Crafted for You, Never the Rack

Expert Suit and Shirt Alterations in San Francisco

A good alteration is the difference between a jacket that fits and one that merely covers you. Esmail Astanboos has spent decades cutting and fitting garments by hand, and the same eye that goes into a bespoke commission goes into altering something you already own. We work on suits, shirts, trousers and jackets for clients across San Francisco and the wider Bay Area, and we will always tell you honestly what a garment can and cannot be made to do.

What We Alter

Sleeve length and shoulder adjustments, waist suppression, trouser hemming and tapering, shirt body slimming, collar and cuff work, jacket length, and full re-cuts where a garment needs more than a nip and a tuck. We also handle repairs — a split seam, a replaced lining, a zip or a set of buttons — which is often the difference between a favourite jacket staying in the wardrobe and quietly leaving it.

Before any of that, we will tell you whether the piece is worth altering. Some garments are: good cloth, good construction, wrong fit. Others are not, and we would rather say so than take your money for work that will never sit right. That judgement is free and it takes about two minutes with the garment on you.

Alterations on Clothing You Bought Elsewhere

Most of the alteration work we do is on clothing bought somewhere else. Off-the-rack suits are cut to an average body, and almost nobody is actually average — sleeves run long, shoulders sit wide, the waist has no shape. Bringing in a jacket you already like and having it fitted properly is usually the single cheapest way to improve how your whole wardrobe looks. You do not need to have bought it from us, and we will not try to sell you a bespoke commission instead.

Suit Alterations

The alterations that change a suit most are the ones people ask for least: shoulder adjustment, sleeve pitch, and taking shape into the waist. Hemming trousers is simple and everyone knows to ask for it. Getting a jacket to sit clean across the back and close properly at the button is the work that actually makes it look like it was made for you, and it is well within what a good tailor can do to a ready-made suit.

Shirt Alterations

Dress shirts are the most commonly badly-fitted garment men own, because sizing is based on collar and sleeve and ignores everything in between. We slim the body, adjust sleeve length, reshape the shoulder, and replace or restyle collars and cuffs. If you have a stack of shirts that fit at the neck and balloon everywhere else, that is a straightforward and inexpensive fix.

House Calls Across the Bay Area

If you cannot get to us, we can come to you. We make house calls throughout San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, Palo Alto and the surrounding Bay Area, taking measurements at your home or your office and returning the finished work when it is ready. It is exactly the same fitting process, just on your schedule — which for a lot of our clients is the only way it happens at all.

Turnaround and Pricing

Most straightforward alterations are ready within a week. More involved work — a full re-cut, a lining replacement, several garments at once — takes longer, and we will give you a date at the fitting rather than leaving it open. Pricing depends on the garment and the work, so we quote after we have seen it and pinned it. There is no charge for that first look.