FAQ
Are Signatario Shirts cotton shirts?
Signatario
Shirts are 100% fine cotton shirts. With a minimum of 120 thread count (top 1%
of world’s luxury cotton output), the fabric are sourced from the top global
mills.
What type of
FIT does Signatario offer?
Signatario
shirts at the moment offer only REGULAR Fits and in sizes 39,40,42,44 & 46.
To ensure you have the right fit and clear any doubts you may have, kindly
visit our FIT & Size section (https://signatario.co.in/fit-size-guide)
What makes
Signatario Shirt different?
Signatario
shirts are essentially made to meet the finest criteria for luxury shirts.
While every commercial brand globally makes shirts to suit every man, there are
compromises made to meet the costs and prices. Signatario shirts target
typically only the top 20% of shirt wearers who buy the product of their choice
than a shirt that meets a certain price. The difference is very visible and
perceivable to both the wearer as well as those who see them. More of the
differences can be read in our section (https://signatario.co.in/why-signatario-shirts)
What is the
Price of a Signatario Shirt?
The brand is
built around a philosophy to keep things simple and play it honest. Our
strength is to provide our customers a product that puts a “wow” in his mind.
We do not compromise on product quality, materials, workmanship etc just to
sell more people our shirts. We benchmark with the top global luxury brands in
terms of quality and fineness of fabrics and materials etc. However, we believe
in making Luxury shirts essentials for our customers. Therefore, we knock off the celebrities, real estate and chandeliers to sell only direct to
our customers worldwide online without any middleman to give you
fantastic prices always.
We are typically a year around “Buy More Save More” prices. Now on Clearance Sale for very short period of time. Hurry!Learn more at (https://signatario.co.in/offers-promotions). To keep the spirit of our buy more save more program, even on Sale, you will gain more as you buy more. (Reduced prices and buy more to save more discounts applies automatically when you checkout your cart based on the quantity added). It applies evenly to any currency of choice you use to shop at Signatario.
Where can I
buy the Signatario Shirt?
We are available
in our boutique in Mumbai, India (Signatario, G 72 Heera Panna Shopping Centre,
Hiranandani Gardens, Mumbai 400076). We are not available with any other
retailer anywhere in the world.
We serve our
customers worldwide online through www.signatario.co.in
Delivery is Free
anywhere within India and takes typically 1-3 days at the maximum. Global
orders are charges “actual” shipping cost based on Global Speedpost rates which
are transparent. We do not wish to saddle you with any cost that is not fair
for shipping. (https://signatario.co.in/policy)
What is
Signatario’s Return Policy?
We do not
believe in pushing our products through to an unwilling customer. We have
worked hard to ensure that every customer makes any informed buy of the shirt
he chooses. Signatario ensures that complete details on the product is
available (much more than what is usually done as a practice) and also offers
online chat help or telephonic assistance if needed before making a purchase.
Similarly, we ensure our products are 100% defect free to eliminate any chance
for returns on account of product quality.
For the chance occasion
where a genuine customer makes an inadvertent error of judgement esp. relating
to size etc, we give a time period of 7 days for the customer to return the
products in unused and original condition back to us for us to exchange/
refund. Read details here (https://signatario.co.in/policy)
We do not extend
a return policy for our overseas customers at the moment due to complex issues
of inbound customs duty and foreign exchange remittances involved.
What makes a
fine shirt different and special?
Shirts are common and perhaps less understood too. While they may
look similar compromises on product quality get masked easily by the shrill
pitch of marketing campaigns. The key qualities of a good shirt are
1. The
fabric forms the heart of the shirt and its quality is the most important
aspect. It must retain its quality; wash after wash, through its lifetime. The
finer the yarns, the better its breathability in a hot and humid weather,
besides the silk like comfort and perpetual natural lustre which are properties
of only the highest end cotton fibre. A mere look at the shirts is enough to
differentiate. Worldwide the finest shirt makers in Italy or in England will
proudly say that they work with the best fibres rather than try to market with
some finish and coating. You market products with coating to mask the quality
of inherent fibres in the fabric most times.
2. The
pride of a shirt is its firm collar. A drooping and wrinkled collar is a sore
sight. A good quality can be made only with superior interlinings and good
process control. With some experience just the feel can tell you if the collar
will last long. A fine shirt always sports a proud collar. Look around and you
will be surprised that it is hard to find good collars.
3. Comfort
is an important aspect that a good craftsman builds into the shirt with skill
and intelligence. How the fabric is used in different places of the shirt
speaks volumes about this. Look for details like a carefully constructed split
yoke shoulder that makes arm movements effortless. Best shirts will never
ignore these fine details. While it may not be so apparent, there is science to
integrate body movement patterns to cuts in the fabric and the good shirt
makers will not compromise comfort for just looks alone.
