Autumn Winter 2026

Made to beinherited

Town and country tailoring, drafted by one cutter and finished by hand in our rooms above Jermyn Street.

The houseNo. I

Since 1891 we have kept the same narrow rooms on Jermyn Street, where every coat is drafted by one cutter, basted and fitted twice, then finished by hand. We make clothes for the long view, and we expect them to outlast the man who orders them.

1891The year Edmund Whitcombe and Arthur Lyle opened their cutting room

80 hrsOf handwork in a single bespoke coat, from first draft to final press

IVGenerations of cutters trained at the same board in St James's

Town & Country

A young man in a long camel overcoat standing in a stone doorway — i.The Ashdown overcoat in camel cashmere, cut long and worn open.

A Georgian country house at dusk with lit windows — ii.Our country department has dressed estates for the shooting season since 1958.

Two wardrobes, one cutting room. Worsted and flannel for the week in town; tweed, moleskin and heavy melton for Friday onwards.

See the catalogue

An older gentleman in a brown check suit and silver tie standing by a curtained window — iii.Brown houndstooth in a country weight, worn with a silver tie and a watch chain.

TheLookbook

Six looks from the Autumn Winter 2026 collection, photographed between St James's and the country.

A grey-haired man in a charcoal three-piece suit and grey tie — I
The Pall Mall three-piece
Charcoal flannel, silver-grey wool tie

A man in a grey check double-breasted jacket standing before carved oak doors — II
The Hartington
Prince of Wales check, double-breasted

An older gentleman in a brown check suit standing at a tall curtained window — III
The country house
Brown houndstooth, silver tie, watch chain

Hands fastening the button of a navy suit jacket — IV
The St James's
Navy chalk stripe, double-breasted

A man in a grey double-breasted wool coat and black roll neck — V
The Rothbury coat
Grey melton, black merino roll neck

An older gentleman in a navy check jacket seated in a panelled room — VI
The reading room
Navy check jacket, pale grey poplin

Every piece in the lookbook can be ordered made to measure.

Browse the catalogue

Autumn Winter 2026

TheCatalogue

Each piece is shown in its house cloth. Choose another from more than four thousand bunches in the cutting room at your fitting.

15 pieces

TheAtelier

Four rooms, eleven tailors and a pattern for every client since 1891. This is how a coat comes to be made on the second floor.

I.
The Cloth

We begin at the bunches. Flannel from the West of England, tweed woven on Harris and in the Borders, cashmere for coats. You leave with a swatch of what you chose, pinned to your order.
II.
The Cut

Your cutter takes some thirty measurements, then drafts a paper pattern that is yours alone. It is chalked onto the cloth and cut by hand with shears older than most of our clients.
III.
The Hand

A canvas of horsehair and linen is pad-stitched into the chest so the coat moulds to you with wear. Buttonholes are worked by hand in cotton twist; the collar alone takes a day.
IV.
The Finish

Two fittings, sometimes three, before the final press. We keep your pattern in the archive for as long as you, or your sons, care to return.

The finest compliment we receive is a coat sent back to us, sixty years on, to be fitted for its third owner.
Thomas Ashby, Head Cutter

Since 1891

TheHouse

Five generations of the same families have climbed our stairs. Some of them still ask for the cutter their grandfather saw.

Whitcombe & Lyle began as two young cutters with one board and a borrowed window. The house has grown slowly, on purpose, and never left St James's.

Founder, 1891

1891
Two cutters, one board
Edmund Whitcombe and Arthur Lyle take the first floor above a hatter's on Jermyn Street and cut their first frock coat.
1924
The panelled room
The house takes the whole building. The oak fitting room on the first floor has barely changed since.
1958
The country department
Tweeds, breeks and shooting coats for estates from Northumberland to the Highlands, tested in the field each season.
1987
Ready to wear
A small collection cut on our house patterns, for gentlemen who need a coat by Friday.
Today
The fourth generation
Eleven tailors, two apprentices and an archive of more than forty thousand paper patterns.