My first ever client, yonks ago, ordered a few shirts a while back. It just so happens he lives in the neighbourhood nowadays, and he orders things from time to time. This shirt is made from cloth by Acorn. They make some of the best shirting cloth in the world. This one is a 2-ply egyptian cotton, and it’s just amazing how this material behaves. I have to admit, it takes a few times of washing before it really starts to live, but then, it’s just miraculous. For some reason, at first it seems to be hard to iron it without wrinkles, but once it’s been washed two or three times, it becomes silky and smooth and so very luscious. It’s got an ever so subtle sheen to it, almost as if it’s silken but it’s not, it’s simply 100 % cotton.
The pick-stitching is done by hand, as are the buttonholes. A fairly labour-intensive job, but this particular client has been my patron for many years so I went a bit further on this one.
Red Silk Velveteen Jacket
A lovely jacket in silk velveteen from one of my english suppliers.
Photoshop, anyone? Yes, I’ve tweaked the colours a bit because this is about the most difficult cloth to shoot. I mean, it’s already difficult to take a good photo of a ‘normal’ cloth, but this is just impossible. My uncle Bert, who is a professional photographer, made the photo of the coat a few posts down, and it’s easy to see why he gets paid the way he does. Wish I had his knack for lighting and stuff. If he’d be here right now (instead of being frozen over in Holland) he’d make minced meat out of this little piece of work.
The backing of the velvet is cotton, and the actual pile is pure silk. I don’t know where the maker gets his stuff, but it’s some of the most smooth, and even, kind of velvet I’ve ever seen. It reflects light in a terrific way, it makes it look like it’s changeant, but it’s actually just one solid colour. Truly stupendous and amazing, but very difficult to tailor. It takes about all of a split second to completely destroy it with an iron, so it took me some sweat to get it right. I think the end-result is quite nice though.
Oh, by the way, I’ve been giving some thought lately to what this blog is actually supposed to be about, and I have some ideas about it. Things are going to change. Things are going to become a whole lot more fun, but more about that soon.
Two good reasons why I live in Salobreña
1: We get amazing sunrises here.
2: Sometimes, aliens come to help make them.
Be Smart: Buy a Bespoke Suit! And then what? Then you’ll be even smarter!
No, seriously. I am not kidding. A few days ago I read an article on a dutch news-site (http://www.nu.nl/wetenschap/2175534/merkkleding-maakt-vrouwen-slimmer.html) (in case you understand dutch) which reported on a scientific study that has recently been performed in The Netherlands. In this research, a group of women was given a G-Star jacket to wear, and were then asked to complete a series of tests to establish how well they performed from an intellectual point of view. Half of the subjects were given jackets where the label had been carefully removed, and were told that it was a cheap piece of garb from the local market, the other half wore a G-Star jacket. Interestingly enough, it was found that those women wearing the branded jacket, scored sigificantly higher on tests involving linguistics, mathematics, and, my favourite one: self-confidence! (I have to admit: I usually wear pretty casual clothes here in this dusty town, but whenever I do wear a suit, I feel soooo much more…. I don’t know…. Powerful? Ballsy? Something. In fact, on those rare occasions that I do dress up, I often happen to run into an acquaintance or friend and sell a suit or shirt, without even trying to. Magic? Oooooh… electricity comes from other planets…)
I don’t really care much for statistics, but hey, it’s science, so it’s got to be true, right?
So, here is how to beat the crisis, depression, low self-esteem and being bullied by your wife/child/dog/filling station attendant or whatever: Buy a damn fine piece of clothing, put it on, and “comete la calle”. That’s spanish, and it means something like: go kick ass.
Of course, I’m not a brand. I’m Martin. Still, I think your best option is to buy a suit from me, but that’s just because I really like my work, severely so.
Buy whatever. Look sharp. Feel good. And go be remarkable.
Renamed: Another one of my teacher’s expressions.
[EDIT: I found the original title: "Quotes from the master: A good tailor has any cutter in his pocket" a little bit too heavy, so I changed it. Small edits in the text below as well.]
