Hey Sean,

To answer your question – you can’t go wrong with a two button. Based on your body type, a three button wouldn’t be terrible either depending on the level of gut we’re talkin’. To be honest, 6’3 is pretty damn tall too, so don’t worry about that lost inch, and to be honest the two button won’t elongate you too much. There are plenty of tall people who rock the two button and rock it well. (Literally The Rock.)

You raise a good point, but you’re barking up an ancient menswear tree. As menswear legend goes, King Edward VII had to start unbuttoning the bottom-most button on his jackets because he got too round. Other men started to follow suit and well, the rest is history.

More practically, the bottom-most button helps with the drape of the jacket and adds an air of masculinity. You’ll notice that if both buttons are buttoned on a jacket that something looks off and the wearer is much more restricted in his movements. Still, not entirely practical. There’s always the one-button jacket for people like you. With one button, you can avoid all of this menswear nonsense 🙂

Time out. Edicts? Dictators? Hardly. Wear it however you want. Fine by us.

We’re not interested in style confrontation. We’re here to educate those who want an education.

We think you make the cut for a three-button suit, Sulu. You’re a big and tall dude—don’t worry about being 1″ off of our mark—so a three-button suit will still help balance out your height with your athletic build. Just remember to keep that last button unbuttoned.

Interesting concept. That’s kind of the idea behind the cummerbund. Since dinner jackets only have one button, the cummerbund covers the waist area where the shirt would, otherwise, peek through. You don’t see that in business suits. Although now, if we see a guy in a suit with matching cummerbund and your name on the label we’ll be able to say we discovered you!

We make Black Lapel suits to your exact measurements. So if you were to order from us, you’d give us a full set of measurements and we’d make it fit you flawlessly, but we can’t speak for off the rank brands with generic fits.

As for the number of buttons, tall guys can look great in a one-button provided that you don’t have a belly. At 6’6″ and 135lbs. we doubt that’s a concern for you. Without getting a little bit more information about you and taking a look at some pictures it’s tough to give a strong recommendation, but if you’d like to use our concierge service, a Black Lapel stylist can gather that info. and give you a more specific recommendation. To do that, drop us an email at concierge@blacklapel.com.

Help has come to your rescue. We want to start off by addressing a few common misconceptions you have about a tuxedo and how it should fit. To start, tuxedos should only ever have one button. A tuxedo with more than one button isn’t really a tuxedo. You can read more about classic, black tie and tuxedo details here. We only sell 1-button tuxedos and that’s also all we recommend to those searching for a tuxedo from another brand. You can see how we style the one-button tuxedo on our models—some of whom have similar proportions to this young man—here: https://blacklapel.com/collections/black-tie/.

This young gentleman you mention does have fine proportions, but no matter how good ones proportions may be, an ill-fitting suit is always going to look bad. We understand his desire to look more filled out, but a tuxedo that’s too big will actually have the reverse affect. If he’s swimming in the tuxedo, he’ll look skinnier and/or smaller. Everything we sell at Black Lapel is custom fit, made-to-measure, and our flawless fit promise essentially says one thing: it’s going to look good because it fits you like a glove. We hope this is helpful to you and this fine young gentleman!

Well, that’s a first in the comment section, John! Full disclosure, no one at Black Lapel has worn a kilt suit. That said, we’ve yet to find evidence of a well dressed man in a kilt suit ever buttoning his jacket. The waistcoat underneath covers the midsection and leaves no reason to close the jacket. And, while we’ve never made a jacket like this for any of our made-to-measure customers we can tell by looking at the handiwork of the tailors who do make them, that the jackets are not intended to be closed. So we say, leave it open.

Good question, Rohil. You should be good to go with a 3/2 roll. When buttoned properly (only the middle button) the button stance won’t be significantly higher than your usual two-button jackets, this one will just have a cool feature that your two-button jackets don’t.

