Altering waist in 4 oz HH jacket?

[Arnold]

Thanks to everyone for your input. I'll go with Marc's suggestion aka option 3 from my original list. As for breaking the jacket in, I can't wait to do so but first need to ensure better positioning of the belt since I have a tapered torso and the jacket would ride up at the left shoulder if the belt was fastened askew while I'm seated.
As for the punch hole, I'll just sew a small leather patch into it by hand.

I'm relieved I found mostly agreement here since at first I wasn't sure how to evaluate this. With such special items it's easy to fall for the sunk cost fallacy (or as someone called it in another thread, Stockholm syndrome) and romanticize flaws that would actually be easy to avoid.

Belt issue or not. I’d be living in that jacket. Talk about sweet!

I will

 

[AeroFan_07]

Glad this will work out for you.
It's a really nice jacket as-is, just too bad about that detail. Hope you can get it sorted to your satisfaction.

 

[Arnold]

On a different note, how do other owners of jackets with thin nylon lining and no venting holes avoid buildup of odor in the armpits? My other motorcycle jackets (Bates, Schott) have those holes and/ or have thicker lining so there's less direct contact between shirt and leather. Is it part of Stuart's masculinity shtick that men have to stink? ;-) [*]

Btw, this J-24 (built in 2014) smells markedly different from a leather sample Stuart sent me in 2016 and from a ca. 1990s Japanese market Flamingo label horsehide jacket I bought from him as new old stock in 2015. Those two items smelled very similar despite their age difference; just a typical classic leather smell similar to high end gloves or furniture, whereas this one has a more rubbery, fruit-like smell to it.

[*] Regarding attitudes... I asked Stuart about the asymmetry discussed here - in what seemed factual and polite language to me as a native German speaker - and his reply was disappointing. First he dismissed my description ("we have no idea what you're describing as no one else ever mentioned these things"), then he contradicted/ devalued his own statement by asking rhetorically how a cross zip jacket could not have asymmetries (which is simple to answer in this specific case), and his conclusion was to question if their J-24 was for me. Forgetting that I bought a J-23 and another leather jacket from him years ago and have owned other heavy MC jackets (of comparable quality as his).
A polite request to sell me a spare snap button and a 1x1" leather patch to kindly support my endeavour as per Marc's suggestion, while I'm looking forward to give this jacket the break-in it deserves but never really got, has not been replied to yet.

This is borderline gaslighting and I'm close to being fed up with him for good. Apparently he would rather have people I meet think "Wow, this is how Lost Worlds deal with details and custom orders on a 'heirloom' jacket" than admit that he made an, um, suboptimal decision in this case (to soften how Monitor put it).

 

[AeroFan_07]

^^ Not fun to hear about your scenario.

I have owned two of his J23's and one was ordered from him directly. The phone call we shared when I ordered it was direct, simple and pleasant. However that apparently has not been the case with everyone.

Not only what you indicated but his prices have taken off. I recently sold the second J23, and I have no intentions of returning to them as a customer.

 

[Arnold]

Yeah, it's a very mixed experience to deal with LW. When I bought things from him years ago he was very professional, so I don't understand his reaction now.
But people can change. For example, those were the times when he wrote rants about people on "egregious internet forums" discussing his jackets; by now forum users seem to make for his main customer base and he deleted some of those remarks

Btw, my 40 year old Bates has a similar mistake - I have to offset the start of the zipper by an inch if I use the snap button, and then the waist hem is more or less straight, or I can zip up normally while ignoring the button and get a slightly diagonal hem (photo shows first option):

 

[Marc mndt]

Btw, my 40 year old Bates has a similar mistake - I have to offset the start of the zipper by an inch if I use the snap button, and then the waist hem is more or less straight, or I can zip up normally while ignoring the button and get a slightly diagonal hem (photo shows first option):

Most of my vintage jackets are crooked in one way or another.

 

[Arnold]

^ I know. It's just funny that my Bates gives me the choice!

 

[VansonRider]

Could "show me your jacket's asymmetries” be a thread…?

 

[Arnold]

Could "show me your jacket's asymmetries” be a thread…?

That would actually be interesting from an artisanal/ technical perspective. There are asymmetries that can be found more or less regularly depending on the type of jacket (or garment in general). But I won't go into detail here, to avoid possibly ruining someone's affection for their jackets - some things can't be unseen.

As for my Bates, I recently undid its side lacing (just intending to replace the laces) and found that the waist hem around the lacing gussets now shows signs of stretching (slight crumpling/ puckering at the edge), apparently because I had tightened the lacing too much considering my physical habits. I guess years of trained abdominal breathing can stretch even the toughest jackets over time. Considering how much weight pulls at a leather jacket's shoulders when it's on a hanger this really surprised me.

 

[Edward]

These are the perils of a] changing a pattern's proportions, and b] fixating on details, as we all can do at times here.

Yeah I don’t really see the asymmetry in wear.

Johnson or Bedo in the US could definitely do it but since he’s in Europe Aero is probably easier.

I don't think Aero would be an option - I may be wrong and it pays to double check, of course, but I'm sure I picked up somewhere that they're no longer doing alterations on non-Aero products.

I wouldn’t bother. I’ve walked the path of chasing minutiae with regard to alterations…doesn’t pay any dividends. Some details are too small to warrant the risk/cost IMO. In this case I’m not seeing a need at all.

