Buying a long coat when you are short, and judging length from a photo

A long coat is the garment where height differences do the most damage, because the hem lands wherever it lands and your legs do not get longer to meet it. The usual failure is not that the coat is too long in some absolute sense. It is that the hem arrives at the widest part of your calf, or an inch above the floor, and the proportion the designer drew has quietly become a different proportion. This is solvable with a tape measure and about two minutes of arithmetic, before you buy rather than after.

Why the photograph cannot tell you

A fashion photograph is taken on one body, usually a tall one, and almost always with the camera low enough to lengthen the leg. Unless the page states the model's height and the size they are wearing, the image carries no length information at all. It tells you the shape of the coat and nothing about where it will sit on you.

Even when the height is given, the eye converts badly. People look at a hem sitting at mid calf and read that as the coat's identity, when mid calf is a position on that specific body rather than a property of the garment. Move the same coat down to someone fifteen centimetres shorter and the hem does not move: the body does.

Two more things distort the picture. Photographers pin and clip garments at the back to make them hang cleanly, which changes the front hem. And a hem photographed from slightly below always looks higher than it is.

The arithmetic that does tell you

What you need from the listing is a back length, sometimes called centre back length or shoulder to hem, measured from the high point of the shoulder straight down. If the listing gives you a total garment length, that is usually the same measurement.

As a rough working figure, your shoulder point sits at about four fifths of your height. Multiply your height by 0.82 and you get the distance from the floor to your shoulder. Subtract the coat's back length and what remains is roughly how far the hem will sit off the floor.

Worked through: a coat with a 115cm back length, on someone 178cm tall, leaves about 31cm of leg, which is low calf. The same coat on someone 158cm tall leaves about 15cm, which is at or just below the ankle bone. Same coat, completely different garment.

Where you want the hem to land

Useful landmarks, again as approximate fractions of your own height from the floor: the knee crease is around 28%, mid calf around 20%, the narrowest point just above the ankle around 10%. For somebody 158cm tall that is roughly 44cm, 32cm and 16cm.

The place to avoid is the widest part of the calf, which for most people is a few centimetres below mid calf. A hem that cuts there makes the leg below it read as short and stubby, and it is the one position where a coat genuinely does make people look smaller. Either stop above the widest point or carry on well below it.

The other reliable choice is simply long: a hem that clears mid calf and keeps going reads as deliberate. The ambiguous middle, a few centimetres either side of the calf's widest point, is where coats look like they were bought in the wrong size.

Shapes that work on a shorter frame

An unbroken vertical line does more for apparent height than any amount of length management. A single column of buttons, a narrow lapel and a hem with no horizontal detail all help. Double-breasted fronts add a strong horizontal across the chest, which is not a reason to avoid them but is a reason to expect them to shorten you a little.

A belt is a lever. Worn at your own natural waist rather than where the coat's loops happen to sit, it raises the visible break and lengthens the leg. Worn low, it does the opposite. If you are looking at something like The Belted Trench, try the belt two notches higher than feels natural before deciding.

Sleeve length is the most common giveaway and the easiest fix. Sleeves that swallow the hand read as borrowed. A tailor can shorten a coat sleeve from the cuff, and on a simple sleeve it is inexpensive. If you are looking at something described as oversized, like The Oversized Long Coat, read the sleeve measurement as carefully as the body length, because oversized designs often add length to the arm as well as width to the body.

What a tailor can and cannot shorten

Shortening the hem of a coat is usually straightforward and usually the right move. The complications are a lining that has to come up with it, a facing at the front edge that has to be re-set, vents that will need rebuilding, and any detail near the hem such as a pocket, a patch or a buttoned tab that will end up too close to the new edge.

A coat that flares will change shape when you shorten it, because you are removing the widest part of the hem. Taking 10cm off a swing coat gives you a narrower coat, not just a shorter one. A straight shape takes shortening much better.

What cannot be shortened sensibly is the distance from the shoulder to the top button, or the position of a waist seam. If a coat's waist seam lands on your hip, no alteration fixes it, and that is a coat to walk away from. A straighter tailored shape such as The Suit Trench has fewer of these fixed landmarks than a coat with a defined waist, which is one argument for it on a shorter frame.

What to ask before you buy

Ask for the back length and the sleeve length in the specific size you want, not the size the model wore. Ask whether the stated length is taken from the high point of the shoulder or from the base of the collar, because that is a two or three centimetre difference and nobody labels it.

Measure a coat you already own, flat on the floor, shoulder seam to hem, and use it as your reference. This is far more reliable than any size chart, because it is a measurement of a garment you have already judged with your own eyes.

We take no returns on clothing, so a guess on a long coat is an expensive guess. Email us before you order and we will go and measure or ask the supplier for the exact size you want. We would rather do that than take the order and have it be wrong.

Questions people actually ask

How do I know how long a coat will be on me?

Multiply your height in centimetres by 0.82 to get the approximate floor to shoulder distance, then subtract the coat's stated back length. What is left is roughly how far the hem will sit off the floor. Compare that with your knee at about 28% of your height and mid calf at about 20%.

Can short people wear long coats?

Yes. The thing to avoid is a hem that lands at the widest part of the calf, which shortens the leg visually. Either stop above that point or go well below it, keep the vertical line unbroken and get the sleeves shortened if they are long.

Is it expensive to shorten a coat?

Usually not, if the shape is straight and the hem is simple. Cost rises when a lining and front facing have to be re-set, when there are vents to rebuild, or when the coat flares, because shortening a flared hem also narrows it.