Wow, Sam, you’re well ahead of the curve for a 16 year-old when it comes to suits. Keep it up. You’re on your way to a life of style.

To answer your question, Black Lapel only makes suits to your exact measurements so all of our suits would, by nature, fit your body frame. The first step in getting one is to create a profile and have a friend help you enter your measurements. Once your measurements are in, you can customize the suit the way you’d like and choose things like lapel type and whether or not to add a ticket pocket, etc. Along the way if you have any questions about measurements or customizations or want something particular done on your clothes that you don’t see on the site (like a 2 inch cuff), just email us at concierge@blacklapel.com and one of our stylists (that’s right a real living, breathing, stylish human being) will help you out. Pretty cool, right?

Of course you CAN do all of these things. You can also go around with your fly open but if you’re looking for approval from us on such misguided acts, you’re not going to get it.

If the goal is to look slimmer, the solution is getting a suit that fits you better, not wearing one incorrectly. A suit that fits, that we can get behind. In fact, it’s our specialty. But even if you don’t get a suit from us, we urge you not to make the fashion faux pas of buttoning your bottom button or, heaven forbid, wearing the abomination that is a two-button dinner jacket.

If we’re understanding the comment correctly, you claiming that there is some sort of conspiracy to get men to make and wear their suits incorrectly? That would mean that every men’s style icon from Nick Wooster to Brunello Cucinelli to Luciano Barbera to Cary Grant was in on it. And who’s behind the conspiracy? Tailors who ware shirking their work? Those are some powerful tailors. No? It’s clothing makers. What’s to be gained by adding decorative buttons and button holes? If anything, the people who make clothes should be conspiring to get rid of decorative elements on clothing since it means spending more on materials.

Sorry James Bond, but this is one evil plot that just doesn’t add up.

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I think this would be a pretty impossible task for a tailor. You could remove a button, but would still be able to see the button whole on the other side. If you want to give it a good, I would look up local tailors on Yelp and see what they think about your proposition!

Sounds like you’ve got a signature style, Len. We say, if you like it, stick with it.

That said, if you’re worried about wearing a two-button suit because of your height, let us allay your fears. While we can’t vouch for other brands, when we make a Black Lapel made-to-measure suit with two buttons we account for the jacket length and the height of the wearer. So you won’t get a two-button that buttons up too high. Everything in proportion, you know.

As for the lapels, you could mix a notch lapel into your collection if you’re looking for a slightly more laid-back look. The peak lapel is a tad more formal and more European. A notch lapel jacket, found more on American style suits and jackets, can also work as a sport jacket but now we’re just being really specific. Peak lapel suit jackets (with the exception of pinstripes) can fill in for a sport jacket with no problem. It’s really just a matter of preference.

In short, don’t get a three button suit unless you want to look short. While we love your idea of creating an ode to vintage clothing, that doesn’t mean you have to make an exact replica of a vintage suit. The best homage you can pay to vintage menswear is to get a suit that fits your body (after all, old-school gents usually had suits made for them).

Our advice is getting a 3-roll-2. That’ll keep the vintage three-button theme going, while keeping the button closure in just the right place to create an elongating V-shape with your lapel that is perfect for a 5’7″ man.

There is such a thing as age appropriateness, but we put more emphasis on lifestyle appropriateness. The middle-aged lobbyists on K Street would probably be best served with a more, pardon the pun, conservative look. After all, the people who run things in Washington tend to be pretty old-school in their style.

A trendy “skinny suit” wouldn’t be our recommendation for anyone, but a middle-aged man who is looking to wear something a little more fitted can definitely do so without looking like he’s trying too hard. He can just get a suit that fits well and look great, as Aiden Shaw continues to prove.

Peak lapels on a three-button suit would definitely emphasize the high V in the jacket. Not our thing but that’s why we make everything custom if it’s your thing, it’s yours when you customize your suit.

