Indira’s Alteration and Design Studio

I have a leather Café Racer style jacket that I bought shortly after my first bike that I’ve had for over 10 years. Due to my fit and style changing, it has been hanging in storage for (at least) the past 8 years. It had a ‘boxy’ fit, but I loved its retro looks, so I kept it. After digging it out recently, I wasn’t sure if a leather jacket could be altered, so checked into alterations for a slimmer fitting jacket. A few places in/​around the city came up in my search. I took my jacket to RAM Leather on St. Charles Rock Rd first. The seamstress there told me the alteration could not be done, and stressed to me over and over that they would do the alteration if I wanted, but it would not be a good alteration and wouldn’t last. I didn’t want to give up just yet, so I wanted a second opinion, so I contacted Indira’s Alteration and Design Studio.
She was very friendly and gave me directions to her studio. She had me try on the jacket, pulled and pinned accordingly, and said the alteration could be done. She said it would take approximately a week, and would be a sturdy repair. Admittedly after the opinion I received from RAM I was nervous. Indira assured me the repair would be solid and showed me some of her past work. So I left the jacket.
I returned a week later and wow. Seriously, WOW. This old boxy Café Racer jacket now looks like it was tailored for ME. The seam on both the outside of the jacket and the liner is flawless. I was wearing a cheap faux leather jacket from the Buckle that had the right sleeve/​shoulder seam separating and she offered to repair that as well. So I asked her to go ahead and reinforce the rest of the seam. She asked me to come back in an hour. When I returned, she not only fixed/​reinforced the right shoulder seam, but reinforced the left shoulder seam AND fixed the left pocket interior which was torn (I never even mentioned the tear). Just fantastic. The value for the work I had done was VERY reasonable. Much cheaper than buying a new jacket and now I will actually wear my old Café Racer jacket!
HIGHLY RECOMMEND INDIRA FOR ANY ALTERATIONS NEEDED.

Yikes. As cold as it was outside the day I went in here, it got even more frigid and icy inside. Indira «greeted» my group with such a defensive attitude from minute one. We were just asking about alterations and she wouldn’t let us finish a sentence, interrupting us with her know all. She had never sewn what we were asking her about, but instead of listening to what we were saying, she grabbed outfits of her rack and screamed at us that she makes her own clothes, and that if she could do that, she could do anything. The whole experience was baffling. It is surprising she can stay in business with how rude and mean she is to customers. She basically threw our fabric at us and yelled at us when we said we’d like to go elsewhere. I am sure she is a talented lady, but my goodness, why be so mean and hateful to people?

Having tried many, many tailors around town, and having had many disasters with every one if them, finding Indira seemed miraculous.
Indira has an eye for fit, a keen awareness of what’s acceptable in fashion and business clothing, and is the most talented alterations and tailoring professional I have ever met.
Which is saying something — for twelve years I owned and operated St. Louis’s largest and most profitable costume manufacturing company. I’ve met a lot of people who can sew, and actually I’m one of them. Indira is the best of them all.
I saw a sign somewhere that said «We can do Cheap, Fast and Good — Pick Two!». Indira isn’t the cheapest around, but she is good and 100% reliable on deadlines. Plus she can accomplish the occasional miracle. I trust her with my suits, some of which are a significant investment, because she can be trusted to do the job right.
Can you ask more than that?