Club Obi Wan

So after a decade of owning the jacket and barely wearing it, I made an interesting observation about Nowak's Crystal Skull collar. Now, I've been off these boards for a while, so forgive me if someone else mentioned this already, but this was pretty interesting to me.

For some reason, although I purchased several different Crystal Skull jackets, the collar never looked right to me. I could never really put my finger on it, but I think I figured it out.

What I noticed was that the collar sits somewhat high on the back, but sits very low on the collarbone. In fact, it sits so low on the front that the collar stand is exposed.

Especially after having the jacket on a hanger for a decade now, I think this effect has really been trained into the jacket. But, what I find is that if you fold in the collar around the collar stand all the way to the back, so that it is uniformly low around the collar stand edge, it ends up looking more accurate, to my eye at least. Very Last Crusade-ish, in fact.

Just thought someone might get a kick out of that.

Hi Castor - Jeepers, I remember when you were buying these and talking to Tony.

Interesting - so are you saying this collar issue is how the collar is folded rather than the actual pattern?

Do you mean like this?

Best wishes,
Stefan

CM wrote:Hi Castor - Jeepers, I remember when you were buying these and talking to Tony.

Interesting - so are you saying this collar issue is how the collar is folded rather than the actual pattern?

CM! Long time no see, how are you doing? Man, I really miss Tony, he was a fan's dream to deal with! Has it really been a decade? That's pretty insane...

What I think is that it is how the collar is folded instead of the actual pattern indeed. Or maybe it was just how Tony liked his jackets... If memory serves, all the jackets I received (and I bought quite a few) were sent with the collar sitting higher in the back.

To help put things in context: just imagine you're looking at a jacket laying on a table, with the front (chest) of the jacket facing you. Now, looking at the collar, you'll see the collar stand. The collar stand has a horizontal bar on top, and a horizontal line on the bottom, both running the length of the collar stand.

If you follow the collar stand to the zipper on both front ends of the jacket, you'll notice that where the collar connects to the collar stand, the collar stand almost turns inside out, so it is peeking out from under the jacket.

If you look at the middle of the collar stand (which is close to where Tony occasionally put his label on the back of the jacket), you'll notice that the distance from the collar stand to where the collar folds downward becomes much more significant. Like maybe a quarter of an inch.

I never thought it looked right, because with that severe a difference in how the collar was folded, it made the jacket look pretty boxy around the collar. It gave the illusion of the collar looking like a staple that had been stapled on itself.

I remember when I met Tony in person, without prompting, he looked at my collar and remarked that I should wet the collar and pull it downwards to shape it. This was with me not even asking or talking about the collar, so I guess he must have thought it didn't look right either.

But what I suggested in my initial post was a much less permanent (and potentially damaging) solution.

If you just fold the collar around the collar stand so that the entire length of the collar is the same distance from of collar to collar stand, then the look becomes much closer to what I see on screen.

Stefan Hills wrote:

Do you mean like this?

Best wishes,
Stefan

It's hard to tell from this picture, but yes Stefan, I think that looks like what I'm referring to.

Basically, a brand new Nowak would have a collar that resembled a freshly starched, high collar dress shirt.



But I think the actual KotCS jackets had a look that was somewhere between that, and the relaxed collars of the Raiders jackets (which looked like a shapeless polo shirt collar).

I get you. I think how collars are folded can really make or break a jacket - not just this one. There's something just a bit off about collars that are folded so prissily - for want of a better word.

I really wanted to buy a Surrogates jacket from Tony and kept putting it off. It never happened and I regret that.

Tony really added some color and vitality to our jacket obsession, didn't he? I can't forget the excitement of seeing that first Raiders jacket copy come out and get posted here. It was like a secret had finally been shared.

I am trying to build a CS jacket (Wested), is CS collar wider than LC, I know LC is 3.5 inches, so maybe 4 inches for CS? Any help would be appreciated!

I’m pretty sure the Wested LC, is actually a KOTCS. Hopefully a more knowledgeable member can chime in.

I had USW vintage cowhide which has similar collar, but fit is just too baggy.
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IJJTM wrote:I’m pretty sure the Wested LC, is actually a KOTCS. Hopefully a more knowledgeable member can chime in.

Basically. That collar thing on the standard Wested LC is pretty much what's described here on Tony's; the back of it sits kind of high, and the shoulders are involved as well. I believe, and someone here can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the standard LC (/CS) that Wested markets now is more or less what they submitted to LFL back in 2007 or so during the pre-production but the contract went to Tony. I KNOW the Wested LC from 20 years ago was quite different from the one they sell today.

So yeah, the Wested LC is virtually a CS, but it's also their specific CS that they designed. I just wish they made the dang straps longer.

Yes, Wested's OTR CS/LC jacket as they call it is their submission to LFL. It's not accurate to Tony's CS jacket that appears in the film. Most notably the pocket size and shape is not accurate to Tony's. I think the collar width is not accurate either. If you want a Crystal Skull jacket I would go to a vendor that makes an accurate reproduction of Tony's jacket.

xmasters wrote:Yes, Wested's OTR CS/LC jacket as they call it is their submission to LFL. It's not accurate to Tony's CS jacket that appears in the film. Most notably the pocket size and shape is not accurate to Tony's. I think the collar width is not accurate either. If you want a Crystal Skull jacket I would go to a vendor that makes an accurate reproduction of Tony's jacket.

Who would you recommend for CS jacket?

Hammerklavier wrote: Who would you recommend for CS jacket?

Steele and Jones or Bill Kelso, are the only people I'm aware of that reproduce the CS jacket accurately.

Hammerklavier wrote:

xmasters wrote:Yes, Wested's OTR CS/LC jacket as they call it is their submission to LFL. It's not accurate to Tony's CS jacket that appears in the film. Most notably the pocket size and shape is not accurate to Tony's. I think the collar width is not accurate either. If you want a Crystal Skull jacket I would go to a vendor that makes an accurate reproduction of Tony's jacket.

Who would you recommend for CS jacket?

If you can find an original TN or one of the Belstaffs that'd be a good option.

Wested's one is their repro of the ones they submitted to production, I think it also has a stitched hem and piped sleeve seams which didn't appear on the Nowak jacket.

thanks all, it seems a difficult mission.