I said last year that we would cover more made-to-measure and made-to-order services on Permanent Style, as a way to broaden the coverage more beyond bespoke. Recently that has included MTO shirts at The Anthology and Bryceland’s, as well as MTM tailoring at the latter.
Just as important as any of those, however, is shoes. As readers will know, my experience with bespoke shoemaking has been rather patchy over the years. While I continue to make bespoke with some people, I would discourage some readers from going down that route - particularly those that are saving up for ‘that one special pair’.
A lot of the time, all men need (from a fit point of view) is made-to-order. They might need two different sizes, or widths, for their two feet. They might need the ability to try those different widths in store, and guidance on which lasts work best. They might also need small tweaks to the last. But they don’t need to start from scratch.
One of the best for MTO is Gaziano & Girling - because of the range of widths they have in store, and the bespoke side of the business that helps make small last adjustments. They’re not unique in this, and we will cover others later, but if G&G is your style, MTO is definitely worth considering from them.
I went through the process of doing this recently with Tony Gaziano, in order to make a nice, classic half brogue in black calf, and here is what I found.
I’ve always known my feet were about a half size different, and Tony confirmed that with the measurements. So we started with the assumption the two shoes would be different sizes.
From the shoes available in the shop, I then tried an 8.5 in one shoe and a 9 in the other - both in the last I had opted for, though not the exact style of shoe (I went for the Kensington model, on the R18 last).
We could have tried different last shapes, but I knew the G&G range pretty well already, plus the limitations of my foot. G&G tends towards the slim and my joints are fairly wide, so we were limited to a small number of options.
The widths of the two shoes were different too (G on the right, F on the left) but that actually means the two shoes measure the same. Widths go up with the shoe size, so a 9E is wider than an 8E. The letter indicates a proportion rather than an actual measurement.
The feeling of those two shoes on my feet was pretty good - not as good as a lot of bespoke, but certainly better than some of it.
Tony then proposed small tweaks to the last shape, including adding a little bit on the sides of my joints.
Now this is a dangerous area - where MTO starts to bleed into bespoke.
The reason some brands don’t like to offer MTO or MTM (or don’t talk about it) is that customers’ expectations are easily raised too high. They think they can change anything, and ask for little tweaks here and there until they’re basically getting bespoke.
This is why it’s important for brands to communicate what is possible, and for customers to keep that in mind. For example it’s quite easy to add a piece of leather to a standard (usually plastic) last and then remove it after the shoe is made. But taking away from one part of the foot is a lot harder, because plastic cannot added on top again.
There are sometimes exceptions, when a customer orders a lot of MTO for example. But the safe thing to assume is that you can only change last, length and width, and add some space in one or two places.
The shoes pictured here are the result, and the fit turned out well. Oddly, the first couple of times I wore them there was quite a lot of rubbing on my heels and across the joints, which I haven’t had in the past with G&G ready-to-wear.
But after that initial period the shoes settled in, and are now very good. They slot cleanly into that space between the very best bespoke (I’ll do a list for that soon) and everything else. So I can certainly recommend it on this basis, to anyone that wants a better fit than they can get with ready-to-wear, but not bespoke.
The other advantage of MTO, at least at Gaziano & Girling, is that you can request the shoes to be made at a higher level. You can have the finely turned Deco waist put on the shoe if you want, or even the Optimum make, where the welt and sole are sewn by hand. (That does start at £4100 ex-VAT though, compared to £1890 for regular MTO.)
At that point it’s a bespoke shoe in terms of make, just not fit. You get the look, and it’s quicker, cheaper and more predictable.
There will always be people who still want or benefit from bespoke. They might have very unusual feet, or they might love coming up with a personal design. They might simply enjoy the process, or want to experience the ‘finest’ or most expensive thing.
But I don’t think that’s most readers, and a large part of the benefit of bespoke fit comes years down the line, when you’ve had two or three pairs and now have a perfected last on which you can make whatever you want for the rest of your life. It makes much less sense as a one-off.
MTO is a big part of G&G’s business, bigger than bespoke, and I can see that given how much prices of bespoke have gone up in recent years, and timelines stretched out. For a reader looking for something beyond ready-to-wear, I think this is a good area to explore.
The model shown is based off the Kensington on the R18 last. The cost of this pair MTO is £1890 plus VAT. Delivery is currently around four months.
Other clothes shown: Bespoke grey flannels from Whitcomb & Shaftesbury in Fox Flannel (CL2-2). Over-the-calf cotton socks from the Anderson & Sheppard Haberdashery.
