Die, Workwear!

It’s been a while since I’ve updated this series, although most things on this blog are about Italian menswear anyway. Still, I thought I’d continue the series, if only for cataloging Italian brands that I think are worthwhile. Perhaps you can use it for shopping purposes, either at boutiques or knowing what to look for on Yoox and eBay.  

I first found out about Fedeli through De Corato, a menswear boutique house with four stores across America (they use to operate as Borrelli’s boutiques, but have since become a multi-brand retailer). Fedeli began as a hat manufacturer in 1934. They did well for some time, but after the Second World War, the founder, Luigi Fedeli, went to Switzerland to work with knitwear factories. He then came back to Italy in 1946, reshaped Fedeli as a knitwear company, and opened his first store in Milan. The store today stands as the oldest on its street, which is impressive given that it’s located in The Golden Triangle - a bustling shopping district in Milan that hosts the city’s highest-end brands. 

The company’s core business is in its cashmere knitwear, but it also produces handmade shirts, ties, trousers, jackets, and coats. Everything I’ve seen by them is incredible. Their jackets, for example, are made out of wools that are softer than you can imagine, and the construction is very well done - unconstructed, finished seams, French facings, etc. I unfortunately don’t have any images of the jackets and coats I saw, but believe me when I say they were something to behold. 

Today, the company is run by Luigi Fedeli’s grandson and great-grandson. It’s a small, family-owned business, so they don’t have fancy, stylized lookbooks. However, they do have some images of their latest collection, which are below. I really appreciate the mature, casual, Italian style we see here, and think it’s a nice breather from the gimmicks we see everywhere today. Here’s a great way to look good without seeming like you spend too much time on the internet.

View the whole collection here.  

If you’re just starting to build a nice wardrobe, you should pour almost all of your money into suits (if you wear them), shoes, and outerwear. To a certain extent, you can heavily skimp on the other things (pants, dress shirts, belts, etc), but if you have the best suits, shoes, and outerwear pieces you can afford, you’ll be pretty well set. 

For the moment, one of my favorite outerwear companies is Enrico Mandelli. The company was started in 1964 as a family business by Paul and his son Henry. Almost right from the start, the company was able to work with some of the most famous designers for “Italian styling,” such as Walter Albini and Luciano Soprani, as well as some important international brands, such as Martine Sitbon and Ungaro. Despite having some considerable success, however, Mandelli remains fairly unknown and its growth hasn’t been very strong. Whereas most Italian companies grow at 3% a year, Mandelli hits around 1.5%. 

Still, if you’ve ever handled a Mandelli jacket, it’s easy to fall in love with the company. They’re simply designed, but fit well and feel amazing. Everything I’ve handled by them, even their twill cotton trenches, feels buttery and sumptuous. Additionally, the designs, while very pared down and basic, express a lot of elegance. For example, their quilted jackets will be cut like notch lapel blazers.

The only downside is that they’re hard to find. De Corato (a store I hope to do a feature on soon) carries some great pieces, but you’ll have to live near one of their locations. For everyone else, there’s Yoox. Their European site often carries Mandelli, and you can get a piece for as little as $125. That’s quite a discount from the brand’s normal $400-600 retail price, but you’ll have to contend with Yoox’s uncertain stock. 

Though it’s the middle of July, it’s time to start seriously thinking about your Fall outerwear. It’s going to rain in just four months or so, and you’ll need some lead-time to prepare. So let’s talk about one of my favorite Italian companies - an under-the-radar outerwear brand that has a cult following among menswear geeks in Europe and Japan: Herno. 

Giuseppe Marenzi and his wife, Alessandra Diana, founded Herno in 1948. The company began in Lago d’Orta, just north of Milan, as a raincoat manufacturer for men and women. The goal was the produce fashionable, practical garments. We see some of the company’s early versions of trenches and duffle coats here: 

In the 1960s, the brand began making cashmere coats and double-faced jackets. Double-faced fabrics are when two fabrics are entirely connected - both throughout the length and width - to each other through thread loops. When they are used for outerwear, they allow the designer to make the garment fully reversible or to be constructed without facings or interlinings. 

