Navy Felted Virgin Wool Jacket - Dropped Shoulder Coat for OEM

A navy jacket from LABO.ART in a soft felted virgin wool, cut relaxed with dropped shoulders, a classic collar, a button-down front and hidden pockets in the side seams, listed at 706 GBP with three of four sizes in stock and the 0 sold out. It is by a wide margin the most expensive reference this run has examined, and it publishes pit to pit, sleeve and length for all four sizes. The number that stops you is the sleeve: 55, 59, 63 and 67 cm, four centimetres per size, against two centimetres of chest width and one of body length. A sleeve that grades twice as fast as the body is either a very deliberate pattern decision or a measurement that starts from a point which moves, and on a dropped shoulder garment it is usually both. The reference is the Nora Feltro Jacket in Atlantic. Dongguan Bafinasa Garments Co., Ltd. develops comparable wool outerwear on OEM and ODM terms, from cloth selection and pattern work to retail or FBA ready packing. We publish this as a development reference and build your own version of it, and we do not supply the branded original or reproduce anyone else's label.

Key Features

• 100% virgin wool felted cloth as stated, made in Italy, dry clean only
• Sleeve grading four centimetres per size against two of chest width, the widest sleeve grade in this run. See the note below
• Dropped shoulders stated explicitly. See the note below
• Relaxed fit with a classic collar and a button-down front as stated
• Hidden side seam pockets as stated, which is a cleaner and more expensive pocket than a patch
• A three column table for all four sizes
• Three of four sizes in stock, with size 0 sold out

Customisable Options

• Cloth: felted virgin wool to the reference, with the fibre fineness in microns and the weight set to your market since neither is given
• Fibre: 100% virgin wool to the reference, or a wool nylon blend for abrasion resistance, or a wool cashmere blend for hand
• Shoulder: dropped to the reference, or a set in shoulder with a sleeve cap, which changes the sleeve grade entirely
• Pockets: hidden in the side seams to the reference, or patch, or welt, quoted separately
• Fit: relaxed to the reference, with the ease reducible by four to six inches for a closer coat
• Edges: raw or topstitched edges as a felted cloth allows, or bound, or fully lined
• Fibre fineness, cloth weight, ease, sleeve length, body length, pocket style, edge finish, lining, size set, colour development, private label and care labelling

Specifications

Size Chart as Published by the Reference

The chest figures are flat half measures taken with the garment laid down, doubling to 110, 114, 118 and 122 cm around, or 43.3 through 48.0 in, which is about twelve inches of ease at size 0 falling to about eleven at size 3. That is ordinary for a relaxed coat meant to go over knitwear. The sleeve is the column that does not behave: it runs 55, 59, 63 and 67 cm, four centimetres per size, while the chest grades two centimetres flat per size and the length one. Over four sizes the sleeve grows twelve centimetres and the body length grows three, and no origin is stated for the measurement.

Our Proposed Body Chart

Occasions and Styling

Suits autumn and winter, everyday wear, work and smart casual, and it is a layering piece. A felted wool at this length works over a shirt or a knit and under nothing heavier, and the dropped shoulder and the hidden pockets make it a coat you wear open as much as buttoned.

Production and Quality Control

The reference states its fibre, describes the cloth as felted, names the shoulder construction, describes the collar, the front and the pockets, gives a care instruction and states the country of make. Three things follow: what a four centimetre sleeve grade means on a dropped shoulder, what felted wool is and what it allows a maker to do, and what a seven hundred pound garment is still published without.

Four centimetres of sleeve per size, and the shoulder that explains most of it, and that is the first thing. The sleeve runs 55, 59, 63 and 67. Four centimetres a size is roughly four times the grade on the body length and twice the grade on the flat chest, and no human arm lengthens by four centimetres between two adjacent sizes. Part of it is real, because a sleeve on a coat does grade faster than a body length, and one to one and a half centimetres a size is normal. The rest is construction, and this page gives away which construction: dropped shoulders. On a dropped shoulder the point where the sleeve begins is out on the arm rather than at the shoulder joint, so as the body widens by two centimetres of flat width per size, which is one centimetre on each side, the sleeve origin moves outwards with it, and any measurement taken from a neck or centre back point inherits that movement as well as the real growth in the arm. Add the two and a four centimetre grade is arithmetically reasonable. The problem, as on so many pages in this run, is that the origin is not stated, and without it the 55 cm figure cannot be compared with anything: not with the 58 cm on the set in shoulder poplin shirt, not with the 59 cm on the wool top in this batch, and not with the 69 cm on the parka which at least said from the neck. There is a second point inside the same column that is worth a pattern cutter's attention. A grade of four centimetres a size over four sizes means the largest size has sleeves twelve centimetres longer than the smallest on a body that is only six inches taller, and it means the cuff will sit at a completely different point on the hand across the range unless the cuff width and the sleeve taper are adjusted with it. On a relaxed coat that may be exactly the intent, since a longer sleeve on a bigger body is a deliberate proportion, but it is a decision that should be visible on the spec rather than buried in a column nobody explains. Our own practice is to publish the origin and to grade the sleeve against a fit model at the top and bottom size, which is the only way to see whether the proportion is working.

