Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Sizing chaos

pudding.cool

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

441–450 of 458 posts

Re: Sizing chaos

#441

Post by pickleRick243 »

throwawy_gender wrote: post #366

I need to say this out loud: Can you really imagine a similar article being written about men's clothing sizes? Seriously, get in shape. Lose weight. I don't care if it takes drugs (ozempic, whatever). If women in other highly developed countries can have a median body weight much less than American women, then I am not very symapthetic to their "clothing size crisis".

I was looking for the first comment along these lines. Regardless of your views on this topic, everyone has an opinion and it's funny how the entire comment section finds a way to self-censor.

Re: Sizing chaos

#442

Post by dredmorbius »

choilive wrote: post #66

If we can have mass produced fast fashion from runway to store in weeks... Why not tailored clothing at scale? Have a set of portable body measurements that can be sent to any retailer - make an order and have it sent from factory to door in a week or two. Or get a size that is close enough - bring it to your neighborhood tailor. Most alterations are simple and not very expensive. Unfortunately sizing is just a leaky…

This has been a long-unfulfilled promise of technology for literally decades.

I remember multiple iterations of various made-to-measure clothing initiatives, dating to at least the 1990s. Levi Straus offered this in its San Francisco Union Square flagship at one point, as did other clothing producers. One of the few extant references I can find is a 16 year old Tripadvisor question with answers indicating that the option existed many years earlier than that: https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g60713-i30-k3392413-Ma...>

More recently, in the late aughts / early teens, there was something of a flood of made-to-measure selvage jeans merchants, though I believe these have also largely ceased to operate. When I checked in on them, prices were far higher than off-the-rack options, not by percentages but by multiples, as in 3--5 times as expensive. I suspect that these to remained niche.

The broader lesson is probably that mass-produced, mediocre-fitting clothes simply offer vastly greater economies of scale that no element of automation or technology can overcome.

For men (speaking from experience) and likely women having tailored clothing made in a lower-wage region (Hong Kong, India, and Thailand seem to be the usual suspects) may remain an option. Or the self-provisioning option via a sewing machine, as noted in TFA.

Closer to HN's interests: similar failures of promises for individually-tailored technologically-mediated options to emerge, unless those serve the interests of advertisers or other mass manipulators seems to be a profoundly persistent tendency. In light of present trends (AI / LLM) I'm calibrating expectations accordingly.

Re: Sizing chaos

#443

Post by dredmorbius »

osener wrote: post #338
fishtoaster wrote: post #14

This is a great use of data to make a compelling case that sizing sucks for women's clothing! I do wish it attempted to answer the question at the end, though: "Sizes are all made up anyway — why can’t we make them better?" Like, why doesn't the market solve for this? If the median woman can't buy clothing that fits in many brands, surely that's a huge marketing opportunity for any of the thousands of other clothing…

There are fast fashion attempts at this like adding elastic material to every fabric so they can get away with having fewer sizes and cuts thus less unsold inventory and availability issues. But everything has a tradeoff. In this case the elastic material degrades MUCH faster than cotton so you have to throw away your jeans quite a bit earlier compared to a quality 100% cotton denim which can last you a decade. This…

I'd noticed the near-universal adoption of stretch fabrics recently, and greatly dislike it. I hadn't considered that this is an inventory optimisation method, though that absolutely makes sense.

Re: Sizing chaos

#444

Post by dredmorbius »

jcims wrote: post #28
fishtoaster wrote: post #14

This is a great use of data to make a compelling case that sizing sucks for women's clothing! I do wish it attempted to answer the question at the end, though: "Sizes are all made up anyway — why can’t we make them better?" Like, why doesn't the market solve for this? If the median woman can't buy clothing that fits in many brands, surely that's a huge marketing opportunity for any of the thousands of other clothing…

I wonder if understanding a particular brand's sizing drives up repeat purchases.

Flipside: drastically changing a brand's sizing standards has repeatedly driven me away from long-time favourites.

This happened to me several times from the 1990s through the aughts. Literally between one shopping session and the next, the same style of clothes (tops, bottoms) which had fit perfectly no longer did, resulting both in a set of returns (of clothing) and non-returns (of myself, for future purchases) to those stores. As someone who generally dislikes the shopping experience, additional and insurmountable frictions such as these are absolutely fatal.

More recently (as I've just commented) it's the widespread adoption of stretch fabrics in non-athletic wear. I may want stretch in some of my workout clothes. I don't want it in my street clothing.

Re: Sizing chaos

#445

Post by sleazebreeze »

munificent wrote: post #411
sleazebreeze wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't control the incentives, you can only control your reactions to those incentives.

We can control the incentives! The idea that we should completely cede the environment and public space to corporations and give them total autonomy over the incentives that surround us is crazy.

