Disclaimer: this post contains fit nerdery. Keep scrolling if random sizing terms and body measurements aren’t your thing.
You ever had that realization that maybe the fashion industry is kind of BS-ing us? Last summer it happened to me while shopping with my friend Jake.
Jake has a classic athletic build: wide shoulders with a narrow waist thanks to years of rock climbing and CrossFit. You know the type – built like the model in Under Armour ads. Should be easy to dress.
Not true.
We were looking for dress shirts since he had recently started working at a corporate consulting firm and wanted to start dressing like an adult. I picked up what should have been the obvious shirt: an “athletic fit” button up from one of Jake’s favorite brands that sponsors roughly 67% of his Instagram followers.
“Bro this is stupid,” he half yelled at me after struggling to button his new shirt. “Look at this jacket. They couldn’t fit a pancake athlete with this thing.” He emerged from the fitting room resembling Elmo in a blazer: too big in every area except his sleeves.
That’s when I had my "The fashion industry is kinda lying to us" moment. The brand pulled down their athletic fit option despite the fact that it wasn’t athletic whatsoever. How does that make sense?
I ended up grabbing measurements from the same jacket size at 6 different stores that were all labeled “athletic fit.” The range of chest-to-waist difference was INSANE. Like 4 inches between the brand that cut the waist the closest to the chest and the brand that cut the waist practically square.
I’ve been thinking about this problem obsessively ever since. Brands make their clothes how they want and label them whatever they want, and we as consumers just deal with it. But why? Why do so many brands put little to no thought into their fits and simply reuse old patterns with new bullshit names?
I recently talked to a technical designer who has worked for several brands over the years (we’ll call him Marcus to protect the not-so-innocent). He couldn’t tell me why brands don’t size their clothes consistently, but he did mention that there is no governing body or industry standard that says they have to.
Each brand just decides what words like “slim” or “athletic fit” mean based on who their target customer is and what words sound good in a marketing meeting. Ten years ago every brand wanted their clothing to be slim fit because that’s what the public wanted. Now every brand needs some sort of athletic fit option.
In fact, a lot of brands just take their existing patterns and slap new “fit” names on them without actually changing the fit. It’s all marketing.
This honestly reminds me of sneaker sizing. If you collect Jordans you quickly learn that different colorways of the same model will fit radically different because they’re made in different factories. We know not to trust the label anymore and just buy our favorite color knowing we’ll have to Truerelize them.
But when it comes to clothes most people still assume that shirts labeled “modern fit” aren’t going to fit the same as ones labeled “classic fit.” Newsflash: they do.
I’ve rounded up a few tips and tricks I’ve learned to help you hack the meaningless fit labels and actually end up with clothes that fit your body.
- Ignore the fit names 100%. If brands list actual measurements, use those. A lot of brands are starting to include chest-to-waist drops, shoulder measurements, and other crazy details about their clothes online. These numbers matter way more than whatever fashionable bullshit name they call their fit.
- When you find brands that fit your body type consistently, buy ALL the clothes. I’ve learned through trial and error that nearly all of Uniqlo’s clothing fits me almost perfectly where as J.Crew shirts and pants are always too long in the torso. Same story with my friend Jake learning that Bonobos actually lives up to their “athletic fit” marketing.
- Size up and tailor. If there’s one area that will ALWAYS fit weird no matter the brand it’s your waist. Sometimes shirts are too big in the waist and sometimes they’re too small. The easiest things to tailor are: hemming, waist suppression, and shortening sleeves. Things that are nearly impossible to tailor are shoulders, neck, and overall body proportions.
- Buy from new DTC brands that are trying to do things differently. Brands like Peter Manning that specifically target shorter men or American Tall that focuses on taller guys are popping up to serve more people. There are also brands that offer the exact same style of clothing in multiple actual fits instead of just changing the name.
- The most important tip: look for brands that list actual measurements and details about their garments. More and more companies are publishing this info online instead of just throwing around trendy fit names that don’t mean anything. Let’s face it, clothing brands realized they were treating us like idiots by assuming we didn’t know our body didn’t have a 32 inch waist and changed tactics.
Until brands start caring about how their clothes fit a wide range of body types or the industry as a whole decides to regulate themselves (facepalm), us consumers have to learn how to navigate this bullshit.
Remember Mike Tyson’s Punch Drunk technique? That’s how I feel every time I go shopping. Once you realize that clothing doesn’t fit you because there’s something wrong with your body, it’s because the brands marketing departments don’t want it to.
The next time you’re wearing a shirt that looks like a trash bag with arms or pants that somehow morphed your once V-shaped waist into a manatee, just remember YOU ARE NOT FAT. Target + GAP are.
Thanks for reading! Excuse the strange beta website on my new man crush mobile. I’ll swap this out soon but couldn’t resist sharing his breakdown of why Athletic Fits DON’T fit athletes.
