Made-to-measure charcoal wool blazer, Italian cloth

A single-breasted blazer in a fine charcoal wool, made to measure rather than bought off a rack: two buttons, peak lapels, jetted pockets, four buttons at each cuff. The cloth is a dense worsted with a fine vertical texture, which reads as a plain grey at arm's length and shows its weave up close.

There is no fashion label. The maker's tag is Daniels Menshop, with branches in Bonn, Aachen, Koblenz and Köln, and the size reads 48 REG. The cloth label gives 100% virgin wool - lana vergine - with the lining in 100% cupro, the Bemberg kind that a good tailor specifies and a factory suit rarely gets. German 48 is a US 38, which is why we list it as an M.

Condition: worn and well kept. The cloth is clean and even with the soft hand a good worsted picks up over time, and the shoulders still sit square.