It’s around this time that the brand started really making a name for itself throughout Europe. The company’s jackets became quite popular throughout the continent and they started receiving more attention at fashion shows. 

In the 1970s, the company began distributing in Japan - a country that has always been one of the early adopters of European fashions. During this time, Herno struck up new distribution deals, presented at Japanese fashion shows, and created marketing campaigns for Asia. 

In the 1980s, Herno finally landed in the United States. European companies always try to break into the American market, but it often takes them a bit of time to do so. When they do, however, they’re largely considered to have “made it.” Having arrived in the US, Herno was now considered a serious international brand among fashion industry insiders. 

It’s after arriving in the US that Herno began to really build relationships with other companies. During the 1990s, they started to produce outerwear pieces for Jil Sander, Armani, Prada, Hermes, Luis Vuitton, and Ralph Lauren. In fact, many of the designer brands we’ve been going to for outerwear have all been using the same Italian manufacturing house. Many of you probably already own a Herno jacket, or have put one on at some point in your life, and didn’t even know it. 

Today, Herno continues to maintain its own collection and still manufactures for many of the big brands around the world. Like many of the other Italian labels I’ve been talking about in this series, the company is also still family owned and operated, and is now run by the third generation of Marenzis. 

As you can see from the photos below, the great thing about Herno’s pieces is their fit. The cut is often slim and slightly cropped, which gives their garments a young, modern, stylish look. Additionally, the coats are often lightweight (to be expected at this point from Italian companies), so they’re a bit more comfortable to wear than something from, say, Burberry. The company also works with mills to develop their own “Herno TECH” fabrics, which are weather resistant, padded for warmth, and designed to be very breathable. In sum, the company takes very simple, classic styles and updates them with modern, stylish cuts, then builds it all with exclusive high-tech materials. 

Perhaps of interest to readers who bike (ie bicyclists and motorcyclists), Herno also has a line of specially designed jackets just for you. There are two models - the “City and Scooter,” and the “Scooter and Touring.” The City and Scooter is made from a breathable technical fabric, cut trim to keep the fabric from fluttering, and features mobile phone pockets on the forearm and windproof Lycra cuffs. The Scooter and Touring model is a bit more rugged. It features removable elbow pads; airbags at the cervical, lumbar, and sacral regions of the body in case of impact; and harder wearing polyester and corduroy fabrics. 

You can find Herno at discounts sites like Yoox (check this page to see all the deals you missed). Prices range between $200 and $500 usually, which isn’t bad for decent outerwear. Barneys also sometimes carries the brand, though they don’t have anything currently. The best stuff, however, is often on Rakuten, or in many high-end Japanese menswear boutiques, such as Guji. Check out all these sites to see if there’s something that you can use this Fall. 

I started this week’s series on Tie Your Tie with Simone Righi, so I thought I’d end with it. This is the face of Tie Your Tie that most of us are familiar with, mostly likely because of Scott Schuman’s love for Italian menswear. Like Tuesday’s installment on Tie Your Tie’s proprietor, Simone carries the same relaxed look through softly constructed jackets and (occasional) pleated pants. His signature, however, is his complex layering of texture, colors, patterns, and even shapes around his chest and neck area.

For me, this is where much of style happens - not in the minutia of cuff widths and inseam lengths. As Flusser has put it, this area frames your face. Men like Michael Alden, Josh Peskowitz, and Simone Righi have mastered the ability to eleganlyt combine the most wonderful things in this “V.” Note, again, the complexity of everything that happens here. 

Lastly, I’ve included some photos of the Tie Your Tie’s Florentine shop. As The Suitorial wrote a while back, Righi designs many of the wares in the shop. I think you can see a lot of his style imprinted in those wonderful creations.

