Our garments run one to two sizes small. They are cut on Asian sizing, which is a different scale from the US and European sizing you are used to, and the difference is not subtle. If you are a US medium you are most likely a large or an extra large here. This is the single most useful sentence on the page and it is the first one for that reason.
We do not accept returns for change of mind, and a size chosen incorrectly is not covered. That makes the size decision the one part of buying from us that you cannot undo, so it is worth five minutes rather than five seconds.
A size letter means nothing on its own. S, M and L are set by whoever cut the garment, and two garments on this site from two different makers will not agree with each other. Where we have measurements, they are printed on the product page under the specifications, and they are the only part of the size information that is actually a fact.
Where a product page has no measurement table, it is because the maker has not published one and we have not yet measured the garment ourselves. We would rather tell you that than copy a chart from somewhere else and present it as checked. A chart we have not verified is a guess wearing the costume of a fact, and you would be the one paying for it.
You need a soft tape. Measure over the underwear you would wear with the garment, not over clothes, and keep the tape level and snug without pulling it tight.
Write them down in centimetres. Almost every maker we buy from publishes in centimetres, and converting once at the start is less error-prone than converting at every comparison.
Comparing your body to a chart involves a judgement about how you want the garment to sit. Comparing one garment to another does not, which is why it is the more reliable of the two.
Find something in your wardrobe of the same type that fits the way you want this to fit. Lay it flat, smooth it out, and measure across the chest from armpit to armpit, across the waist at the narrowest point, and the length from the highest point of the shoulder straight down. A flat measurement doubled is the garment's circumference, so if our table gives a circumference and yours is a flat measurement, double yours before you compare.
Size up. Our makers say the same thing in their own notes, and it holds for a second reason: a garment that is slightly large reads as a choice and a garment that is slightly tight reads as a mistake. On a printed garment there is a third reason, which is that the print area is a fixed size and stretching it across the chest distorts the drawing permanently.
The exception is anything with an elasticated waist, where sizing up can leave the waistband loose with nothing to grip. On those, go by the hip measurement.
Makers measure by hand and ask for two to three centimetres of tolerance. We pass that on rather than hiding it, because it is real: two garments of the same size from the same maker can differ by that much. If you are within two centimetres of the boundary between two sizes, you are effectively choosing between them and the advice above applies.
Boots are sold in the maker's own European numbers, with the US equivalent printed beside each one, because the maker stocks European sizes and every conversion done at packing time is a chance to send you the wrong boot. Measure your foot in centimetres, heel to longest toe, while standing. Where a US half size falls between two European sizes we list the larger one, because length can be taken up with an insole and cannot be added.
Our makers' own listings carry a note that reads, more or less: "Asian sizes are 1 to 2 sizes smaller than European and American people. Choose the larger size if your size is between two sizes. Please allow 2 to 3cm differences due to manual measurement." That warning was sitting on their pages and not on ours, which meant we were taking the order and they were doing the warning. It belongs here.