My apologies. I was responding to the fact that animals and humans have base instincts that steer us towards bad food choices or over-stimulations. I was considering those instincts as the incentives that can't be changed.

On a macro scale, yes I agree that we should revolt against campaigns designed to exploit our animal nature. However on a personal basis, I do believe we owe it to ourselves to take radical responsibility over our own reactions to those things.

Re: Sizing chaos

#446

Post by advisedwang »

_main wrote: post #240

If you shop online and use raw measurements, then it will both fit and be available. The real concern I have is how the large majority of westerners are overweight or obese. That's a serious issue way beyond the practicality of buying clothes

> If you shop online and use raw measurements, then it will both fit and be available

The article itself gives numerous reasons why this is not true:

* Patterns are scaled up and down from a single original pattern. However actual bodies do not follow simple scaling. As a result, variation in body size will always result in clothes that fit poorly.

* There is not a universal set of body proportions. The article shows a categorization system with 9 buckets. I suspect women's body's simply have a wider range of shapes than men's leading some men (possibly including you?) to discount this.

* Some brands literally don't stock even the median adult women's size!

Re: Sizing chaos

#447

Post by dredmorbius »

dredmorbius wrote: post #442
choilive wrote: post #66

If we can have mass produced fast fashion from runway to store in weeks... Why not tailored clothing at scale? Have a set of portable body measurements that can be sent to any retailer - make an order and have it sent from factory to door in a week or two. Or get a size that is close enough - bring it to your neighborhood tailor. Most alterations are simple and not very expensive. Unfortunately sizing is just a leaky…

This has been a long-unfulfilled promise of technology for literally decades. I remember multiple iterations of various made-to-measure clothing initiatives, dating to at least the 1990s. Levi Straus offered this in its San Francisco Union Square flagship at one point, as did other clothing producers. One of the few extant references I can find is a 16 year old Tripadvisor question with answers indicating that the op…

Update: Levi Strauss apparently does still offer bespoke jeans, under the "Lot No. 1" label. Pricing begins around $USD500, and the option is offered only in SF, NY, and London.

There is also a "Levi's Taylor Shop" option at somewhat more locations: https://www.levi.com/US/en_US/features/tailor-shop>.

Re: Sizing chaos

#448

Post by abustamam »

dandellion wrote: post #400
abustamam wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a 5'5", 110lbs man. I shop at the teens section and get larges. I may not get the trendiest looks, but I get cheaper clothes that fits and looks good on me! I also tried Stitch Fix, they had a surprising amount of stuff that could fit me (both fashionably and size wise), albeit not as cheap as kids' clothes.

I might grab something like sweatpants from kids section, but for normal clothes I generally prefer a bit more quality. I work remotely so a good pair of pants can last me more than half a decade, so I don't mind buying quality and having it fitted. But yeah, I feel as a short guy there's actually more than plenty of options for us, I never felt that clothes were an issue. Well, there was a shop once that put the sma…

That's fair. I work remotely as well and to be honest I just cycle through the same two pants I got from Stitch Fix and a few collared shirts, and some concert merch for more casual outings.

I was speaking more to waistline — I have a 28 inch waist and the smallest I usually find is like 30 or more, so even a belt can't fix that.

Re: Sizing chaos

#449

Post by munificent »

sleazebreeze wrote: post #445
munificent wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can control the incentives! The idea that we should completely cede the environment and public space to corporations and give them total autonomy over the incentives that surround us is crazy.

My apologies. I was responding to the fact that animals and humans have base instincts that steer us towards bad food choices or over-stimulations. I was considering those instincts as the incentives that can't be changed. On a macro scale, yes I agree that we should revolt against campaigns designed to exploit our animal nature. However on a personal basis, I do believe we owe it to ourselves to take radical respons…

I agree. We have individual agency and also the corporations and systems around us have agency in ways that affect us.

My initial comment was disagreeing with the claim that any systemic problem foisted on the world is solely the fault of our individual wills to resist it.

Re: Sizing chaos

#450

Post by altairprime »

KK7NIL wrote: post #440
altairprime wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there's plenty of incentive for them to order the right amount. If the incentives to avoid waste were effective in the market, the EU wouldn’t need to introduce regulations to halt it — but their industry is destroying a bit over ten kilos of finished products per person there each year, so the market carrot isn’t working and manufacturers have more than earned the regulatory stick (and can afford the share of prof…

You seem to not even be addressing my point that what you said is objectively false. You've instead changed the discussion to whether or not those incentives are "effective", which is a very different and subjective discussion. You also make the dubious assumption that we should halt all destruction of retail clothing when the truth is that a supply surplus is a good thing to prevent supply shocks for consumers and t…

Oh. Okay! I’m clearly wrong and it would be a waste of your time for me to claim otherwise. Apologies :)
Post reply on HN