4. Look
for the variety a shirt maker brings to the collection. If he is able to ensure
the details are good across patterns then you can fairly know that skilled
craftsmen have made these shirts. You will seldom see ordinary shirt makers
play with complex and intricate pattern and weaves on fabrics.
5. Likewise,
there are some more details that confirm the interest of the shirt maker. These
include the way button holes are made, the choice of sewing threads to suit the
fineness of the yarns etc. A poorly made shirt is easily visible in comparison
and the details will often stick as an eyesore. Once you have seen and
experienced well made shirts you will just not feel like going back to an
ordinary one ever. Awareness builds tastes and changes habits forever.
Why are good shirts so rare and what are
the commercial brands selling?
Shirts are today made for all requirements. Most commercial brands
grow in size to be able to cater to as wide a market as possible. Requirements
vary from a basic functional requirement to have defining standards that
identifies well with the attributes of the wearer. Compromises on various
features of the product therefore separates one brand from another.
The single biggest area where compromises are made in commercial branded
shirts is the fabric – They choice of fabric varies from polyester fabric,
cotton-polyester blends, 100% cotton fabrics (lower grade cotton to the highest
grade and fineness, coated fabrics for instant appeal to natural finishes).
The next difference will be in the way a shirt is constructed –
priority to saving cloth to a priority to comfort for the wearer. This is
reflected in the comfort and fit most times
The last general point of variance is quality of workmanship
–cheap accessories like collars that appear plastic like, very visible stitch
holes along joints, visible seams with thicker threads that stand out, poorly
finished buttons and button holes.
Most brands commercially available will fall into this wide range
defined. Majority commercial brands including very large ones will pick the
most valuable part of the shirt for compromise – fabric. Therefore, it is not
unnatural to see 99% of shirts available in the world closer to the range of
50s to 70s thread count cotton. It is this reason that most customers also feel
indifferent to the different brands they try as broadly they follow similar
methods and though process to make your shirts
Signatario Shirts are made with an intent to stick to the highest
standards that the finest luxury brands hold. We differ from them in the way we
see our products and business. Our strength is purely on the product
attributes. While the Earls and the Barons may find Signatario Shirts
indistinguishable from their Luxury brand choices, every customer of ours is as
special as a royalty because he appreciated the value in the products.
What are the coatings on cotton fabrics?
Why are they done? Blended Cotton Fabrics?
Fibres are plenty to make clothes and there is competition in this
space. Technology is progressively making new inroads to improve man-made
fibres. Cotton is still the preferred choice especially so among the more
informed customers.
Man made fabrics like polyesters, rayon, viscose are far cheaper
than cotton. The artificial fibres have sheen and shine which lasts lifetime
and can be very light too. But all man-made fibres are water repelling. They
will not absorb water and moisture and trap heat within them. This is the
worst thing to have in a tropical climate. The breathability of fabric is best in
natural fabric like cotton and linen. With breathability an issue, additional
technological solution comes our way with dri-fit by having layers and playing
with the structure of the yarn to absorb extreme sweat etc. Despite all, the
climatic conditions don’t help wearing artificial fibres for long and in the
open. Variants keep coming into the market with names changing every time with
half-truths in marketing campaigns which will liberally use words like natural,
liquid, intelligent, smart etc. They have their use as a cost effective medium
and are liberally used in today’ world of fast fashion where use and throw
concept necessitates lower cost. One must remember that these innovations have
come from the West where the climatic conditions ensure that the man-made
fibres don’t hurt you as much as in tropical and humid weather of Asia.
Coated fabrics (stain free, odour free, wrinkle free) are at times
used to boost marketing campaigns in lieu of higher quality fabrics. This is
achieved by special treatments on the fabric. For instance a nano silver
particle treatment is a well known method to produce odour free coatings.
However, with sweat & oil secreted which become sticky the coatings are
often times rendered less worthwhile within a couple of washes. Studies have
proved that more than 35%-50% of nano silver particles are washed away within a
couple of washes rendering the efforts and investment futile! These washed
Silver ions are extremely harmful to aquatic animals and are serious pollutants
is yet another matter though. Other options include using anti microbial
triclosan which some soaps too advertise heavily. These coating too don’t last
beyond a few wash and also react with skin at times to form complex compounds
blocking pores.
Treated Cotton fabrics with features like never iron, wrinkle free
or stain free are brought about by altering the cellulose bonds with
specialised coatings and baking them to keep the broken bonds in place. That
could be seen as a layman’ understanding behind non iron shirts. The longevity
of the coatings is subjective beyond half a dozen washes. The coatings while
helping you to get rid of ironing shirts compromise on breathability and
absorption ability of the fibre.
Fine cotton fabrics will show some crease at the end of the day.
You will see these happening not as much from crumpling (physical stress as in
case of coarse linen) but because it absorbs the tiny sweat drops you create.
