Why a made-to-order shirt takes weeks, and what those weeks are

Our delivery times are longer than Amazon's and we are not going to pretend otherwise. To the door: 12–27 days for the US and Canada, 9–23 days for the UK and EU, 16–37 days for Australia and the rest of the world.

Our line. White cloth goes in on the left, printed garment panels come out on the belt, and the sewing stations are the next room over. Nothing here starts until an order exists.

That is a wide range and a long wait by the standards of modern shopping. Here is what is actually happening inside it, so you can decide whether it is worth it rather than wondering whether we forgot your order.

Nothing exists before you order it

There is no warehouse of printed shirts. Your garment does not exist at the moment you buy it, and that is the point — it is why the catalogue can hold tens of thousands of designs in every size without anyone gambling on which ones to stock, and why a design by a single designer with three customers is as available as a bestseller.

The cost of that model is time. Everything below happens after your click, not before it.

Printing comes before sewing

This is the part that surprises people, and it is the reason the wait is longer than for a shirt with a chest print.

With a printed graphic on a blank tee, the shirt already exists; the print is applied to a finished garment. With all-over reactive printing, we print the fabric — the panels — and then cut and sew the garment from that printed cloth. Your order goes through dyeing, fixing, washing, drying, cutting, sewing and quality control.

That sequence is what puts the print on the sleeve, across the shoulder and around the side seam. A finished shirt cannot be printed edge to edge; only fabric can.

Reactive dye needs its own time

The colour bonds chemically with the cotton, then the fabric is washed to remove everything that didn't bond. Skipping or rushing that wash is exactly how a garment ends up transferring colour onto everything it touches. It is unglamorous, it takes hours, and it is why the colour survives 60°C washes later.

Then it crosses the world

We make in Uzbekistan and ship worldwide. Depending on destination and customs, transit is the largest and least predictable part of the range — which is why the ranges are wide rather than a single reassuring number. We would rather quote you the honest spread than a best case you might not get.

What we do not do

• We do not start the clock when the parcel leaves. The ranges above are to your door.
• We do not quote the fast end and hope. If a range says 12–27, both numbers are real.
• We do not hold your order to batch it with others. Production starts on payment.

Express, if you need it

If you have a date to hit, write to us before ordering and we'll tell you honestly whether it is possible. Sometimes it is; sometimes the right answer is that you should buy something else this time, and we would rather say so than take the order and disappoint you.