New plans, houses, clients…

Some of you might wonder why I’ve been so slack with this blog recently. Normally I would hide behind feeble excuses, but this time there is actually a reason why, and I will tell you.

It’s again a story about Martin, not about suits, but it’s relevant to my work, so here goes.

For a long time, my lovely fiancee Gosia, and I, have toyed with the idea of moving away from Holland. Worked on it, rather than toyed, actually.

The tailor’s beauty…

Not that there is anything wrong with Holland, but after having lived in the rural Ardennes region of Belgium for five years back when I was still a monk, I no longer feel at home in a bustling metropolitan area. We want peace and quiet, if possible. So where would we want to go? At first, I thought that moving back to Belgium would be good, but as pretty as the landscape is, the climate there is far less than agreeable. Rather wet, mostly.

For several reasons, Southern Spain has moved up on our list. England was there for a while, but there is something about the quality of life in Spain that can’t be beat. And for a non-english tailor, I do expect competition in England to be murderous. After all, it’s a country where people tell you: “Ah, you’re a tailor? My friend/brother/nephew/whatever is a tailor too.” In Holland, the closest thing is people will tell you : “My grandfather was a tailor.” Just to show how few tailors there are here, and how many in England.

But there are more reasons. Part of this has to do with personal matters, relating to my former life of dedicated spiritual practice. No, I’m not going back to being a monk. (would you, seeing the beauty in the picture above?). But I do wish to go back to a more humble way of living.

What I’d like to explain is that as a monk, I owned nothing, except for the hooded cloak I wore, and the bowl I ate from. For the rest, it was sworn poverty all around. If I needed new socks, I’d have to ask our bookkeeper for money. While living like this, as well as the obedience to the abbot and celibacy, have shaped me in ways I still frequently marvel at, I am happy that I now live a ‘normal’ life. (Define normal, Martin?) It’s nice to have a modicum of worldly posessions. A car is useful. A good stereo is precious. That kind of thing.

But the career I had been aspiring to, that of the famous travelling tailor, being fashionable and a hot item, is a far cry from the original way in which I started my mature life. Nothing wrong with it, but I guess that it isn’t really my schtick. For quite a while, I’ve longed for life-views with a more modest character.

Added to that is another aspect: I’m a terrible businessman, and a lousy marketer. Sure, I can write a nice bit of text, and my blog is being liked by many people, but if I want to have a blog, I should upkeep it, yes? We all know I not too good at that. Partly because I have a one-track mind: Once I get to working, I disappear in it, spend too many hours on a garment, forget about paperwork, blogging or editing photo’s. Yes, I sell suits via this blog, but I wonder how many I would have sold if I had blogged as regularly as I should have in the last year. Say two or three times a week. Probably a lot more suits.

But I am an artist, not an entrepreneur. The suits are what matter, not the marketing, or the letterhead or whatever. For all the enjoyment my readers may glean from my writing, it is nothing compared to a suit. And that includes the making of the suit. So I’ve been running ahead of myself, trying to do it all: business plan, travel itineraries, marketing, tax returns, oh, and making suits.

So here’s the deal:

As of may 10, I will be living in Salobrena, an ancient seaside town 40 minutes South of Granada, in the wonderful province of Andalucia, Spain.

The view from the bedroom.

It’s not much of a view in this picture, but I don’t have a wide-angle lense on my camera. In reality, the view is quite amazing. Can be seen from all rooms in the house, and there a three terrases. Nice! To the right you can see the sierras with snow on the peaks all year round (off-screen in the picture) As you can see on the map, the village is right by the sea, so in the morning you can go skiing, and in the afternoon one can have a swim in the ocean, and sit in the sun. Nice!

A view of the village.

Of course I will go on making suits. I have customers in London and in Holland, and I will continue to visit them a number of times a year. For the rest, I have decided to keep this outfit small. That means I am not making plans any longer to visit the U.S. Cities in Europe, such as Paris or Vienna, are an option. Brussels of course will always be on my list. But for the rest, I intend to keep things small-scale. The truth is that it is quite a rat-race in some ways, to work as a travelling tailor. I’m sure it’s worth it, but what with my lack of professionalism in how to run a business, I have to admit that I have overstretched my reach somewhat. In recent months, I have a few times come dangerously close to compromising the quality that is the hallmark of bespoke clothing. And that is not something that is worth it to me. Like I said, I’m all about suits, and I have rather high standards when it comes to quality, which is why it’s so hard to find tailors whose work I like enough to hand them jobs that I’ve cut. Quality is fixed. There can be no compromise.

So the compromise has to come from somewhere else. And that means scaling down the business. Honestly, I’d far rather make twenty suits a year that I really like and can be proud of, than to make a hundred that are actually not quite as good as I would like them, but “that is business, innit?” No it isn’t. Not for me, anyway.

I guess there are people who would call me crazy, others might be jealous. It’s up to you. I just had to decide something about my future, and this is it. Plus the reasons why.

Oh, here’s a few shots of the way they celebrate easter there. During the entire week, there is a procession nearly every day, whereby a statue of Christ if carried on a different route everytime through the village. The whole village will come out to watch during these events which can last as long as six hours. And if you think it’s a joke, let me tell you that this is serious religious observance. Not being catholic myself, I was nonetheless very impressed by the effort being made by everyone who partook in it, but even more so by the intense spiritual energy present at the time. Very, very beautiful to witness.

Something about the quality of life there…

The statue on the first night.

Everyone is there to see it.

Some of these guys take their religious practicevery seriously. Try carrying something like this through streets with slopes going up and down, stairways, and very narrow turns. For four hours minimum. Barefoot!

The guys carrying the bier.

And this is needed for the procession to exit and re-enter the church. The door, while quite high, isn’t nearly high enough for the whole affair to pass through, so in order to start and to end the procession, the men who carry the statue, need to crawl in and out of the church on their hands and feet.

So, anyone interested in suits, please do continue to write and call. I will still make suits, I will still travel. Also if you have any questions regarding bespoke tailoring, please feel free to contact me. To keep informed of future developments, please subscribe to my newsletter .

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© Copyright Martin Stall Bespoke - 2012