Ok, I hope the title of this post causes some curiosity. As I’ve said before, my teacher mr Dahoe, used to speak at great length about all kinds of clothing-related topics. His favourite expression was always: People underestimate this work. And it’s true: in a general sense, people have no idea what it takes to make a jacket, or a shirt, or a pair of trousers.
First, you take measurements on a person. This is a three-dimensional, living and moving body. The measurements are a very rudimentary distillation of some of the aspects of this person.
Then, you draft a pattern based on those measurements. That very pattern is a two-dimensional thing, it’s just lines and curves on a piece of paper. The tricky bit is doing it in such a way, that once all the seams are closed, this becomes a well-fitting, three dimensional garment that is adapted to the client. So essentially, you translate three dimensions into two, and then translate that, back into three dimensions. The first half of the process is mostly the part of the cutter, the second, putting it together, is then the tailor’s job.
One of the things mr Dahoe used to say was: “A good tailor has any cutter in his pocket.” What he meant by that, was that a tailor, when making up the cut fabric, needs to apply many tricks and knacks. He may be less experienced than the cutter who supplied him with the cut cloth, but no matter how good the cutter is, in the end it is the tailor who applies the art when it comes to making. He is the one who actually needs to assess how much the cloth needs to be eased in, or stretched. He may decide to alter the line of a seam ever so slightly, based on his judgement. With his iron he actually makes the cut into a garment, and in many ways therefore, has the final say. And if he’s wrong, he can very easily mess up or destroy a wonderful cut. Obviously he can’t go and change the cut or the design, because these were created by the cutter, according to the clients’ wishes.
This is the fun part for me. Since I’m a cut&make tailor, I do everything myself, from cutting through fitting to stitching and pressing. It would be great to have a few tailors working for me and turn out 200 suits a year, but that’s not reality.
I guess I can say I have myself in my pocket. Makes me feel a trifle schizofrenic at times. But seriously, I often find that when making up a garment, I will want to change what I had previously designed, so mr. Dahoe’s axiom does hold true.
Long time running
The empire of my forebears. The text reads: Specialty: Overcoats and fabrics
Sometime in the second half of the 19th century, a young man by the name of Heinrich Stall, loaded a few spools of tapestry yarn onto a wheelbarrow and set out from Germany, on foot, to The Netherlands. After some lengthy trekking and a good deal of hardship, he arrived in Amsterdam.
There he got married, and ended up running a rather succesful business, buying and selling yarn. Over the years, and a few generations later, it had evolved into what looks like a fairly big clothing enterprise, considering the image above was created at the beginning of the 20th century. I found the image on a postcard when I was emptying my fathers’ house after he passed away a few years ago, and I recently came across it again, so I thought it would be a nice little background story.
Updates, past events, into the future etc
A bespoke shirt in a wonderful cotton/wool mix. A bit warm for this climate, definitely only for winter months
I’m sure many of you will be wondering what happened and why I left my brainchild sitting all by itself without paying attention to it.
The short story: I’ve been busy, very very busy.
The full lowdown:
After moving to Salobrena, I spent a long time getting to know my way around here. Meeting people, setting up shop, integrating. Although Salobreña is a very small town, moving to a different country is always a challenging affair, and as such, it took me quite a while to find my niche.
To summarize, for those people who haven’t read previous posts here: After leaving a monastic life in a small monastery in the french-speaking part of Belgium, I moved back to my native Holland, and started a small company, making very fancy handmade suits. It’s a trade I completely love, and a skill that I acquired during my years as a monk. Fast forward a good year or so.
My girlfriend finishes her studies and joins me in Holland. Fairly soon we decide we want to live someplace sunnier, so we decide to move to Salobreña, in the south of Spain.
And life takes a whole new turn.
You see, it’s not just the sun. There was something in Holland that I felt was missing. Something quiet, peaceful. As I’m sure pretty much anyone who is on the internet knows, life in the modern world is hectic business, especially nowadays. (If you happen to live in the wilderness; you are not reading this. Also, I wish I was there.) Having left a place where I’d lived very peacefully for many years, I needed to have some of that back in my life. And some more sun, please. So it got to be Salobreña, but it could have been anyplace, anywhere.
