The bomber is the most copied silhouette in streetwear and the easiest to get quietly wrong. What separates a good one from a flat one is never the logo. It is the depth of the hem rib, whether the collar stands or folds, where the sleeve seam crosses the shoulder, and whether the body is short enough for the rib to land on the hip instead of below it.
None of that is decided by ordering a blank and putting artwork on it. We hold no stock jackets. Your bomber is cut from a pattern built for your fit, in a shell you chose, with rib knitted to your colour and a lining specified rather than inherited. That is why this page is a list of decisions instead of a list of features.
You do not need a tech pack to start. A sketch, a moodboard, a reference photo or a bomber you already own is enough, and if you already have a tech pack we will quote straight from it. Pattern and fit development happen in house.
Bomber jacket production at a glance
Everything below is standing policy, not an estimate. Where a figure is a range, the range is real and depends on your spec.
Send a sketch, a reference photo or a bomber you already own. All three work.
A bomber is not one fabric decision, it is three. The shell sets what the jacket looks like from across a room. The lining sets what it feels like to put on and how warm it is. The rib knit at the collar, cuffs and hem is the part nobody itemises and everybody notices when it is wrong.
The MA-1 flight jacket was made in nylon, and nylon is still the reference point. Everything else on this list is a deliberate move away from it, and each one changes how the jacket has to be sewn and how it can be decorated.
| Shell | How it reads | What it asks of the make |
|---|---|---|
| Flight nylon | The original. Light, wind resistant, faintly lustrous, and crisp enough to hold a standing collar. The closest thing to an MA-1 without buying one. | It is slick to cut and it remembers every needle hole, so seam lines and decoration placement are fixed before sampling rather than moved afterwards. A fine coil zip suits the weight. |
| Poly or cotton twill | Matte and dry, with more body than nylon. Reads workwear or utility rather than military. | The most forgiving shell we build bombers in. It presses flat, so a full back graphic sits clean, and it takes screen print and embroidery without argument. |
| Satin | High shine, souvenir-jacket lineage. Colour reads deep and it photographs louder than any other shell. | It marks, and it shows needle holes, so stitch density is kept down and artwork is worked on the flat panel. It wants a full lining, or the shine drags on knitwear underneath. |
| Suede or faux suede | Matte, weighty, no shine at all. Pushes the silhouette away from military and towards something quieter. | No heat-applied decoration: DTF and sublimation are out. Embroidery, an applied patch or a debossed trim instead. Seams have to be right first time, because the nap does not recover from being unpicked. |
| Wool melton or boiled wool | Varsity lineage. Dense, warm, and it holds a strong shoulder line instead of collapsing. | Heavy enough that the zip and the rib have to be specified up to carry it. It is also the shell where contrast sleeves and leather sleeves start to make sense. |
If you already own a bomber whose shell you like, send it. Matching a fabric in the hand is faster and more accurate than describing one, and it settles the handle, the sheen and the weight in a single step.
The lining is the half of the jacket the wearer touches, and on a bomber it is also the half that shows every time the jacket is worn open. It is the most under-used branding surface on the garment.
| Lining | What it does | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|
| Plain taffeta or poly | Slides over a hoodie without dragging and adds almost nothing to the weight or the warmth. | The default on a nylon or satin body. A contrast colour, an all-over print or a custom woven lining turns it into part of the design with no change to the construction. |
| Quilted lining | A diamond or channel quilt on a thin wadding, which adds a little warmth and a lot of visual weight when the jacket hangs open. | The quilt is built as its own lining panel and then set into the jacket. Nothing is stitched through the face fabric, so the shell stays smooth and unbroken. |
| Reversible | Two finished faces, most famously a sage shell against a high-visibility orange inside. | It is close to making two jackets. Both faces need finished seams, both need their own pockets and zip treatment, and the rib has to read correctly from either side. |
| Sherpa, fleece or brushed jersey | Turns a light bomber into something that carries a cold month. | It has bulk, and bulk needs room. The body and the armhole are cut with extra ease, or the jacket fits in the shell and not on the wearer. |
A quilted bomber is not a puffer. On a bomber the quilting is a lining detail: there is no baffle, no chamber and no fill weight to specify, and the shell is never stitched through. If you want real loft, warmth measured in fill weight, and a shell built around it, that is a different garment and a different pattern. We make those too, on our custom puffer jacket manufacturing page.
Collar, cuffs and hem are knitted rib, produced separately from the shell and joined in at the end. Four things are yours to set, and all four are settled with the fabric rather than with the artwork.
| Decision | What changes |
|---|---|
| Gauge and density | A fine, dense rib looks sharper and holds a collar upright. A chunky rib reads sportier and softer, and it blouses the body more at the hem. |
| Depth | A deep hem rib pulls the body in and gives the cropped, blousing shape the silhouette is known for. A shallow rib leaves the jacket straighter and longer on the hip. |
| Elastane content | Recovery, not stretch. Rib with no elastane goes slack at the cuff within a season, which is the most common complaint about a cheaply made bomber. |
| Tipping stripes and colour | Stripes are knitted into the rib itself, never printed on, so the colourway is locked at the yarn stage. Solid rib can be matched to the shell or run deliberately in contrast. |
Because rib is knitted rather than cut from your shell, it carries its own lead time inside your production window. It is one of the first things we confirm on your spec, not one of the last.
