Fit
A high armhole looks uncomfortable and is the opposite
The small, tight-looking armhole in a well-cut jacket is what lets you raise your arm without lifting the…
· 4 min read
Lukas Brenner
Senior writer, The Outfit Files
Lukas joined to cover fit, fabric, care & repair and stayed for the awkward questions and reads the small print so you do not have to.
17 articles
Fabric
A woven cloth and a knitted one fail in completely different ways
Weaving interlaces straight yarns at right angles while knitting builds a fabric out of loops, and nearly…
· 4 min read
Fabric
Cotton, linen and viscose are all cellulose and behave nothing alike
Three fabrics made from the same chemical substance differ so completely in strength, creasing and drape…
· 4 min read
Style History
Khaki began as a camouflage problem and ended as an office trouser
The colour was adopted because white uniforms were dangerously visible, and the cloth that carried it…
· 3 min read
Fit
A dart is how flat cloth is persuaded to become a body
Fabric comes off the loom flat and nobody is, so the wedges folded out of a pattern are what bridge the gap…
· 4 min read
Fabric
Colour fades three different ways and only one is the dye's fault
A garment loses its colour to light, to washing and to rubbing, and the three processes look different…
· 4 min read
Care & Repair
A hanger is a load-bearing device and most of them are the wrong shape
Hanging a garment transfers its entire weight onto two small areas of cloth, and whether that damages it…
· 4 min read
Wardrobe
Most wardrobes are built for the rarest occasion in them
Clothes are bought while imagining a specific event, and the events people imagine are the unusual ones…
· 4 min read
Style History
Nearly everything casual in your wardrobe came out of sport
The garments people now wear on ordinary days were almost all designed for a specific athletic activity…
· 4 min read
Fit
A cuff has to pass over your hand and then stay above it
The circumference of a sleeve end is set by two conflicting requirements, and understanding the conflict…
· 4 min read
Fit
A pleat is stored cloth and it only opens if the trouser lets it
Pleats add width where a body needs it without adding it at the waist, which is a genuinely useful trick…
· 4 min read
Fabric
Recycling a fibre usually means making it shorter or breaking it down
Recycled content on a label covers two completely different processes with different consequences for the…
· 3 min read
Care & Repair
Hard water quietly ruins laundry and most people blame the detergent
Dissolved minerals react with washing products and deposit inside the cloth, and the greying, stiffening…
· 3 min read
Style History
Knitting was mechanised before weaving and nobody wanted it
A machine for making stockings existed in the sixteenth century, was refused protection, and then spent two…
· 3 min read
Style History
Domestic laundry technology decided which fabrics won
How clothes were washed at home shaped what people were willing to buy, and every major change in…
· 3 min read
Fit
Half your clothes are worn sitting down and almost none are fitted that way
A garment is assessed standing still in front of a mirror and then spent most of its life in a chair, where…
· 4 min read
Fabric
Silk is a continuous protein filament and it is weaker than it feels
The only natural fibre that arrives as an unbroken thread owes its lustre, its strength and its long list…
· 3 min read