Why Your Clothes Don’t Fit: A Tailor Secret from the Entertainment Industry

by Ashley Griffin, Stage Directions

So, there’s a reason clothes don’t fit you right, and actors and costume designers have known about it since the dawn of time.

It doesn’t matter what your body shape is. We have all had the experience of going into a store and trying on clothes, and even if you find “your size,” they still don’t look quite right or fit you the way you want them to.

And it’s not because anything’s wrong with you. Listen to that again:

There is nothing wrong with you.

You wanna know the secret that everyone in entertainment knows about getting clothes that fit them like a glove and brilliantly flatter them?

It’s called tailoring.

Since the dawn of clothing, clothes have been custom-made for the person who will be wearing them. Even if you went to a store to get a clothing item, you would show them what you liked, pick out a fabric, they would measure you, and then you would come to pick up your garment when they’d finished sewing it.

The idea of sizing came about probably not in the way you think.

It was because of the military.

War, specifically the Napoleonic Wars, the Crimean War, and the American Civil War (all of which occurred between 1803 and 1865), not to mention the American Revolutionary War in the late 1700s, required unprecedented numbers of uniforms and so full-body sizing systems were developed, making it possible to calculate other parameters based on a single chest measurement. This gradually transformed into the production of ready-made clothing for everyone. It was easier, faster and cheaper.

Have you ever wondered how ready-made clothes are sized? Companies use models called “fit models.” (I’ve been one, and it’s a fascinating experience.) Basically, companies look for people who they believe are the perfect size X based on whatever calculations lead to that belief. They then measure the fit model and make clothes to fit them perfectly. They do multiple fittings and alterations; they send the garment into production when it is exactly right for the fit model.

But here’s the thing: no two human bodies (except maybe identical twins) are exactly the same. Even if your measurements are. So if you’re that fit model, great! You can go into the store you were a fit model for and know that every size X will fit you perfectly. But if you’re not, you may find that a piece of clothing is too short for you, or gaps in places, or is too tight in a certain area.

That’s because that’s how your body differs from that of the fit model.

And that’s not even getting into issues of size inflation, such as the fact that a size 10 is not the same at different stores.

But no one really talks about or teaches this. For example, I have a long torso. I remember going into my favorite store growing up, the store all my friends were buying cute tank tops at, and feeling terrible because all those tank tops looked TERRIBLE on me. I fit them, sure, but they were all made for a fit model (and, potentially, for aesthetics) for someone with a shorter torso.

These weren’t crop tops; they just weren’t made for long-torsoed women like me. When I put them on, they would hit my jeans a few centimeters above my hips and make me look like my waist was non-existent. I kept wondering what was wrong with me because I looked terrible.

But being in the entertainment industry, when I started getting more involved in the wardrobe I wore for shows and film projects, I noticed that not a single actor was wearing a garment that hadn’t been tailored specifically for them. I used to think that this was, again, something bad about me and my body; if I was “right,” they wouldn’t have to alter anything.

But I eventually figured out that that wasn’t it at all.

Every human being is unique, and you look fantastic every time when you have clothes tailored to you. This idea that we’re not “right” if we don’t fit into a LITERAL mold has got to stop.

And you know what? Actors use the tailoring trick in real life for just about everything!

Seriously, do you see photos of your favorite celeb walking down the street in a plain T-shirt that somehow just hangs on them beautifully? Yeah, that T-shirt was tailored to them. Most often, actors (who can afford it) will buy pretty much every clothing item one size bigger and then have it tailored to fit them perfectly.

And, you know, when I started doing that (not with everything! It is expensive) but with particular pieces that I either really loved, or really had problems with the fit, it changed my world about the way I see myself, about the way I wear clothing, and my relationship to sizing.

Almost any good cleaners in your area offer tailoring, and it’s affordable for individual pieces.

A lot of the things I wear in real life have been tailored. Pretty much every item of clothing I’ve ever worn onstage or on film has been tailored to me.

So, trust me… don’t worry about sizing… don’t worry about how an off-the-rack piece of clothing looks on you. If you like something, get it and take it to a tailor. You will look and, most importantly, feel like a million bucks.