Anyone looking for a 1950s-style varsity sweatshirt might consider the new 1821 Label, a collection of classic casual sportswear. The strange thing is that you will need to go to Savile Row, arguably the world capital of men’s bespoke tailoring, to pick it up.
Indeed, 1821 comes from Norton & Sons, favoured tailor of Fred Astaire, Cary Grant and King Juan Carlos of Spain, which was founded 205 years ago. Alternatively, pop into a Mango store, and you’ll find a capsule collection of soft contemporary tailoring devised by Savile Row newbie label Richard James – established merely 34 years ago.
“The perception of Savile Row can sometimes be that it’s rather dusty – there’s always those conversations about ‘the death of the suit’ and so on. But, really, Savile Row has never stood still,” says Toby Lamb, brand director for Richard James, which has also devised collections with the performance sports brand Castore.
“It’s been more about quiet innovation. And, actually, there’s more innovation on Savile Row than I think there’s been in 40 years, all of which is giving it more reach and credibility,” Lamb adds.
That doesn’t only include more of the street’s historic stalwarts – the likes of Huntsman, expanding into ready-to-wear and quickly making it a quarter of its business. “To me, that shows there is still a clear understanding of what Savile Row quality is, that younger customers get their clothing from here and not from often comparably priced designer brands,” says managing director Taj Phull.
It also means the kind of offbeat collaborations that would have been scoffed at not long ago, are now possible. Henry Poole – Savile Row’s oldest bespoke tailor at 220 years old – has, for instance, worked on projects with Adidas, Canada Goose and, for its new reefer jacket, with technical fabric specialists Gore-Tex.
Such collaborations “raise eyebrows to start with”, Simon Cundey, Henry Poole’s managing director concedes, “but they give you a certain dynamism. They need to be fun.”
Besides, the reality is not as rigid as Savile Row’s image as a place to acquire buttoned-up formalwear might suggest. Cundey says historically, Savile Row made a well-heeled gentleman’s entire wardrobe, not just the formalwear for which it became famous. Today’s more fluid aesthetic, as well as an emphasis on separates is, in a way, a return to form.
“In order to speak to a new generation, it’s important Savile Row continues its journey with a greater sense of modernity – not least because we have people working here who are super-talented, and we need to let them run with that talent,” says Cundey.
“It’s true that sometimes the not-so-traditional can cause a sense of outrage on the Row, but you need new ideas.”
Take, for example, the opening four years ago of Clothsurgeon, offering bespoke clothing with a streetwear twist. “Savile Row has always been pushed forward through these moments of rebellion,” says Rav Matharu, founder and London College of Fashion alumnus.
“Think of tailors like Edward Sexton or Tommy Nutter in the 1960s. They’re needed to bring in more contemporary ideas for a younger audience that’s always at risk of becoming more oblivious to Savile Row and its importance.”
It’s not just about a younger audience, either. Two years ago, Knatchbull, Savile Row’s first all-female tailoring business catering to women, was relaunched.
“It’s important to periodically blow some of the dust off Savile Row, but not all of it because its rich heritage is very much part of its appeal,” stresses founder Daisy Knatchbull, who brought the brand’s first trunk shows to the Middle East at the end of last year. “But there’s an understanding on Savile Row that a shopfront for women here can only be a good thing.”
Johnny Allen, head of bespoke tailoring at Davies & Son, says: “Sometimes Savile Row can be just seen as classy – something to aspire to. But sometimes it comes across as fuddy-duddy, which is why anything that moves it beyond being old-fashioned, that makes it more approachable, more intriguing and more energised is positive.”
Established in 1803, Davies & Son became the first Savile Row tailor to show at Pitti Uomo, arguably the world’s leading trade show for menswear. There, it unveiled a collection designed in collaboration with Satoshi Kuwata, the LVMH Prize-winning Japanese fashion designer and one-time Davies apprentice, applying his distinctive, origami approach of ironing and cutting folds into the patterns to allow the resulting jackets to fold flat, akin to a kimono.
“That’s been brilliant for us,” adds Allen. “Suddenly, we’re seen as forward-thinking and it’s bringing a lot of customers, who might not have considered Savile Row before.”
As Kuwata notes, Savile Row has long been used to working with designers behind the scenes to assist on the tailoring elements of their collections – Anderson & Sheppard does for Wales Bonner, for example – but rarely, if ever, is there a shared billing.
Huntsman struggled to get recognition for its work on designer Demna’s debut couture show for Balenciaga three years ago, but more recently, made a deserved splash with a collection devised with designer Daniel Fletcher. Could it be that, while Savile Row could never – and should never – be brash, it is now finding a new confidence, a new voice?
“The fact is all these efforts are, on the one hand, about spreading the word of Savile Row, but on the other, a means for it to stay relevant, as it must,” says Lamb. “It’s about exploring new ways to express the Savile Row guiding principle of craftsmanship. The question is always: How far to push it?”
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