How to measure your hips for a kameez and trousers

Finding the fullest point

Wear leggings or thin trousers, empty your pockets and stand side-on to a full-length mirror.

• Bring your feet together. Standing with them apart adds to the reading.
• Wrap the tape round your hips and slide it slowly downwards from the waist. Watch the number rise, then start to fall. The highest reading is your hip.
• Check the back in the mirror. The tape tends to ride up over the seat or dip below it; it should be parallel to the floor.
• Keep the tape snug enough to stay put and loose enough to slide a finger under.
• Read it standing upright. Bending to look pushes the seat out, so pinch the tape at the meeting point and lift it away to read.
• Note how far below your waist the tape was. That depth helps place the shaping on a fitted kameez.

High hip, full hip and the tummy

The full hip is the measurement described above. The high hip is taken about 3 to 4 inches (8 to 10 cm) below the waist, across the hip bones and the tummy. Many people point to this spot when asked for their hips, which is how hip measurements end up too small.

Add a second figure in any of these cases:

• Your tummy is fuller than your seat. Measure around the fullest part of the tummy and label it. A tape at seat level skims past it.
• You are ordering fitted trousers or a shaped kameez. The high hip shows how quickly you widen below the waist.
• Your thighs are wider than your hips. Measure around both thighs together at their fullest and send that as well.
• You wear your waistband low. Trousers that sit on the high hip need that number for the waistband.

How the number is used

On a kameez, the hip sets the width of the body at that level and the point where the side slits usually open. A straight kameez needs room there to sit down without the slits pulling apart; an A-line passes over the hips with width to spare. On trousers, the hip decides the seat, and together with the rise it decides whether fitted styles feel comfortable. The trouser measurements page covers the rest.

Hips spread when you sit, often by an inch or two (2.5 to 5 cm). You do not need to allow for that yourself. Room for sitting and moving is added when the garment is cut, so send the true standing figure.

Small things that change the reading

A hip measurement that is out by an inch shows up as slits that gape or a seat that pulls. The usual causes are simple.

• Measuring over jeans, a thick waistband or a phone in a pocket.
• Holding the tape at the hip bones instead of the seat.
• Pulling the tape tight to get a smaller number.
• Adding “a bit for comfort”, which is then added again in the cutting.
• Measuring once. Take it twice, and a third time if the two disagree.

Sending it with your order

Enter the full hip on the quote form and put any extra figures in the notes with clear labels, such as “high hip” or “tummy at fullest”. Measuring alone? Our guide to measuring yourself without help has a mirror method, and the size guide shows every point on a diagram. Custom stitching explains how your measurements are agreed in writing before cutting.