A bomber gives you one big flat canvas and several small awkward ones. Almost all of it is decorated while the panels are still flat and separate, which is why moving a graphic after your sample is not a change of artwork. It is a change to the order the jacket is built in.
| Placement | What fits there | When it happens | What it changes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Back panel | The full graphic. Large embroidery, chenille lettering, a screen-printed block, an applied twill patch. | On the flat back panel, before the body is assembled. | The hem rib eats the bottom of the panel, so artwork has to stop above the rib join or it vanishes into the gather. On a raglan body the sleeve seams cut across the top corners, so a full-width rectangle collides with them. |
| Chest, left or right | A small embroidered mark, a woven label, a leather or rubber patch. | Flat panel, before assembly. | It has to clear the zip facing and the pocket bag underneath. The lining goes in afterwards, so the back of the embroidery is never on show to the wearer. |
| Outer upper sleeve | A logo, a number, a flag-style tab, a small patch. | On the flat sleeve panel only. | Once a sleeve is closed it is a narrow tube. It will not sit flat under a hoop or a print platen without distorting, so a late sleeve placement means re-cutting, not just re-printing. |
| Sleeve pocket flap and zip | A woven tab, a branded puller, a small embroidered mark on the flap. | With the pocket, at sleeve stage. | Small, but it is the detail people photograph. Custom pullers and branded tape are produced to your spec rather than picked from stock. |
| Collar stand and nape | A short mark inside the collar stand, or above the main label. | At trim and label stage. | Rib does not hold a print, because it stretches and the ink cracks along the wale. Anything at the neck goes onto a woven tab or is knitted in. |
| Rib hem and cuffs | Tipping stripes, a contrast colour, a knitted-in band. | At the knitting stage, before the jacket exists. | This is a yarn decision with its own lead time, so it is fixed with your fabric and not with your artwork. |
| Lining | An all-over print, a custom woven lining, a large internal label. | Before the lining is set into the shell. | The one surface with no rib, no zip and no quilt lines in the way. It is the easiest place on a bomber to put something ambitious. |
Which method suits you follows from the shell you chose. Embroidery and applied patches work on every shell on this page. Screen print is happiest on twill. DTF is heat applied, so it is ruled out on suede and handled carefully on coated nylon. Sublimation needs light polyester and is planned as panel artwork before cutting. Custom labels, woven tags and custom trims sit alongside any of them.
Custom outerwear made for Che Lingo
We manufacture for Che Lingo, Blanco, Grace Ajilore and King Promise, and our work has appeared in NME, Teen Vogue, the Crunchyroll Anime Awards and Retail Jeweller.
A bomber run starts the same way every time: your shell, your lining, your rib colour, your zip, your labels. Send what you have and we will quote it.
Send whatever exists: a sketch, a moodboard, a reference photo, or a bomber you already own and want built better. We will ask which shell you are picturing, whether the lining is plain or quilted, and how you want the rib to sit, then come back with a tailored quote. If the design is not finished, our team provides full design support.
Once the quote is agreed we cut the pattern: body width and length, sleeve construction, armhole, collar stand height, rib depth at hem and cuff, and the position of the sleeve pocket. It is then graded across your full size range, so an XL is the same jacket as a small rather than a different garment stretched sideways.
We hold no stock, so the shell is sourced or produced for your order and the rib is knitted to your colour and gauge. Zips, pullers, snaps, cord ends, custom labels and woven tags are specified now. Because rib and hardware carry their own lead times, this is the step that decides how the rest of the schedule runs.
You get the jacket in your hands before anything goes to bulk. Zip it up and sit down in it, put it over the thickest hoodie you sell, and check the sleeve pocket falls where your arm expects it. A free sample of each design is included with every committed bulk order; a standalone sample without a bulk commitment is charged. One sample revision round is free, further revisions are chargeable, and changes to your quote are always free.
Your approved sample becomes the reference for every jacket in the run. Panels are decorated flat, the body and sleeves are closed, the lining is set in and the rib is joined last, with your labels, tags and trims applied to spec at our own dedicated overseas facility.
Every order passes fabric inspection, in-process checks, post-production inspection and a final pre-shipment review. On a bomber that includes running every zip, checking the rib recovers after being stretched, and confirming decoration sits square to the seams. Your jackets then ship worldwide.
As seen in
As seen on
Che Lingo
Grace Ajilore
Blanco
King PromiseSend a sketch, a reference photo, or a bomber you already own and want built better. We will come back with a tailored quote, make your sample first, and start bulk production only once you approve it.
Get Your Bomber Jacket Quote on WhatsApp
