Where does one start when traveling with your good clothing. You have invested a lot of money to dress right and be presentable on business trips and meetings when you arrive at your destination. Sometimes you need to get right off a plane or train and get right to work and that could involve having jet lag, being hungry, thirsty and carrying your bags from place to place.

Luckily, most of us use bags with wheels on them to scoot around the airport. Remember the days of lugging around huge pieces of stuffed luggage you could hardly carry? I do. What has been happening in the cell phone industry is the exact opposite of what is going on in the travel industry. Cell phones or smartphones are getting larger and carry on luggage is getting smaller. More and more we have to pack less and less in order not to be hassled by checking luggage or paying a penalty to the airlines for being overweight in our checked bags.

This brings me to the subject of this article, how to fold a suit jacket without incurring any wrinkles. I would like to stress that this technique can be used for men and women’s apparel alike. You could even fold shirts and lightweight outerwear with this method. The center piece of this fold, taught to me by my grandfather who learned it from his father, is to form the bulkiest pieces of clothing into the latest pieces. What has to be looked after is the structure of your jackets. When folding tailored clothing the most important part to avoid wrinkles is to not crease the shoulders or collar. These areas are pressed many times in a clothing factory to give you the shape needed to form to the body. That is what makes a garment fit so well, how many times it has been pressed during it’s creation.

The question being now is how do you fold a suit jacket to avoid wrinkles and not fold over the collar and shoulder area? Follow me here as it might get a little tricky explaining this, but in actuality it is not difficult to do and takes only a few seconds. You don’t need another person or a table to lay the jacket onto.

Take each hand and extend your fingers.

1-Put each hand inside the shoulders of your jackets with the opening of the jacket facing you. Now your hands should be placed under what is called the collar points of the jacket.

2-Put your two hands, palms together with them inside the shoulder area of the jacket.

3-Now with the right hand grab onto the left shoulder of the jacket from the inside and remove your left hand. You should now be holding the jacket with your right hand and your left hand is now free.

4-Use your left hand to lift up the collar and the lapels so they are now facing outward.

5-Using your left hand for support hold onto the top of the collar that is now up and with your right hand pull both shoulders to the right side as you twist with the collar in your left turning the shoulder pads inside each other.

6-With both hands, line up the lapels so the notch or peak line up.

7-Holding the collar again for support with the collar up and lapels together and using your right hand, push the shoulders back through to the other side. Now the jacket should be in half vertically and the shoulders still are in their rounded pressed form only inside each other.

8-For the last step, fold the jacket in half horizontally over your arm and there you have it. You just learned how to fold a suit jacket and pack it without wrinkles.

The jacket is now completely flat. The shoulders are not creased or crushed. The collar will keep it’s shape. You can now pack jackets on top of each other this way in your luggage by alternating where the shoulders lay making sure you are profiting from the best use of your luggage space.

Philip Pravda, Founder of SUITCAFE.COM was born into the men’s fashion business. His great grandfather sold men’s suits beginning in 1908 New York City. The tradition followed through four generations. Having been a top retailer of luxury Italian brands for more than 27 years he is now accessible to you online anytime. He can be found on YouTube with a video on how to fold a suit jacket here: http://youtu.be/-KmDUtx2v2s