As for brighter colors, we’re all for them, but we don’t limit their placement to ties. See Using Color in Your Accessories, A Guide to Stepping Up Your Sock Game and Adding Color to a Wintry Mix for examples.

Height does make a difference, Wes. It’s a viable option, but we prefer the 3-roll-2 for taller guys, (see the 6’2″ Cary Grant). (Bonus points, this is a great look for being chased by a crop duster).

Your fears are well founded, Lance. The one-button look is most flattering to guys with flat stomachs.

Trying to turn a keg into a six-pack? You can always use this look as motivation. When you’re at the gym, just remember how dashing you’ll look in your new one-button suit.

Shirt collar choice is really an individual thing, as we noted here. Spread, point and button-down collars are all appropriate with suits, so pick the types of collars that work for you and you’ll be all set.

Even though we’re not fans of the three-button look we respect your right to wear them. That’s why we offer three buttons as a customization option on all of our suits.

We’ll meet you half-way, though. We ARE pretty enamored with the 3-roll-2 look.

You kind of answered your own question, Alexander, but we recommend buttoning your jacket when you stand whether you’re wearing a tie or not. The button holds your lapels in place and creates a V that flatters your body no matter what body type you have.

As we noted above, the last button was originally intended to be worn but when Edward VII couldn’t button his anymore, other men stopped buttoning theirs and the fad became the style, which became the rule. Today the button is purely decorative.

Of course, if the unbuttoned bottom button really annoys you, you can dispense with it altogether and go with the sleek single button option which works well on blazers and many suits.

All is not lost, Chris. If you’re hoping to keep the old 3-button in the rotation, try converting it as a 3-roll-2. To do this ask your tailor to press it so that the crease of the lapel rolls over the top button.

Now, there are any number of reasons why this might not work. It sounds like you like this suit, though, so if you’re choosing between converting this suit and throwing it away, it’s probably worth a try.

We’re assuming you’re referring to the Daniel Craig image from our What to Wear to a Summer Wedding article. Are you asking for just a general suggestion on colors for suits? If so, you can’t go wrong with a strong foundation of Solid Navy, Charcoal Gray and maybe a Glen Plaid to mix things up. If you’d like more specific advice on building a suit wardrobe, you can always take advantage of our concierge service by emailing concierge@blacklapel.com.

If you were a few inches taller, we’d say 3-button. However, in your case, you can probably get away with a 2-button, and if you’re feeling a little more adventurous, the 3-roll-2.

That’s a limited edition BL shirt that never made it to production James! How badly do you want it? 😉

Jeff, we already do. 🙂 It’s our Navy Windowpane.

Larry, everything is easier with a canvassed suit! 😉 However, the canvassing does have a specific tension in the stitching that is designed to pull the lapel into a certain position (responsible for the natural roll at the bottom of the lapel). Re-pressing it will give you a new shape but it may not give you the natural roll that would enhance the look of your lapel. It comes down to a trade off and if having them become 3/2’s with a slightly flatter lapel would allow you get more use out of your suits, we’d endorse such a plan!

Yes, the 3-roll-2 has a fully function top button and buttonhole. The top buttonhole tends to lie right at the edge of the fold of the lapel and the button itself is hidden behind the lapel.

Button, then un-button. Then button again. And un-button again. [enter dubstep track]

The English more or less invented the suit as we know it today so we’re pretty much sure they can pull off any look. 😉 Good choice on the 3-roll-2!

Haha, Allen, we do sell that tie you know?! All good, we still have love for you even if you hate our ties! 🙂

You certainly can and we’ll be here waiting. 😉 Just remember to email our concierge team with your special request!

Agreed. We have only love for 3-button suits, especially for those with lower stances and a gorgeous lapel roll like the one you linked. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t be offering them as one of the default options. 😉 Great eyes on the 3/2 by the way.

Glad we were able to bring something fresh to the table for you Terrence! Is there room for a 3-roll-2 in your closet in the near future? 😉