http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1539297/British-tweed-suits-the-Italians.htmlBritish tweed suits the Italians
By Malcolm Moore in Florence
Published: 12:01AM GMT 12 Jan 2007
A woman looks at a suit made for Madonna by designer Henry Rose
This season's hottest fashion for Italian men, much to the irritation of local tailors, is British tweed, mustard trousers, Prince of Wales check and flat caps.
The mania for "lo stile inglese" was evident everywhere yesterday, as Pitti Uomo, Italy's annual menswear exhibition which, for the first time in the show's 70-year history, dedicated an entire palazzo over to tailors from Savile Row.
"The Italians are loving it," said Karl Matthews, a tailor at Anderson & Sheppard. "We had an order within half an hour of opening." The tailors, who had a houndstooth dinner jacket made for Fred Astaire in 1935 on show, said they had already had orders for 20 copies from clients around the world.
"They particularly like the traditional clothes, the tweeds and the checks. They can get the cashmere and so on from Ermenegildo Zegna here in Italy," said Richard Anderson, the former head cutter at Huntsman who now runs his own tailor shop.
Elsewhere, Tony Lutwyche, a newcomer to Savile Row, was showing off a jacket made from pashmina and vicuna with pinstripes woven from platinum thread. "It costs around £2,500 a metre for this material, so you are looking for £10,000 for the suit before the labour is taken into consideration," he said.
"English tailoring is back," he said. "Just look at how Ralph Lauren raped and pillaged Savile Row techniques for his Purple collection. We are taking things forward."
Meanwhile, on the other side of Florence, an exhibition charted British tailoring's greatest hits, from the very first dinner jacket, cut for King Edward VII by Henry Poole, to a shooting outfit made for Madonna.
London and the Tuscan capital have had a close connection since Queen Victoria holidayed in the city, and it became an important stop for artists on the grand tour. The enthusiasm for all things British continues at the Old England Store on the Via dei Vecchietti, which sells marmite and baked beans.
However, the arrival of Savile Row in Florence has ruffled feathers about whose tailoring tradition is best. Lucio Nigro, the head of Sartorio, a tailor from Naples, said Savile Row "is too inward-looking, too stuck to the past and to its conventions. People do not change their suit three times a day anymore, or wear smoking jackets. They want a lightweight comfortable suit which they can wear all day.
"Besides, here in Italy we have been able to turn suitmaking into a real business, while retaining a quality product. In London, it is so insular, and elitist."
Enthusiasts of Italian tailoring also point to the fact that James Bond is not clothed in England, but by the Italian tailor, Brioni.
Timothy Everest, who runs one of Savile Row's most up-and-coming ateliers but offers off-the-peg suits made in Italy, admitted: "The Bond suit was a very nice piece, with good attention to design, like the gun holster. Someone described the material as featherlight." However, he said the decision to give Bond an Italian tailor was purely down to product placement fees. "It would be nice for Bond to have a Savile Row suit, but I don't think it is likely on a commercial basis. Look at how many Fords he drove during the movie," he said.
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