A hand-finished suit costs in the order of a small holiday. It is also constructed in a way that responds well to gentle, regular maintenance and very badly to harsh treatment. The single most useful thing we tell our new clients on the day they collect their first commission is this: do not dry-clean it.
Not for the first six months at least; ideally, not more than once a year for the lifetime of the garment. Dry-cleaning is a brutal process for tailoring. The solvents strip natural oils from the wool, weakening the fibres; the heat and pressing flatten the hand-padded canvas chest into something that no longer drapes. After three or four dry-cleans, a suit that should last fifteen years begins to look like one that is in its eighth.
What to do every wear
- Brush the cloth. Five minutes with a soft natural-bristle clothes brush, in a downward direction. This dislodges the dust that abrades wool fibre from the inside out.
- Empty the pockets. Weight in a single pocket pulls the front of the jacket out of true within weeks.
- Hang it on a curved wooden hanger. Wire and thin plastic hangers don’t support the shoulder. We will give you two hangers cut to your shoulder width with the first commission.
- Let it air for twenty-four hours before next wear. The wool absorbs moisture from the body during the day and needs time to release it.
What to do every month
- Rotate the suits in your wardrobe. Wear is uneven; rotation keeps the wear even.
- Steam, don’t iron. A handheld garment steamer at a foot's distance does ninety per cent of what an iron does, without crushing the canvas. We will lend you one for the price of two espressos at your next visit.
- Inspect the buttons. The hand-sewn shanks loosen over time. Re-securing a button takes us four minutes; replacing a lost one is more work.
What to do once or twice a year
- Bring the suit in for a press. We press to the original shape from the original pattern. Free for the lifetime of the garment.
- Consider a fabric-only dry-clean on heavily worn pieces — specify "no pressing" so the shape isn’t flattened.
- Replace the buttons if any are showing colour wear. Horn and corozo buttons fade gradually under bright sunlight.
Stain handling
- Liquid stains: blot with a clean white cloth, working from the outside in. Do not rub. Resist the urge to apply water in the moment.
- Oil and food: cover with talcum powder or cornflour to absorb the oil; brush off after thirty minutes. If a mark remains, bring it in — we’ll handle it.
- Ink and red wine: get the garment to us within forty-eight hours. We have specialist solvents for both and a decade of practice using them. Do not try the home remedies you’ll find online — most of them set the stain rather than lift it.
The wet-rain question
If you are caught in a sudden downpour and the suit gets wet: hang it on a curved hanger overnight in a well-ventilated room. Do not hang it near a heater or a fan. The wool will dry slowly and uniformly; you will lose almost nothing of the shape. If the lining has soaked through, leave the jacket open on the hanger while it dries.
Storage between seasons
Suits stored in plastic dry-cleaning bags grow musty within a year. Use a breathable cotton garment bag instead — we sell them in the studio for RM 38. Cedar blocks at the foot of the bag deter moths and absorb residual moisture; refresh them with a light sanding once a year.
The lifetime aftercare promise
Every Novablox commission comes with lifetime alterations on the original garment, lifetime pressing, and lifetime button replacement. If a seam opens or a lining wears through, bring it back. Suits we cut five years ago are still walking back in for a press and walking out the same afternoon. That is how the room is meant to work.
— The Novablox cutting table.