Pyjama top in linen hopsack in malt

€485,95

Colours

Size XS S M L XL

The pyjama top fits entirely true to size. The mannequin here — the most standard 40 chest on this planet or any other — is wearing an M.

	XS	S	M	L	XL
To fit chest	36	38	40	42	44
Pit-to-pit	20	21	22	23	24
Back length	28¼	28½	28¾	29	29¼
Sleeve from centre-back	3	34½	35	35½	36

The method of sleeve construction, with the sleeve cut as one continuous panel from neck to cuff, means the shoulders accommodate and drape smoothly over human contours of every shape and size — rendering a shoulder measurement both impossible and irrelevant.

Four-button jacket, made in London, with mid-weight (10oz) linen from a mill in Northern Ireland, and horn buttons from the Cotswolds.

The pyjama top isn't really for bedtime. Rather, it is a light, unstructured jacket, with some of the trappings of old-fashioned jim-jams. It has an open collar, which falls low, and is suited well to being worn in a louche and laid-back manner — over a t-shirt, say, or light shirt — ideally in spring and summer.

A curious type of collar, this — previously found only on uniform jackets in the middling second half of the last century. It is asymmetric, in that one side — the under-side when fastened — has a small notch where the curve of the collar begins, enabling things to sit nice and flush when fastened.

There is a split at the end of the sleeves, which makes turning them up much easier. Again — the pyjama top is a resolutely relaxed affair, and outwardly encourages such gestures when the going gets warm.

A large patch pocket with turn-down detail is stationed at the chest of the jacket. It is deep, the pocket, and positioned quite low at the chest so the treasures stashed within may be very readily retrieved. The turn-down detail, meanwhile, rolls over on itself and is held down with bar-tacks.

This is a half-raglan sleeve — halfway between a set-in sleeve and a full raglan — and is what gives the pyjama top its blend of soft shoulder, like a full raglan, but with less smart and sporty lines. The sleeves are lined with a slinky satin to allow arms to slide in and out without friction.

The buttons on the jacket are large, solid horn — dark in colour and matte in finish — and each is a little different from one to the next. They are in that regard as if alpha-keratin snowflakes — such is the beauty of being a product of a high-grade natural material, rather than, say, a plastic replica.

The sleeves of the jacket are fully lined with a slinky satin, making donning and undonning it a breeze, and helping to reduce friction with whatever is worn underneath.

Tremendously earthy, this cloth, but subtle in colouring and smooth in finish, and so staying the right side of smart. It is fine, long-staple linen, mercerised for a sleek look and sanforised to remove shrinkage. It is thick and strong, and creases less than most cottons, let alone crumpled, unkempt linens of stereotype.

As worn

Him, here, is as standard a 38 as ever there was, with a height of 6ft 1in and a weight of 12 stone, and is wearing a sizeS.

Makers of

The jacket is made at an outerwear factory in London: the best, many agree, in the capital. The jacket is cut by the hands of a cutter with some 30 years in the trade, and sewn by one of four seamsters whose meticulousness and pursuit of perfection would be caricature were the end results not always so good.

The cloth is woven by a linen mill, a few miles south of Belfast in Northern Ireland. The mill was built at the end of the 1800s, back when Belfast was "Linenopolis". That it's one of the last mills still standing in the area is testament to its exemplary work in the weaving, dying, and finishing of luxury-grade linen.

The horn buttons are cut, shaped, and polished by the last horn button-makers in Britain. Relocated from the Midlands to the Cotswolds, they continue a tradition going back to the 18th century."It is no easy task,"claimed William Hutton in 1780,"to enumerate the infinite diversity of buttons made in Birmingham."