Yes, I agree. I'd leave it and learn to live with it as just a quirk of that particular jacket. My very first P-type leather way back in 1990 had one lapel very smooth, the other grained up. Bothered me briefly, the lack of symmetry, but over time I just stopped noticing it. Had I not grown out of it, I'd still be wearing that jacket today.

If OP really doesn't feel they can live with it, I'd sell on rather than risk ending up with a whole lot more money sunk into a jacket that could end up very botched, not wanting to wear it and it be harder to sell on.

 

[VansonRider]

I’ve participated in VERY similar discussions about replica swords in a few Historic Fencing groups.

One thing to remember is that the modern eye is so used to seeing perfect symmetry. Everything we come into contact with in our daily lives (almost) is made by a robotic arm controlled by a computer. Very few items are made by hand and we get used to perfection as a baseline. Every Apple Iphone 14 looks identical to every other one. Every Estwing roofing Hammer on a rack in a hardware store will be identical to every other one.

Then someone pays $1,500.00 for a custom sword and the cross guard isn’t quiiiite symmetrical, or the pommel is rotated a degree and a half from where it should be.

If you look at museum pieces swords are WAAAY off center all the time. Even the jeweled and clearly VERY expensive examples made for kings. Like, “I am king because I can trace my ancestry directly to God” type kings.

People just didn’t see the asymmetries because everything was hand made. We are surrounded by such precision in the most mundane of objects.

So do you want a sword designed and cut from a bar of steel with a CADD program, or from a Smithy?

I have and appreciate both for what they are.

Something I think about sometimes, and their really isn’t a right answer. I’d be bummed out about the hem, and if I made the jacket I’d have just made the pocket a little smaller. But really nothings perfect. Just need to decide how imperfect will bother you.

 

[Arnold]

@Edward @VansonRider Have you read the whole thread? Others have summarized the issue much better than I originally had (https://www.thefedoralounge.com/threads/altering-waist-in-4-oz-hh-jacket.111736/post-3027825). I'll note this in an edit of the OP for future readers.

Regarding symmetry in history (you wrote "People just didn’t see the asymmetries because everything was hand made"), I think you're neglecting that arts like e. g. ecclesiastical architecture with their high degrees of precision have existed for a long time. People who frequented such buildings were very much used to seeing symmetry as a general phenomenon, if not in their clothing or other smaller objects. Pre-industrial astronomers and nautical navigators couldn't have worked without certain degrees of symmetry in their tools. So, while your general argument that symmetry is a relatively young phenomenon and that the perception of it has likely changed interactively is very valid, its development is probably more nuanced than I can read out of your comment.

But anyway, again, this thread wasn't supposed to be about symmetry in jackets in general and about expectable deviations in heavy leather jackets. It's about an asymmetry that *was* usually, and easily, avoided in the vintage jackets LW claim to pay tribute to and to improve upon. And since the fit of the belt can ultimately even affect safety, the decision LW made here is really puzzling.

 

[VansonRider]

I have, and I saw what you posted. I was just waxing on in a more general way about expectations. It was a thread derail, sorry about that. And very valid points about artesanal precision. I’ll see myself out…

 

[Arnold]

P. S. - Two aspects worth considering when it comes to decorated swords are 1) possibly intentional deviations to accomodate physical preferences or handicaps of the user? I don't know much about swords, just a suggestion/ question. Someone here mentioned custom requests for a lower shoulder, and some people order bespoke jackets with different sleeve lengths. I wasn't excluding a similar intention for this LW jacket until Stuart sent that personal reply.
2) Many historical cultures that were technically capable of high degrees of perfection have intentionally incorporated imperfections in their crafts and artworks as a means of expressing the contrast between divine and man-made, avoiding hubris, or just to allow for more personal touch and free workflow. This is not to contradict your point, just to add to it.

 

[VansonRider]

I’m really enjoying the scholarship on this site!

 

[JMax]

Vintage jackets generally are not symmetrical. I’d bet that generally LW and other modern repros are more symmetrical.

But I get that it can be bothersome. For me, any fix, to include leaving it alone, is better than having the snap go through the D pocket. I don’t like how it looks. Probably because it looks like something I would do in a pinch. Lol.

I think the safety argument is a bit overblown in this case but I’m no expert. I can say that I did go down in my barely asymmetrical 23 short. May Bambi remain forever in purgatory. Anyways, I slid on the road and my LW handled it like a champ. A litte buffing and some conditioner, good as new. I was amazed.

 

[Aloysius]

I don't think Aero would be an option - I may be wrong and it pays to double check, of course, but I'm sure I picked up somewhere that they're no longer doing alterations on non-Aero products.

Aero would know best, but my understanding was that they didn't do repair work on brands with skived seams, but most American makers both historic and modern don't skive their seams.

 

[Arnold]

For me, any fix, to include leaving it alone, is better than having the snap go through the D pocket. I don’t like how it looks. Probably because it looks like something I would do in a pinch. Lol.

It's interesting how subjective perception differs. I know what you mean, and it IS a crutch (because in a new jacket it would be quite possible to just cut a slightly smaller D-pocket for Short sizes or move all pockets upwards), but for me and apparently for Buco back then it's the better option.

 

[Marc mndt]

For me, any fix, to include leaving it alone, is better than having the snap go through the D pocket. I don’t like how it looks.

I'm sure you'll love this AMF HD with the snap going though the cigarette pocket lol.

 

[JMax]

I'm sure you'll love this AMF HD with the snap going though the cigarette pocket lol.

View attachment 540178 View attachment 540179 View attachment 540180

And there it is, what I always see- the simple jack of D pockets.