T.M. Lewin vs Spier & Mackay: which dress shirt is actually worth it?
Side by side on the specifications that decide how a shirt looks after a year: the collar interlining, how the size is arrived at, the cloth, and the price each brand actually advertises rather than the one on the ticket.
Spier & Mackay delivers more shirt per dollar than T.M. Lewin
Spier & Mackay scores 100/100 on specification per dollar against 41/100 for T.M. Lewin. The score weighs two things a shirt is actually judged on after a year: the collar interlining and how the size is arrived at. T.M. Lewin does not publish its collar interlining, so there is nothing there to check. Price is the lowest per-shirt figure each brand advertises itself, not a list price neither of them expects you to pay.
- Lower advertised price: Spier & Mackay — $58 against $86 a shirt
- Collar construction: Spier & Mackay — Spier & Mackay publishes it (fused or unfused, your choice at order); T.M. Lewin does not
| Specification | T.M. Lewin | Spier & Mackay |
|---|---|---|
| List price, one shirtWhat a single shirt costs at full price. | $1151 | $6845 |
| Lowest advertised priceThe per-shirt price the brand itself promotes — its multi-buy ladder or standing sale. | $861 | $5845 |
| Collar interliningA glued collar is what bubbles and curls after a year of washing. Most brands decline to say which theirs is. | Not published by the brand12 | Fused or unfused, your choice at order4 |
| How the size is decidedAlpha sizing asks you to fit the shirt; a drafted pattern fits the shirt to you. | Neck + sleeve length21 | Neck + sleeve length5 |
| Cloth | Twill, poplin, oxford, herringbone, dogstooth and dobby, mostly cotton with some wool blend, in both non-iron and easy-to-iron finishes. No ply or yarn count is published anywhere on the listing. Royal oxford is not offered.1 | Fine 100% Egyptian cotton yarns, used exclusively. Ply and yarn count are not published on the about-our-shirts page, and there is no non-iron or wrinkle-free claim.4 |
| Published construction | Single and double cuffs are offered, with classic, button-down, semi-cutaway and wing collars. Single-needle side seams, split yoke, stitch density, gussets and button material are not published on any page read.1 | Eighteen to twenty-one stitches per inch in single-needle construction — note the unit, per inch, which is not the same measure as a per-centimetre count. A four-piece split yoke cut on the bias, removable collar stays, reinforced triangular gussets at the side seams, pattern matching across seams and sleeves, hand-turned collars and more than twenty-five collar styles.4 |
| Where it is made | No country of manufacture was reached. T.M. Lewin has no country-of-origin page, and none of the pages read names a factory or a country. | No country of manufacture is published. The brand publishes a deep construction spec and no origin at all, which are two different kinds of transparency.45 |
| Returns | Thirty days from order confirmation, unworn and with tags on. The customer pays: the prepaid label price and any taxes and duties are deducted from the refund. There is no exchange at all — the policy requires you to return the shirt and make a separate new purchase. Altered items cannot be returned.3 | Stock shirts: 30 days from delivery at full price, 14 days if discounted, with a prepaid return label for Canadian and US customers and self-arranged returns internationally. A third-party return guide mentions a $15 return shipping fee, which contradicts the prepaid-label statement on the brand’s own FAQ. Custom is different and harsher: all custom clothing is final sale with no refunds, one complimentary remake or store credit on a first custom order, a second remake at 50% of the original price, requests inside 30 days, and a $30 shirt alteration credit in store credit only. Unclaimed items are treated as abandoned and non-refundable after 45 days.567 |
| Turnaround | No dispatch or delivery time was reached on any T.M. Lewin page read for this record. | Custom orders: allow four to six weeks for production and delivery — the longest made-to-measure lead time in this comparison.5 |
| Spec per dollarCollar construction and sizing method against the price actually advertised (0–100). | 41/100 · Fair | 100/100 · Exceptional |
Who each one is for
- T.M. Lewin
- Someone who wants to know in inches what a brand means by "slim" before ordering, and is buying four shirts to trigger the discount.
- Spier & Mackay
- A spec-driven buyer who wants the collar construction, stitch density and yoke published before ordering, and can wait six weeks for a custom shirt.
Questions people ask about this pair
- Is T.M. Lewin or Spier & Mackay cheaper?
- Spier & Mackay. Its lowest advertised price is $58 a shirt against $86 for T.M. Lewin. At full list the two are $115 and $68.
- Which has the better collar?
- Spier & Mackay. Does not publish whether the collar and cuffs are fused. Nothing on the shirt listing or the size guide addresses interlining. Publishes it outright: shirts are offered in fused and unfused constructions with German interlinings. No other brand in this comparison names both the choice and where the interlining material comes from.
- How do I get the right size from T.M. Lewin or Spier & Mackay?
- T.M. Lewin: Formal shirts are sold by collar size and sleeve length across a 14.5 to 20 inch collar range, and T.M. Lewin is the rare brand that publishes the garment chest and waist behind each fit name. At a 15.5 inch collar the four formal fits run Regular 47 inch chest and 44 inch waist, Slim 45 and 40, Fitted 43.5 and 38.5, Super Fitted 41 and 37 — six inches of chest and seven inches of waist from end to end. The casual Relaxed fit switches to alpha sizing, so the brand runs two sizing systems across one shirt range. Spier & Mackay: Ready-to-wear is sold by neck and sleeve; the collection pages that would confirm the fit names were unreachable. For custom, the brand takes body measurements from a tailor or measurements from a shirt that already fits you — there is no questionnaire or algorithm route.
- What are the return policies?
- T.M. Lewin: Thirty days from order confirmation, unworn and with tags on. The customer pays: the prepaid label price and any taxes and duties are deducted from the refund. There is no exchange at all — the policy requires you to return the shirt and make a separate new purchase. Altered items cannot be returned. Spier & Mackay: Stock shirts: 30 days from delivery at full price, 14 days if discounted, with a prepaid return label for Canadian and US customers and self-arranged returns internationally. A third-party return guide mentions a $15 return shipping fee, which contradicts the prepaid-label statement on the brand’s own FAQ. Custom is different and harsher: all custom clothing is final sale with no refunds, one complimentary remake or store credit on a first custom order, a second remake at 50% of the original price, requests inside 30 days, and a $30 shirt alteration credit in store credit only. Unclaimed items are treated as abandoned and non-refundable after 45 days.
What a made-to-measure shirt costs from the workshop
We are not on this page to sell you a third option you did not ask for, so here are the numbers to compare against the table above. A shirt cut to your own measurements in our Hoi An workshop is $39–$59 garment-only, depending on the cloth, with shipping quoted separately. There is no size to pick and no fit name to guess between: the pattern is drafted from your measurements.
Neither T.M. Lewin nor Spier & Mackay is a bad shirt at its price. The question this page exists to answer is what each one publishes about how it is built — and that is in the table, with the sources. See how the measurements are taken.
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Other shirt comparisons
Sources
- 1. T.M. Lewin — men’s shirts collectionbrand · read 2026-09-29
- 2. T.M. Lewin — size guidesbrand · read 2026-09-29
- 3. T.M. Lewin — returns policybrand · read 2026-09-29
- 4. Spier & Mackay — about our shirtsbrand · read 2026-09-29
- 5. Spier & Mackay — frequently asked questionsbrand · read 2026-09-29
- 6. Spier & Mackay — custom / made-to-order return policybrand · read 2026-09-29
- 7. The Return Guide — Spier & Mackay return policy (states a $15 fee)third-party · read 2026-09-29