Shirtmaker · Paris · Founded 1838

Charvet

Said shar-VAY

The first shop in the world to make shirts to measure for whoever walked in, and still the reference.

Charvet opened in Paris in 1838 and effectively invented the shirtmaker's shop: before it, a shirt was made at home or by a dressmaker. It holds one of the largest ranges of shirting cloth anywhere, cuts an individual paper pattern for each bespoke customer, and remains the standard against which shirtmaking is measured.

BespokeMade-to-measureReady-to-wear

Charvet's shop at 28 Place Vendôme, Paris — Charvet store, 28 place Vendôme ; 37 rue Danielle-Casanova, Paris. Hôtel Gaillard de la Bouëxière

House style — shoulder: not documented

Chest — extensive handwork

Fittings 1–2 6–16 weeks

From $650 lowest documented, converted

Inventing a trade

Christofle Charvet opened in 1838 selling shirts made on the premises to individual customers' measurements: a retail proposition that did not previously exist. Within decades the model had been copied across Europe, and the word for the trade in French, chemisier, essentially describes what Charvet did first.

The house moved to Place Vendôme in 1877 and has stayed. Its clientele has included a long list of people whose orders are documented in the house records rather than in anecdote.

The cloth

The distinguishing feature of Charvet as a shop is the range: several floors of shirting held in stock, in quantities and varieties no other shirtmaker attempts. For a customer this changes the nature of the commission; the choice is genuinely open rather than limited to a bunch.

The house also makes ties, and its silks are cut and constructed to a standard that puts them among the handful of ties worth their price.

Commissioning a shirt

A bespoke shirt begins with measurement and a paper pattern cut for the customer, then a trial shirt in most cases, then the order. Houses at this level normally require a minimum order, several shirts rather than one, because the pattern-making is the expensive part and is amortised across the order.

The details that separate a bespoke shirt from a good ready-to-wear one are mostly invisible: a collar attached by hand so it sits closer to the neck, a sleeve set by hand, hand-sewn buttonholes, a pattern matched across the yoke and the front, and a fit through the shoulder and armhole that no size run can produce.

Ties and furnishings

Charvet's ties are made from its own silks and constructed to a standard that puts them among the small number worth their price. The house also makes dressing gowns, pyjamas and the rest of the furnishings trade it has occupied since the nineteenth century.

The shop's range of shirting is the reason people travel to it: several floors of cloth, held in stock, in quantities and varieties no competitor attempts.

The invention of the shirt shop

Charvet's historical claim is specific and unusually well supported: it was the first establishment to make shirts to measure for anyone who came through the door, rather than for an existing clientele of the sort a private tailor served. That sounds like a small distinction and it created the modern shirt trade.

The other thing the house is known for is the sheer extent of the cloth selection, which functions as a genuine service rather than a display: a customer with an exact colour in mind is more likely to find it here than anywhere else, and the staff's ability to navigate it is part of what is being bought.

The record

Founded

1838

City

Paris · 28 Place Vendôme

Country

France

Service levels

Bespoke · Made-to-measure · Ready-to-wear

Shoulder