Felted wool, and what a cloth that does not fray lets you do, and that is the second thing. Felted or boiled wool is a woven wool cloth that has been fulled, meaning it has been wetted, heated and worked so the fibres migrate and the cloth contracts and consolidates. Three consequences follow and they are all useful to a maker. The cloth becomes denser and warmer for its weight and it holds a shape without much help from structure, so a coat can be made with less interfacing and less lining than the same shape in a plain woven wool. It does not fray, because the fibre is locked rather than merely interlaced, so seams can be left raw or butted and topstitched, which is a distinctive and expensive looking finish that no woven cloth can take, and which saves the cost and the bulk of binding or overlocking every edge. And it is less prone to shrinking further, since much of the potential shrinkage has already happened in the fulling, which is part of why a felted garment is more stable in wear than an untreated one. There are costs on the other side. The cloth takes more wool per finished metre, because it has been shrunk down from a larger piece, which is the main reason a felted wool costs more than a plain woven one of the same nominal weight. It has less drape and more body, so it makes a shape rather than following one, and a silhouette that needs to fall softly will not come out of this cloth. It is heavier per square metre for the same warmth in some constructions, and the hand is firmer, which some customers read as rustic. And no specification is given here at all: no fibre fineness in microns, no weight, and no degree of felting, so there is no way to source an equivalent from the page. Anyone developing this needs all three numbers, and especially the degree of fulling, since it decides both the weight and the residual shrinkage. We would also want a shrinkage test on the bulk cloth before cutting, because felted wools vary more between lots than woven ones do.

Seven hundred and six pounds, and the specifications that are still missing, and that is the third thing. This is the most expensive reference examined in this run, more than three times the price of the cotton parka and twice the wool top in this batch, and it publishes three columns and no more. There is no fibre fineness, which on a garment worn against the neck decides whether it is comfortable, and virgin wool says only that the fibre is new. There is no cloth weight, so nobody can tell whether this is a light coating or a heavy one or what it will cost. There is no lining statement at all, and on a wool coat that is a real gap: a felted cloth can be made unlined with raw or bound edges, which is lighter and cheaper, or half lined in the sleeves and the back, or fully lined, and the three are different garments to wear and to quote, and the difference in cost between them is not small. There is no shoulder or across back measurement, which is the measurement that decides where a dropped shoulder actually falls and therefore how the whole coat reads, and on a garment built around a dropped shoulder it is the most conspicuous absence on the page. The pockets are described as hidden in the side seams, which is a genuinely more expensive pocket than a patch, since it has to be set into a seam with a clean finish and it adds an operation, and it is worth saying so because customers read a hidden pocket as a sign of a better make and it is one. No model information appears, so the 84 cm length, which is a long coat finishing below the knee on most heights, cannot be read against a body. And the care instruction is dry clean only, which for a heavy felted wool coat is the correct and conventional instruction and which carries the running cost this run has already discussed on the wool top beside this one. Every bulk shipment gets a measurement report against your approved chart.

Optional upgrades include stating the fibre fineness in microns and the cloth weight, without which a felted wool cannot be sourced or costed, specifying the degree of fulling and running a shrinkage test on the bulk cloth, publishing shoulder and across back measurements, which on a dropped shoulder garment decide the whole silhouette, publishing the sleeve origin and grading the sleeve against a fit model at the top and bottom size, offering unlined with raw or bound edges, half lined and fully lined versions and quoting them separately, since felted wool makes all three possible and the cost difference is real, a set in shoulder version off the same block, a closer fit with four to six inches less ease, patch or welt pocket alternatives, a shorter length option, a model height and body measurements, size set, colour development, private label, hangtag and care labelling.

Pre-production sample approval, in-line inspection during cutting and sewing, and a final AQL inspection before packing, with measurement reports and photos shared before shipment.

Send us your tech pack, a photo or a reference garment and we will quote within 24 hours. Contact bafinasa@bafinasa.com or WhatsApp +86 13827222469.