I mentioned yesterday that Spier & Mackay is a company I’ve been keeping my eye on lately. They are known most for their shirts (both OTR and MTM), but have expanded into a full line including tailored jackets, trousers, outerwear, and sweaters. Last season they introduced a new cut called the “Neapolitan,” so named for being in the style of Neapolitan tailoring (all of Spier & Mackay’s goods are manufactured in China).
I tried it then, and found the fit wanting (I tried the Contemporary fit, which has low armholes and an overall boxy fit), and the overall feel of the garment to reflect its price (suits start at about $350USD; jackets at about $250). They make with a half-canvas construction, which puts them on par with other mass produced suits in this price point (TMLewin, Charles Tyrwhitt, SuitSupply).
After that first Neapolitan silhouette debuted is when they got my attention. I started getting involved in their affiliate thread on Styleforum, just as they were asking for feedback for them to refine the cut. They implemented some changes and are introducing the second revision of the cut this season in a handful of suits and in three sportcoats. The suits are in year-round VBC fabrics, and the sportcoats in three fall-winter fabrics: Abraham Moon gun club cloth, a natural brown Donegal tweed, and a black-and-white houndstooth flannel.
Rick, who runs their Styleforum account, sent me a suit (and upon my request, the gun club sportcoat) to give him some feedback on the changes they made.
He explained in the Styleforum thread that the updates they’d made were to
1- lower the gorge slightly
2- remove one layer of canvas (reducing it from 3 to 2)
3- remove all padding in the shoulder.
Having tried rev.1 of the Neapolitan suit, I can say that all three of those were the right decisions. The product, in-hand, and as it feels while you’re wearing it, feels much lighter. It’s much more in line with my expectations for “Neapolitan tailoring” in so far as that phrase has come to signify “a lightweight chest piece and natural shoulder construction.” The two layers of canvas go up through the shoulder—so it is not a completely unstructured shoulder, as the canvas gives it a nice clean line (smoothing out any natural curves in your shoulder anatomy).
But in contrast with the previous Neapolitan cut from SM, there is no additional padding and it feels much more natural. This feels more premium to me than the first iteration. The first one felt like a TMLewin suit I once had, which came to be my stand-in for stiff, cheap suits (ok not “cheap” like Target or H&M cheap, but in the realm of reasonable half canvas menswear shops). I’d peg it now in the same realm as SuitSupply (which is more expensive across the board for similar make).
These coats are made in the Spier & Mackay slim fit—the previous suit I tried was Contemporary fit.* So, fit-wise, I like this better. The armholes still feel low to me coming from Eidos, and I also still feel a little constricted in the upper back.
The gun club tweed is fantastic and heavy. The armhole height is less of an issue with it because the thickness of the fabric makes the whole thing fit a bit more snug than the suit, which is a year-round VBC fabric. On me, if I were a bulky body builder type, no way would I be able to comfortably bend my arms with the sleeve width on this.
Speaking of this gun club fabric, I’ve been seeing the Formosa version that No Man Walks Alone sold last fall/winter pop up again in my Instagram and Tumblr feeds as seasons change and folks pull it out of the closet. Obviously quality of construction-wise, Formosa blows this out of the water with its handwork and full canvas construction. But style-wise, I prefer this silhouette to Formosa, which I’ve come to identify as “boring conservative Neapolitan.” That’s not a knock—Formosa’s silhouette works really really well on some people (Sebastian McFox comes to mind), but on me, I felt it was blah. Spier & Mackay’s Neapolitan cut has more character and interest, in my humble opinion.
Rick says they are continuing to refine their fits, by the way. In Spring, they plan to roll out higher armholes with slightly wider shoulders, which would be a major boon to me.
But even with the current revision, I’d still recommend these jackets and suits at the price. As always, fit is king, so try them for yourself.
Spier & Mackay’s Neapolitan jackets and suits go on sale Monday.
*This is one interesting thing to me about how they are approaching the diversity of cuts and fits. Instead of creating the Neapolitan in a new fit all its own, they are offering it in their already-existing fits. This is different from, say, Eidos, where the No Man Walks Alone cut with its wide lapels fits completely differently from the Tenero cut, with its narrower lapels and shorter length. I appreciate and think it makes some deal of sense to offer two standard fits, with different stylistic details available.
