height, if the measure if anything greater than 14 it is on the low side.

Michael, you put me to work this morning with your measuring rules. I felt like a little boy with a new toy going through all my bespoke notch lapel jackets. AMAZING RESULT: absolutely all of my suit jackets are high notch while many of my heavier odd jackets are either average or low notch (light odd jackets are high notch again). Too much of a coincidence: these are all bespoke jackets by 4 different tailors for which I didn´t bespeak explicitly the notch levels (may be indirectly I did through other related instructions). This makes me think that JCH´s question above, regarding some relation between notch level and type of jacket, might not be as "empty headed" as he said it was. I will have to figure it out.

[marburyvmadison]

Pardon this 'ignorance' but I need some clarification on the 'gorge'. Assuming the jacket is a notched one. Is the collar the top part from the notch, and the lapel the bottom part (all the way till the button stance)?

So, in other words, high gorge = high notch? Or not?

*Suddenly hit me. When one says 'the point where the collar and lapel meet', does one refer to shirt collar, and jacket lapel?



"Take a tape measure. Place one end deep in the fishes mouth (What is the fishes mouth?), the point where the collar and lapel meet (Is this the notch?). Run the measure up to the shoulder seam at a ninety degree angle. If the measure is 10-10.5 cms it is a high notch. If the measure is 12-12.5 cms or so it is an average notch height, if the measure if anything greater than 14 it is on the low side."

[hectorm]

Is the collar the top part from the notch, and the lapel the bottom part (all the way till the button stance)? high gorge = high notch? Or not?

Yes and yes

*Suddenly hit me. When one says 'the point where the collar and lapel meet', does one refer to shirt collar, and jacket lapel?

Not the shirt collar but the jacket collar.

What is the fishes mouth?

I think it's an elegant way of describing the V-shaped cut off the lapel (actually I believe it's more cut off from the collar cloth than from the lapel's).

[marburyvmadison]

That helped. So why don't people just say that the jacket has a high notch, as opposed to high gorge?

[hectorm]

That helped. So why don't people just say that the jacket has a high notch, as opposed to high gorge?

Maybe because high notch could give some the impression that you are talking only about a notched lapel jacket and exclude peak lapels (which BTW have a notch too).
I recommend that you do a quick search (key word: "gorge") inside the LL and you'll get enough material on the topic as for a fortnight of sleepless nights.

[Rowly]

I like a high button stance which, I think, suits my body shape allowing for a good amount of waist suppression giving a tailored look but without losing elegance. For guidance, I have looked at many suits from on-line photos to the most up-market Rtw. and the best that SR has to offer, in the flesh. I have concluded that given the high gorge from the high button stance, there is some loss in the elegant sweep of the lapel. A high gorge can make the lapel look short. By raising the notch as high as possible an optical illusion can be created which suggests more length in the lapel. I have found that the most elegant compromise is where the notch is level with the points of the shirt collar, or very marginally above it (too high will make it look like a footballer's designer outfit - so beware). I find this approach to be consistent in all the top SR houses. I have not verified this with any SR Tailors, it is my own personal analysis and of course, I could be wrong. I would be keen to hear other views on the subject. I hope this helps....Rowly..