Most of us associate Tie Your Tie with Simon Righi, but the real man behind the house is Franco Minucci. Mr. Minucci and his wife and opened the first Tie Your Tie store in the historic center of Florence in 1982. As I noted in yesterday’s post, the label expanded to Japan twelve years after its founding. Today, it does business across East Asia thanks to Minucci’s business acumen. 

Much of the label reflects Minucci’s own personal style. Everything here has a soft touch. Notice the relaxed details - the soft, sloping shoulders is obvious, but see how the pleated pants and drape in the jacket’s chest make this feel comfortable, almost slouchy, and not at all like the overly slim cut that our Mad Men obsessed culture is stuck in.

There are also some quirks here. The back blade on Minucci’s tie hangs much longer than his front - much, much longer, and in a way that I’m not sure any other man can pull off. I’ll write more about my interpretation of sprezzatura some other time, but to me, this kind of sprezz can only be pulled off when you have a full head of white hair - the kind that says you really didn’t give much thought into some sartorial detail today, because you were surprised you even woke up. Minucci also buttons only the top button on his jackets, another unusual quirk. 

Altogether, however, Minucci looks elegant and clearly comfortable his in clothes. This is a man who’s a grandfather, best friend to son, and proprietor to what Alan Flusser once called “one of the most elegant shops in the world.” Although I strive to make my name in a different career, if my life turned out half as successful as Minucci, I’d be a proud man. 

Oh, and when asked by Luel magazine what he wear this summer, what did Minucci say? Bermuda shorts, very soft moccasin shoes, and t-shirts or a light pink shirt. I can get down with that. 

Tie Your Tie is a Florentine shop that was started in 1984. Menswear nerds mostly know the label through Scott Schuman’s photographs of Simon Righi, who serves as the Director of Tie Your Tie, as well as Alan Flusser’s Style and the Man, where the shop was cited. The house stands for a relaxed, sporty, casual take on classic styles.

This is actually a look you see everywhere in the Japanese menswear scene, and perhaps partly as a result of Tie Your Tie’s effort in Japan. The house was one of the early movers into the Japanese market, opening their first store in Tokyo in 1996, and then another location in Osaka in 1998. That same year, in 1998, distribution of Tie Your Tie accessories began across the East Asian country, and the label has been doing very well since.

If you’re familiar with the history of the global economy and East Asia, you probably recognize what an incredible achievement that is. In 1997, the East Asian financial crisis, one of the biggest financial crises in the 20th century, bashed Japan’s currency exchange rate, which meant that foreign goods became considerably more expensive. As we’ve seen with this latest global economic downturn, however, true high-quality luxury labels often seem unaffected by these things, even though their clients are the ones who take the biggest hits (in absolute terms). Tie Your Tie’s success post-1997 is a testament to not only its quality products, but also its brand value. 

Their website has been updated with some of their AW11 products, which sit alongside the current SS11 line. Here we see light raincoats in Loro Piana fabrics; shirts with longer collar points and softer interlinings; and entirely unstructured jackets. Everything is made in Italy, and all exclusively or nearly completely handmade. The cream color linen jacket, with striped knit tie and handrolled pocket square, is a look I particularly like. It reminds me that I really want a striped knit for this summer, and since only need one, probably should get it from Tie Your Tie.

I’ll return tomorrow with some more about the house, so stay tuned. 

I was flipping through some image archives on my computer the other day and came across this old Belvest lookbook from 2009. For whatever reason, Belvest doesn’t get that much attention, at least not the attention they deserve. The company is the manufacturer for Prada and Hermes suits, and they’ve been marketing their own line for a few years now. Perhaps it’s because most menswear geeks aren’t that obsessed with Prada and Hermes suits in the first place? Either way, their quality is quite good, and they feature the softly constructed, slim silhouettes that we all love. 

This old lookbook is by far my favorite from the company. Typical of Italian style, there is a lot of color, but done in a way that’s incredibly wearable. Note the use of colors you don’t often see in menswear, such as burnt ochre and purple, and the utilization of soporific scarves. Maybe because it’s summer time, but the idea of a more colorful FW collection, fully done in classic Italian style, is really inspiring right now. 