The revolutionarily new thing that I experienced here was intense and multifaceted. Sure it’s nice to live in a tropical climate. I remember that during the first year or so, and nowadays still do sometimes, I would think: DUDE! I have palmtrees in my street!
Good times.
Ok, if you live in Florida, or in Asia, or anywhere tropical, chances are that you will have seen a palmtree before. But honestly, for a green and youngish ex-monk, abruptly moving to this place was nothing short of miraculous and intense.
You see, I have a theory. Probably nothing new, or indeed correct, but I theorize that the fact that living for many thousands of years in a climate like this, a population will genetically adapt to that very climate. One thing for instance that is a result of good weather, is that it makes people laugh, smile, be generally happier than if it would rain. And the sun just keeps on shining here. So my theory is that as a result, the local people have evolved into groovy cats who enjoy life, take care of eachother, are warm and generally know how to have a good time. Quality of living and all that jazz.
So yeah, I’m happy. Not only do I live in a really nice and quiet small town, just by the sea, it just happens to be in a zone where I have palmtrees in my street. Oh, did I mention that due to the micro-climate in a 10 km radius around Salobreña, this is the only place in Europe where one can grow tropical fruits such as mangos.
The people here are so nice! Everyday I meet people, new faces, friends, acquaintances. And everyone is smiling, and being friendly. It’s all so wonderful, it ought to be in a romantic movie or something. Anyway, to summarize: it was a good choice. And it caused me to forget entirely about my blog. To apologize: I’m sorry that for that time of acclimatizing, I have left my regular readers without word for so long.
Martin, enough about yourself already! What about the suits?
Yeah, about that. Not doing badly, I’m happy to say. The area is not exactly filled with great dressers, but there are, fortunately, enough people who like to wear something special.
I’ve been making more shirts than I used to, and also more ladies’ clothing. Mostly suits, blouses and of course there are always always suits and jackets for men.
Your favourite mad cutter is back
Hello…… Anybody out there….?
Gosh, it feels really weird to be back here. I can’t believe it’s been very nigh on two years since I last updated my blog. Nice to be back though! It feels kind of like coming home after a long long voyage. And that is in fact, exactly what happened, in a way.
During the next few days, I intend to give some background info regarding the farings of Martin Stall Bespoke here in the sunny south. Watch this space.
Visit to London
Next week, thursday 18th of october, I will be in London for appointments. My colleaugue and friend Jonathan Quearney has, very kindly, agreed to let me use his shop to receive customers.
The address is:
7 Windmill Street
Fitzrovia
London W1T 2HY
I will be available all day on thursday 18th, and until 13 pm on friday.
For any enquiries or for making an appointment, please call me on 0034 656 321 321, or write me an email at martinstall@gmail.com.
For updates about my work and my travel plans, please subscribe to my newsletter, or click the RSS button in the menu on the right. Thank you.
Taking care of business: The Netherlands & London
From wednesday 26 of september through saturday the 6th of October, I will be in Holland.
I’ve got some appointments with clients and need to arrange some business matters that have to do with my recent move to Spain.
This means that I will available for appointments during those days. Now, I know that usually travelling tailors make it a custom to receive their clients at a hotel, but for several reasons I cannot do this. First of all, my current schedule requires me to be present at various locations during the week, making receiving customers less practical than visiting them.
But mostly, it’s because I really much prefer to treat my customers with the care and distinction that they deserve. Rather than herding a people into a hotel, fitted into a tight schedule, I believe it is much more pleasant for everyone to be given the time and tranquility that is needed to take proper measurements, select a cloth, and to discuss the suit they want to have. When buying something as personal and individual as bespoke clothing, my view is that the service you receive should be equally personal and individual.
So anyone in The Netherlands or Belgium who is interested in making an appointment, please be advised that I will be more than happy to visit you at your home, office, or other location of your choosing.
After my stay in The Netherlands I will fly out to London, where I will also be seeing customers. The dates for this leg of my trip are as yet not confirmed. I’ll keep you informed when things become definite. You may also subscribe to my newsletter, that way you’ll receive an email as soon as something changes.
For appointments, please write me at martinstall@gmail.com or call me on either my spanish mobile: +34 656 321 321 or my dutch mobile: +31 6111 111 61. (no longer in use)
Thank you.