You will notice it in the joints of your arms in general. But this is a quality
of cotton for which it is treasured and considered healthy to wear in tropical
climates. Water molecules break the long cellulose chain when they are
absorbed. It is this reason why it is easy to iron fine cotton inside out and
using a bit of moisture (water or steam). The mild moisture allows the heat of
the iron to have the shape you want while ironing.
Summary, natural fibre is the best your body needs. Cotton does
not have a natural affinity to bond with any artificial coating making them
short lived. Technology may help come very close to nature but it is not quite
there in every aspect at least as yet.
Why are collars in most shirts drooping
and out of shape?
The pride of a shirt is the uprightness of its collar through its
lifetime. The choice of interlinings that make the collars and the process of
making the collars decide the pride of your shirt.
Good interlinings are rare. Over the years there are plenty of
mass produced interlinings in the market. But none of them gives you the
consistency and quality that allows you to confidently say that my shirts have
firm collars.
The
best interlinings are very few to choose from. The ability to choose a good
interlining and differentiate from the poorer but similar looking ones is not
there with most. A good understanding of the process, chemistry, fabric and the
role of the interlinings helps in choosing the best ones.
Good interlinings simply explained have a few roles.
a. It
should provide stiffness and support to the fabric and provide a firm collar
while remaining soft enough not to hurt your neck.
b. The
material used must ensure that the differential shrinkage between the
interlining and cloth should not cause ugly warping and wrinkles after a few
washes and rounds of ironing.
c. The
resin used must of high quality to ensure the bonding is for life. A good resin
ensure properties and get cured fully when the collar is being made
An easy test will be to see if your collar can retain shape or if there are
wrinkles on the inside part of the collar after a couple of washes. You should
be able to crush your collar easily without feeling like crushing a plastic
like thing. We can guarantee that 9 in 10 of the shirts around you would not
pass this simple test.
The final part of the collar and cuff making comes with process
control. The process parameters are fixed after experimentation. It has a
direct co-relation with the varieties and quality of fabric you use in making
your different shirts. It is also this reason that shirt brands which try to
make shirts for every budget and therefore use all kinds of fabric often
compromise in the quality and consistency of the collars and cuffs made. The
right space for the bend in the collar ensures you do not wear away the cloth
on top of the interlining because of the strain. This is a reason when you see
torn fabric in the joints/ bend in the collar from inside.
A
shirt appears to be a simple product but in a carefully crafted shirt you will
see plenty of instances to say that it is a blend of art, skill, science and
engineering. Understanding the body part movement, ratios of body part like
neck, shoulder etc allows you to craft better collars that stand stiff and
proud giving the majestic look a shirt should give.
What brings a lustre/ shine in a fabric?
The lustre is either natural or brought about with artificial
coatings or blend of artificial fibres. We will discuss the lustre as it
appears in nature with cotton fibres. The top quality cotton fibre as it is
naturally occurs is very fine. The micronaire of the fibre, its uniformity are
product of nature. This low and uniform micronaire of the fibre results in for
best reflectance. Its ability to absorb light is a lot lesser than other fibres
and the uniformity ensure scattering of light is minimal. Speaking in layman’
terms, what you see is a nature’ way of showing total internal reflection when
you see a close set of very fine fibres woven together! Therefore a lasting
sheen and lustre is largely a function of the grade of cotton alone.
While the best fibres bring in natural attributes for high
reflectance and uniformity etc, processing abilities and a good control on that
is achieved by very few mills. Dyeing is another important process where
process control and abilities vary so much that for the same thread count
fabrics made by different mills will clearly show who excels the game. The kind
of dye also matters. While mordant dyes are seen across the world, very few
mills world over have expertise when it comes to vat dyes. The skill levels
needed for accuracy and uniform penetration and after treatment makes the kings
what they are despite the competition from thousands of ‘large” mills. Such
mills are barely more than a dozen and these specialise in fine fabrics. Fine
yarns allow better dye penetration and control and allow richer colours too.
Now we move to understand lustre in fabrics as marketed by several
mills. When the grade of cotton fibre is less than the best, the resulting
fabric has several flaws which affect the dyeing, lustre etc. For fabrics to be
attractive certain minimum lustre helps and this is attained by treating the
fabrics with several processes. Each company tries to make slight variations
and call these coatings by different names to market them as unique.
Essentially by having a very fine coating over the yarn/ fabric, we are ensuring
that light is falling on an uniform surface, typically a polymer based layer
akin to a coating of fine film of polyester (word used for sake of better
understanding). These layers are no more than a few microns in thickness and
typically break away over the first few washes. This is a reason why you see
most fabrics lose their shine and glow after a few washes.
With the rationale and science behind the sheen explained, you
will see that polyester and cotton-polyester blended fabrics are shinier in
appearance. Many fast fashion products are typically reliant on man made fibres
which are much cheaper than cotton and have an appearance that can draw the
impulsive nature in a customer with its shine.