A Life That’s Tailor-Made : At 90, Floyd Harris Is Still Making Custom Men’s Clothing

Floyd (Fuzz) Harris, one of the last old-time tailors, turned 90 in October. But it would be a mistake to think of him as old.

“The way I see it, a man who comes to work every day can’t be old,” said Harris, who has been at work every day in Long Beach since the Hoover Administration--more than 60 years. “Naw, I’m not old,” he went on. “I’ve just been around a long time, is all.”

During that long time, Fuzz Harris has devoted his working life to an art that he fears may soon be lost: the making of custom men’s suits. He has made somewhere in the neighborhood of 25,000 of them over the years--beautiful, handcrafted suits that fit a man like nothing “off the rack” ever could, suits that make a man feel like a millionaire even if he isn’t one.

“There’s just something about a good suit,” said Harris, a distinguished, silver-haired man dressed, naturally, in a beautifully tailored suit. “Me, I’d

rather walk down the street with a good-looking suit on and nothing in my pockets than walk down the street in dungarees with my pockets full of cash.”

Of course, in these casual, dressed-down times, not everyone would agree. But generations of Long Beach-area doctors, lawyers, bankers, accountants, politicians--anyone who enjoys a good suit--have depended on Fuzz Harris to make them look their best.

“Every suit, every jacket, every pair of pants I have was made by Fuzz Harris,” said Long Beach Mayor Ernie Kell. “He’s the best tailor I’ve ever had, the best in California. When Fuzz Harris makes them, they fit.”

Born in Abilene, Tex., in 1902, Harris acquired the nickname “Fuzz” at an early age, for reasons he is somewhat reluctant to discuss. (It has something to do with a boyhood swimming hole.) After working in the dry-cleaning business in Texas for 10 years, he came to California in 1930, one of thousands of young men who moved to the Golden State during the Depression in search of opportunity.

Harris settled in Long Beach, working first at a dry-cleaning business then later opening his own shop. In 1934, he and a partner opened a combination dry-cleaning and tailor shop on Locust Street with, as Harris recalls, “one beat-up old sewing machine.” In 1955, he moved his tailoring business into a small storefront at 122 E. 3rd St., and has remained there ever since.

“You’re talking to the best tailor in town,” said Dr. Robert Fair, a Lakewood podiatrist who stopped by Harris’ shop one day recently. Fair, a longtime customer, has Harris make custom suits as well as alter sports jackets and other clothes bought off the rack.

Although Fair intended it as high praise, being “the best tailor in town” is not the distinction it once was.

“Thirty, 40 years ago we must have had 15 or 20 tailors in Long Beach that made clothes,” Harris said. “Now, there’s not but one or two. It’ll be a lost art one of these days. There just aren’t any new tailors coming up. After World War II there used to be a trade school for tailors in Los Angeles, but now there aren’t even any schools anymore.”

But should anyone really care? Can’t you buy a perfectly good suit off the rack and have it altered to fit you?

“I always tell people, I don’t make better clothes than you can buy in a good men’s store,” Harris said. “But when I make them they fit you .”

Are you left-handed? If so, your left shoulder probably will hang a little lower than the right, Harris said. Do you stand up straight or hunch over? If you are hunched, your suit has to be cut to allow for it or it will stick out at the collar. Those and many other individual characteristics, things that mass producers of suits cannot allow for, are important in getting a suit to fit properly. Harris takes all those things into account when designing a suit.

The cost of this special treatment is surprisingly reasonable: about $500 for a polyester-wool suit, up to $1,200 for the finest wool, as much as $1,800 for silk or cashmere. Harris also makes custom dress shirts for $40 to $80. Those prices probably do not shock anyone who has recently bought an off-the-rack suit from a top men’s or department store.

Still, Harris said, business is not what it used to be.

“People just don’t dress up like they used to,” Harris said. “They wear sports coats, dungarees.”

Harris shakes his head, sadly, at the notion that any man with a white-collar job would wear blue jeans for any occasion more formal than mowing the lawn or changing the oil in the family Chevy.

Despite all that, Harris said reports of his imminent retirement have been greatly exaggerated.

“Oh, I’ll be around for a while longer,” Harris said. “I guess I’ll quit when I don’t feel like coming in every day anymore.”

By his own definition of aging, until that happens, and even if he hits 100, Fuzz Harris will never be old.