When it comes down to it, much of the hype over Italian menswear boils down to Neapolitan tailoring. While Italy as a whole has more diversity than people give it credit for, Naples is fairly aligned with the soft construction and casual elegance that most of us are familiar with and love. 

Since February or so, I’ve been lusting over one Neapolitan house in particular - Cesare Attolini. I recently found out that they were setting up a stand-alone shop in New York City, and I’ve been really wanting to visit. Prior to this, coming across an Attolini jacket was difficult, unless you were in Naples, so you can imagine how happy I was to hear there would be an outpost here in the States. 

Like many of the other Italian operations I’ve been talking about, Cesare Attolini is a family owned operation. They used to be called Sartoria Attolini some ten to fifteen years ago, but they changed it to Cesare when they decided to move the business from a traditional tailoring workshop to a bigger factory operations. Today, three generations of Attolini men run the company, and the original founder, now a grandfather, still oversees quality control. 

Attolini jackets feature many of the Neapolitan trademarks we’re already familiar with - soft, natural shoulders; super-light, barely there constructions; and 3/2 button rolls designs (meaning a three-button jacket where the third button is hidden by the lapel roll, effectively making your jacket a two-button). 

Where Attolini deviates, however, is that their garments are slightly more fitted. As well, their jackets tend to be a bit shorter than what the orthodox would prescribe, which at times also means a higher button stance, so that the balance can be preserved. Mr. Attolini feels that this helps visually heighten the torso, and consequently, make the wearer seem taller. Personally, I usually prefer button stances to be more at the natural waist, and I find that higher stances can give an undesirable pear-shaped silhouette. However, I also can’t say I’ve seen many Attolini jackets that I didn’t like, so they must be doing something right. 

Construction wise, Attolini is comparable to Kiton or Brioni - there are handiwork details, though not as much as you would get in a bespoke Rubinacci. They’re a made-to-measure service, with everything being manufactured in their own factory, located ten-minutes outside of Naples. Before, you would have to go to Naples to even just get your measurements taken, but now you can do it in New York City. Not bad for those of us who want a little Neapolitan style, but can’t afford to travel all the way to Italy to get it. 

One of the things that strikes me the most about Italian menswear is how common it is for companies to stay “within the family.” To take two examples, Borelli is managed by the third generation of the Borelli family, and Ermenegildo Zegna is managed by the fourth generation of the Zegna family. Canali is another case of a family-managed Italian label. Two brothers, Giovanni and Giacomo Canali, started the company as a tailoring workshop in 1934. It wasn’t until the 1950s, however, under the direction of the family’s second generation that the house really took off. Today, the label is a global brand run by the family’s third generation, and manufacturers everything you can think of in a full menswear line, including fragrances, cuff links, and socks. 

I would consider Canali as an entry point into truly good quality menswear, on the level of Ralph Lauren Black Label, Corneliani, and Isaia. Their suits come with full canvassing, really nice fabrics, and some handiwork details. Once you own a suit from this tier of quality, it’s impossible to go back. They also offer high-quality sportswear through their Exclusive collection. This includes their famous Kei jacket, a completely unlined cashmere blazer that wears like a sweater. The name, Kei, is actually pronounced like the letter K, for the first letter of the word knitwear. In addition, they also have supple leather blouson jackets that are reversible to cashmere, knitwear that’s unbelievably soft to the touch, and outerwear pieces with vertical zip pockets just inside the lapel, so that you can access your belongings without having to completely unfasten your coat. As you may have already expected, everything is made in Italy, and only in the company’s own factories. Quality control is paramount for the label, so they require constant oversight. 

This season’s SS11 collection is guided by the creative flair and vision of men’s elegance that the line always exhibits. You can see from the lookbook that everything seems to be fairly classic looking, but there are very subtle innovation in the details, such as how lapels open, collars are shaped, and trims are finished. Lately, this is what I tend to appreciate the most about a line - when it’s able to present classic pieces in a way that makes it feel contemporary and fresh, not dusty and anachronistic.