I’ve spent more time thinking about waistcoat buttons than I probably have about my own retirement savings account. And that’s not hyperbole for humor’s sake—I stood in my basement in front of a mirror for three consecutive weekends buttoning and unbuttoning a $9 thrift store find deciding whether or not the bottom button is supposed to stay open as a rule or just something rich people invented to lord over you at weddings. I sent my mom a text. She replied “why do you own that”, which is fair. But also not helpful. Here’s what I learned after overinvesting in all of this myself.
Buying a good waistcoat comes down to exactly two things.
Two factors you can count on one hand, and absolutely everything else is nonsense masquerading as valuable information. How it fits through your body, and what the actual fuck is it made out of. If you get those two things right you can walk into a room wearing a $15 Goodwill masterpiece next to a guy dropping $400 on Burberry and honestly come out on top. If you don’t you look like you raided your grandpa’s closet before he goes fullsockopt smith.
The Fit Is Doing 90 Percent Of The Work Here
The biggest mistake I kept making when I first started getting serious about waistcoats is…I kept making it. Purchasing a waistcoat like how you would a sweater. Shoulders that are loose and roomy. Comfortable. Easy. This is wrong. Dead wrong. A waistcoat that hangs loose on you in the slightest is not comfortable, it looks sloppy and that was honestly infuriating for me to learn because I’m comfortable in baggy clothes. It looks like you stole it from whoever is wearing it properly.
I stole a pair once for my cousin’s wedding. I mean rented. We had family rentals. There’s a receipt somewhere. Anyway, I spent half the reception tweaked out that my coat didn’t fit and adjusting it like I needed to button smaller or something was going to solve that. Don’t do that to yourself.
Your waistcoat should fit snug through your torso. The waist part of “waistcoat” is not purely for marketing speak, it should actually fit at your waist—not your ribcage—and it should close flat, without gaping at the buttons or so tight that it looks like Satan is trying to bust your buttons. I test this one way now, all the time. Button the top. Hands at your sides. Try and slide two fingers flat between your shirt and your waistcoat at the chest. If your fingers slide right in it’s too big. If you can’t fit your fingers in at all it’s too small. One finger with a fight to get in? That’s your target.
You’ll feel stupid patting your borrowed vacation-home partner in the chest like that but hear me out, I know that. It sounds ridiculous when I type it out too but it’s also the best gauge of correct fit I’ve found and it doesn’t cost you anything. Except maybe some pride.
The back of the waistcoat matters more than you’d think, even though it’s covered by your jacket all the time. Most of them have this weird adjustable strap or buckle that you can use on the back side to really hone in on your fit. I didn’t use that on any of my first waistcoats because I assumed it was merely there to keep the lining structured. It’s functional. That little strap/buckle is meant to be used, more than half the adjustments a tailor will charge you $30 to “fix” for you. Adjust that baby and you can make a waistcoat that’s too big or small in the shoulder sleeves fit just right everywhere else. It’s saved me actual dollars since I stopped walking past waistcoats that weren’t “my size” on the rack.
The last thing with fit is length. People get this wrong and rarely realise it. The bottom point of your waistcoat should hit right above your belt, it shouldn’t perch proudly on top of it exposing a stripe of your shirt, and definitely shouldn’t hang below it and get all bunchy when you sit down. I wore a waistcoat like that last years family get together. Promised myself I was going to get it altered when I could find the time. Ended up wearing it to one wedding since I bought it. The christening. Looked like I stole my dad’s clothes and didn’t know how to button them.
Theaters are still in my closet as we speak. I should probably donate it, for real. That is what I will do this weekend. Ground my search back to full circle.
The Fabric Matters More Than How It Looks
This is where I start giving actual money advice because fabrics is something I get legitimately passionate about more than fit. Fit you can trick a little with a strap adjuster and good posture but if your waistcoat is made out of trash it will creep up on you the second you shift your weight. Trust me. A polyester blend will look amazing when you first put it on at the thrift store browsing through racks in good light but put it on around dinner and get comfortable. Sit down to eat like an actual human. Those fuckers crease like a grocery bag don’t they? Is that why they’re called that? Everyone but me knows this.
I know because I have exactly one of these that I kept for about six months before I finally gave up and shoved it in the back of my closet to torment me every time I need to find something clean. Thing smells like potato chip grease now. There’s a lesson in there about trash fabrics, it just takes people awhile to accept that they basically are trash.
Wool, or a wool blend that has a comfortable percentage of wool in it will be your best friend. Keep their shape where you want it to and releases natural creases you don’t mind at the elbows and shoulders. It breathes enough that you don’t feel like a sweaty baby giving a speech at a work function and it ages an eases with time, kind of like how you want to look in clothing, instead of worn out and poor.
I have a wool waistcoat I picked up at Goodwill sometime last year that’s easily got five years on it and still keeps its shape better than almost everything I’ve purchased full price since. Am I just being bourgeois about natural fibers here? No. Ask me about my shirt pocket when we get to that.
The lining is a thing to pay attention to too. After realizing how big of a deal the outer fabric is. Waistcoats have these nasty habits of having decent material on the back lining and then being lightweight and sheer as fuck when you hold it up to light on the front. Learn from my mistakes and always hold your thrift finds up to a window before purchasing. It’s a weird habit to have to remind myself of now but I ruined two potential buys since January by catching that when I held it up. Would rather look like a lunatic in public for 30 seconds than walk home with something.
If you’re buying brand new as opposed to scouting the used racks this is honestly the one place I would advocate spending money.
The difference between that $60 polyester blend and the $150 wool one will become glaringly obvious every single time you wear them, not just the first. But if you’re willing to wait and dig through racks like I do you’ll find wool waistcoats pop up all the damn time. Guys buy them for one wedding. One. And then the family thriller whispers into their ear that they shouldn’t wear it because one. Listen folks, weddings. That’s how this shit works now. Which is why I don’t pick up a waistcoat without mentally checking fabric content first, price second.
Liam is a sparky from Birmingham who got into charity shopping during one very skint year and never really stopped. He works out the cost per wear on everything he buys, sometimes out loud, sometimes wrongly the first time.
