Summer Suitings

I attended a Brioni trunk show about six weeks ago, where the company was featuring spring cloth selections for its made to measure clothing. And they were marvels of textile technology - Super 150s in 7 ounce weights that reflect the state of the art at the Carlo Barbera mills where they are woven - as they should be for the price. And that got me thinking about cloth for the first time in a while.

You see, even the Brioni executive admitted that stuff doesn't tailor easily. It's so light that it'll flap around in the faintest breeze. But worst of all, most of it didn't look cool wearing despite the light weight.

That's because the temperature control of cloth depends as much on the weave as the weight. In my experience, woolen flannel wears two to three ounces warmer than the same cloth weight in a conventional worsted. And conventional worsteds wear two to three ounces warmer than the same weight in a high twist cloth like Minnis fresco, Holland & Sherry Crispaire or Smith's Finmeresco.

In other words, my 9/10 ounce fresco suits wear quite a bit cooler than a nine ounce worsted. And compared to most seven ounce worsted, which is about as light as suiting cloth gets, they are as cool, more resistant to wrinkling and drape considerably better.

That's why my next summer suit order will be a quarter lined Finmeresco in the pictured light gray. At 11 ounces it's a lot heavier than the cloth Brioni is tailoring so it'll hang a lot better in a breeze. And I'll be every bit as cool.