Thread by @dieworkwear

Which suit looks better to you? I will let you mull on it for a while and then give some of my thoughts below. 🧵

In the last 20 years, suits have become slimmer and shorter as a counter-reaction to the billowing, oversized Armani suits of the 1980s and '90s. This can look fine on certain body types, but more often, it does not look very flattering.

Here, we see Macron in a toned-down version of that look—updated, but not overly fashionable—and Henri, the Grand Duke of Luxembourg, in a more classic cut.

Macron is wearing a short jacket with trim, tapered trousers. Henri is wearing a longer jacket with fuller trousers.

One does not need to conform to classic Western ideals for gendered body types. But it helps to know that the classic male silhouette is shoulders broader than the hips, whereas the classic female silhouette is hips broader than shoulders (think: David and Venus)

Short jackets tend to emphasize the hips, which is why women's tailoring tends to feature shorter jackets than men's tailoring. (Although many women wear longer jackets for various reasons, including not wanting to conform to this feminine stereotype; and vice versa)

Compared to Henri's longer jacket, Macron's jacket tends to emphasize his hips more. But more importantly, when you shorten the jacket, you have to raise the buttoning point to keep a proper distance from the buttoning point to the hem.

When you raise the buttoning point, you do two things:

1. You shorten the lapel line
2. You limit how much the jacket can be taken in at the waist, which is the narrowest part of the person's torso.

These two things, when combined, limit that strong V-shaped figure.

When you shorten a suit jacket, you also have to make it trimmer to keep the correct proportions. And when you make the jacket trimmer, you also have to make the trousers trimmer. Everything moves in concert.

The prob is that Macron's jacket can only be taken in so much before it starts pulling. But his trousers are fairly slim. The effect is that his tailor has broken the suit into two distinct blocks: upper and lower. Henri's jacket flows into his fuller trousers, creating a whole.

Trimmer trousers are also more likely to catch on your legs, creating ripples that ruin what should be a clean line going from your waistband to cuff.

With a short jacket that emphasizes the hips, a high buttoning point, a short lapel line, a limited V-shaped silhouette, and trim trousers that dangle out from beneath the jacket like bead lines under a bell, you can end up looking like a sweet double popsicle.

I see a lot of people whose solution to improving a suit is to "take it in"—make it slimmer and slimmer until it conforms to something they saw in a magazine. But this does not work on every body type. Best to think about how the silhouette flatters you, not conform to trends.