FAQ

Norton & Sons was founded in 1821. You can read more about our history here.

We make bespoke and made-to-measure tailored clothes, and made-to-measure shirts.

We make jackets, trousers, suits, overcoats, blazers, waistcoats and shirts. We make both classic and contemporary formal wear and are always pleased to offer advice on the correct attire for any occasion. We make lounge suits and morning dress for weddings, black tie and white tie evening wear, smoking jackets, and morning suits. We offer a wide range of formal wear cloths including superfine wool or mohair barathea, cashmeres, velvet or brocade. We work with the Royal School of Needlework to offer bespoke embroideries. We cut fine country suits, breeches, sporting vests, riding coats, lightweight sporting jackets and field coats and offer an unparalleled collection of tweed fabrics.

Bespoke tailoring as practiced on Savile Row has a very specific meaning. Originally the word bespoke comes from the phrase ‘to bespeak of’ or reserve, a piece of cloth from which to make a suit of clothes.

A Savile Row bespoke garment is made from a hand cut pattern, individually cut from a customer’s unique set of measurements. Cloth is hand cut and the garment must be sewn by hand by a Savile Row trained tailor. Multiple fittings are usually required to achieve the correct fit. Once completed a customer’s pattern, and details of the cloth used to make his or her garment is kept by the tailor for any future needs.

A full description of the bespoke process can be found on the website of the Savile Row Bespoke Association of which Norton & Sons are proud to be a member.

Your first bespoke garment might take up to 12 weeks to complete, but this is dependent upon the work in hand in our workroom, and upon your availability to attend fittings.

Once we have a good pattern for a customer it is usually possible to complete garments in as little as ten working days if required. Such garments would be subject to an expediting cost.

There are almost as many different definitions of Made-to-Measure tailoring as there are tailors who offer it. At Norton & Sons the primary differences are that we start with a pre-cut house pattern, and adjust that to your measurements, and that the majority of the sewing is undertaken by our partner factory, with only the finishing being done by hand on Savile Row. A fuller description of our service can be found here.

Typically it is around 8 weeks.

Typically a first bespoke garment will require 2 or 3 fittings.

On subsequent orders if we have an up-to-date pattern for you we would usually undertake just a single fittings, or if a pattern is well established we can straight-finish garments with no fittings at all. Turn around time for this can be extremely swift, sometime as little as a few days if you find you have a very urgent requirement.

We typically will carry a selection of over 8,000 cloths available in bespoke lengths from the finest British and European cloth houses. It is our policy to offer predominantly cloths from UK Mills, and the great majority of the woollen fabrics we offer are from the mills of Yorkshire and Scotland. Where a great quality UK made cloth is not available, for example for most cotton, linen or silk cloths, we will use cloths from Italian mills. In addition to the cloths we hold in the shop we have access to many thousands more from our cloth houses, so it is very rare we cannot find a cloth that suits your needs. In addition we are always pleased to help you to design and commission bespoke cloths from our partner mills, everything from woollen estate tweeds to cotton or silk jacquards.

The price of your garment is dictated by the price of the cloth you choose, and by any additional extras style details, such as poachers pockets, collar tabs, back pleats, that you might choose.

All prices are inclusive of VAT and are subject to change depending on the final cloth choice.

Bespoke prices are as follows

Jacket from £4,500
Trousers from £1,600
Two Piece Suit from £6,000
Two piece dinner suit starts from £6,600
Overcoat from £5,900

Made-to-Measure prices are as follows
Jacket from £1,750
Trousers from £750
Two Piece Suit from £2,500
Two piece dinner suit starts from £2,880
Overcoat from £2,400

If you live outside the UK you can either reclaim your VAT, or we can ship your clothes directly to your non-UK address in which case we would not charge VAT on your items.

In this instance you would be responsible for paying any applicable local taxes and import duties on your garment.

To reclaim your VAT we will provide you with a VAT refund form which you should have stamped at your point of exit from the UK, typically the airport. You must then mail this stamped form back to us and we will process a full refund of the VAT. This can either be repaid directly, or held on account for your next order. You must complete this process and attain the stamp within 3 months of the final invoice to lawfully receive this refund.

We offer a Made-to-Measure shirtmaking service. The price of your shirt is dictated by the price of the cloth you choose, as well as by any extras such as embroidery which you might choose. Made to Measure shirts start from £225.

Between the five houses that make up the modern house of Norton & Sons we are proud to have held Royal Warrants to Queen Victoria, King Edward VII, King George V, King George VI, The King of Spain, The King of the Belgians, The King of Italy, The King of Portugal, The Emperor of Prussia, The Emperor of Austria, and the Duke of Aosta.

We have made for political and military figures including Winston Churchill, Presidents George Bush and George W. Bush, Presidential candidate Ross Perot Jr, and both General John J Pershing and Baron Manfred von Richthofen.

In addition we have made clothes for many of the history’s most stylish men including Cary Grant, Bing Crosby, and couturier to HM The Queen Sir Hardy Amies.

Discretion is an important part of our service and we do not disclose the names of any current customers, unless they have chosen to mention us themselves first.

In recent years we are pleased to say that we have made clothes for many leading names from the world of art, film, television, music, fashion and design. We were honoured to have made many things for the extraordinary Alexander McQueen. Contemporary figures who have been kind enough to mention us include Christian Louboutin, Kim Jones, Christopher Kane, Jools Holland and Andrew Lincoln.

You have two options.

Firstly you can see us on one of our scheduled tailoring visits to New York or Houston. We typically visit the USA about 5 times a year.

Secondly you can have one of our cutters travel to you wherever you are in the world. If you wish to do this we are very happy to discuss costs.

We are always delighted to make alterations and repairs to Norton & Sons clothes no matter how old they are (in fact we especially lovely to see old pieces). We will always carry out an initial inspection of the garment to be altered and repaired and provide as accurate an estimate as we can of the cost of any work before it is carried out.

If capacity allows we are also happy to discuss undertaking alterations and repairs for regular customers on garments made elsewhere.

The shop is located at number 16 Savile Row, W1S 3PL.

Our building on the older east side of Savile Row is one of just two original buildings remaining on this historic street, built on what was at one time the garden of Burlington House, now part of the Royal Academy.

We are delighted to see you without an appointment however if our team are busy we will always prioritise customers who have booked. For fittings booking an appointment is recommended so that we can ensure your garments are ready for your arrival