What tailoring actually costs and what's worth paying for

The cheapest job on a tailor's board will do more for how you look than anything else you buy this year. Hemming a pair of trousers costs less than lunch in most cities. It's also the difference between looking like the clothes belong to you and looking like you borrowed them.

Start there. Then work up the list, because the price of alterations climbs fast and not evenly, and knowing the order saves you real money.

The rough order, cheapest to most expensive

Most shops post a price list on the wall or hand you one. The numbers vary a lot by city, but the ranking barely varies at all. From cheapest to dearest:

• Trouser hem. Straightforward, fast, often same-week. Cuffs cost a little more than a plain hem.
• Taking in a shirt. Side seams, or darts in the back. Cheap, and it transforms a boxy off-the-rack shirt.
• Shirt sleeve shortening. Cheap unless there's a placket to rebuild, which there usually is, so ask.
• Trouser waist in or out. Cheap. There's typically an inch or two of fabric in the seat to play with, sometimes more.
• Tapering the leg. Cheap. Also the single most commonly overdone alteration in existence.
• Jacket sleeve length. Middling. Shortening from the cuff is the normal method. If the jacket has working buttonholes, the tailor has to go in at the shoulder instead and the price jumps.
• Jacket waist suppression. Middling. Taking in the side seams and centre back gives you shape through the torso.
• Skirt or dress hem. Middling, and it depends entirely on construction. A plain hem is quick. A lining, a pleat, a bias cut or a vent turns it into a real job.
• Zip replacement. Middling, and worth it on a coat you like.
• Jacket shoulders. Expensive. Very expensive.
• Shortening a jacket body. Expensive, and it wrecks the proportions of the pockets and vents.

That list is the whole strategy. Everything above the line is worth doing on almost any garment you like. Everything below it, you avoid by buying better in the first place.

Buy for the shoulders, alter the rest

A tailor can fix your waist, your sleeves, your hem, your rise and your leg width. What a tailor cannot economically fix is the shoulder seam sitting an inch off your actual shoulder, or a chest that's too tight, or a jacket that's simply cut short for your torso.

So when you're trying things on, ignore everything but the shoulders and the chest. If those two are right and the rest is baggy, buy it. If the shoulders are wrong and everything else is perfect, put it back. I've watched people spend more on shoulder surgery than the jacket cost, and it still never looked right, because the armhole and the sleeve head were engineered for a different body.

Same logic in a women's blazer or a coat. Shoulder line and chest first. Waist, sleeve and hem are all cheap conversations.

Budget it as part of the purchase price

The mistake is treating alterations as a surprise expense after the fact. They're part of what the garment costs. A suit that fits nobody off the rack and needs trousers hemmed, a waist taken in and both sleeves shortened has a real price that's higher than the tag.

My rule of thumb, and it's a judgement not a law: I'll spend up to about a quarter of what the garment cost on making it fit, if I'm going to wear it weekly. On something I'll wear three times a year, I won't. On a sale rack bargain I only half like, I won't spend a dollar — the alteration bill is often what turns a mediocre impulse buy into an expensive mediocre impulse buy.

Run the cost-per-wear in your head at the counter. A work jacket you'll put on once a week for five years justifies almost any sensible alteration. A wedding-guest dress doesn't.

What to bring to the fitting

Turn up wrong and you'll pay twice.

• The shoes you'll actually wear with it. Trouser length is measured off the shoe. A hem set over sneakers is wrong over dress shoes and you'll be back.
• The belt. It changes where the waistband sits.
• The shirt or layer that goes underneath. A blazer pinned over a t-shirt will be tight over a dress shirt and a knit.
• Your normal posture. Don't stand at attention, don't hold your breath, don't suck it in. The tailor is fitting the person who wears the clothes, not the person in the mirror for ten seconds.

Empty your pockets, too. A phone in a trouser pocket skews the drape.

Say what bothers you, then stop talking

Good tailors have seen thousands of bodies and thousands of garments. Tell them what's bugging you — "it's loose through here," "the sleeve swallows my hand" — and let them decide the method. Don't arrive with a number of inches you read somewhere. You'll get exactly what you asked for and it won't look right.

Ask three questions before you hand anything over. What will you do? What does it cost? When's it ready?

Get a ticket. Expect one to two weeks as standard. Rush work costs extra and it's a fair charge, not a shakedown.

And a second fitting is normal on structured pieces. A tailor who wants you back once before finishing is doing the job properly. That fitting shouldn't cost you anything.

Where people go wrong

Over-tapering. Slim is not the same as narrow. A trouser leg that clings to your calf looks like you outgrew it. Ask for the hem opening to be reduced modestly, then live with it for a week before going further. You can always take more off. You can't put it back.

Altering before you've worn it. Wear the shirt for a day. Sit down in the trousers. Reach forward in the jacket. Things reveal themselves.

Using the dry cleaner counter for structured work. Plenty of cleaners have a genuinely skilled tailor in the back, and plenty subcontract to someone who only does hems. Both are fine for a hem. For a jacket, ask directly who's doing the work and whether they do jackets regularly.

Trying to save a garment that's wrong. No alteration fixes a fabric you don't like or a colour that doesn't suit you.

Finding someone good

Ask a man whose clothes fit where he goes. That's it — that's the whole method, and it beats reviews.

When you find someone, start small. Give them a hem. See how it comes back. Check the work before you leave the shop, in the light, with the shoes on. If it's right, give them the shirt next, then the jacket. A tailor who knows your body and your preferences after five visits is worth more than a famous name who's never seen you stand up.

Pay cash if that's what they prefer, tip on a big job, and don't haggle. This is skilled handwork by someone who trained for years and is charging you less than it's worth.

The most expensive thing hanging in your closet is the jacket you spent good money on and never wear because something about it feels off. A tailor can usually tell you what that something is in about fifteen seconds.