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Crunch the numbers, and the future of tailoring looks bleak: the global appetite for formalwear is locked in slow decline. Look deeper, however, and a more hopeful story emerges. Tailoring is no longer menswear’s prime dialect, yet it remains a big part o
If the parameters of masculine elegance in menswear have really shifted over the last few years from the formal to a philosophy of anything goes, then you’d suspect that suiting’s place in the market is in decline. So is it?
Well, according to data compiled by Bain & Company for L’UomoVogue, the men’s formalwear sector actually enjoyed a pretty good year in 2015. Since then, however, it has declined in 2016 and 2017 respectively, reaching 23%, equal to 6.21 billion euros, and 22%, 5.94 billion euros, of the total luxury menswear market – a sector that in 2017 was worth 27 billion euros. And that growth in 2015? That upturn turns out to be a b lip driven not by an appetite for tailoring but favourable exchange rates and broader market conditions. Faced with the ever-increasing “casualisation” of the male wardrobe, brands specialising in the for mal sector have seen the volume of their businesses decrease steadily from 2011 to 2017, with an annual rate of decline that has fluctuated between -4% and -7%.
In 2018, according to data from the Altagamma Observatory compiled by Bain, the situation has not improved. If the apparel market for men and women is worth a total of 60 billion euros globally, the growth rate of -1% over the year is also explained by the less than stellar
performance of menswear, both casual and for mal. Predictably, accessories are the best performers: + 7% for shoes (19 billion euros), + 5% for bags (51 billion euros), + 4% for cosmetics. In these numbers, many phenomena converge. These include the emergence of an increasing crossover market in which f ashion brands find themselves competing with those specialising in spor tswear. Then there is the changing way we conceive workwear and the decline of professions that insist upon for mal attire in the office. So is for malwear really dead in the water? The truth is that the travails of this long-dominant sector cannot be reduced to such a simplistic, all-or-nothing diagnosis. Examine smaller trends within the market and you discover that while this is a cor ner of menswear that is absolutely undergoing disr uption, it is by no means at its last gasp.
Look, for instance, at the made-to-measure sector. During these tough last few years it “has shown all its resilience”, according to Dr. Claudia D’Arpizio of Bain. Despite its frequently trumpeted passing, formal elegance is not a concept on the cusp of extinction, but one that is undergoing a transformation in line with the chang ing lifestyles and expectations of both male and female consumer. Far from being a threat, their shifting social codes and desire to experiment with new materials represent an opportunity to fleet-footed formalwear specialists. As the S/S 2019 ready-to-wear runway shows demonstrated, there is to some extent a r eturn to tailor ing underway, confoundingly driven by the very same designers who were until recently so influential in its rejection. These designers are swinging back on the pendulum “to a more classic definition of the masculine form”, as Tim Blanks wrote in the last issue of L’Uomo Vogue. To get an idea, look at the fir st Kim Jones collections for Dior Homme (or his Tokyo Pre-Fall). Then consider Virgil Abloh’s first outing for Louis Vuitton, Riccardo Tisci’s debut for Burberry or playfully stylised “male couture” by John Galliano for Maison Marg iela.
Bain’s research reveals another chink of light in what might seem a dark time for formalwear. For while its silhouettes might be less pr evalent, its philosophy has increasing value across all of meanswear. Bain reveals the increasing importance of “tailor-made” as a g rowth tool for luxury menswear players in every category. It adds that that per sonalisation – the essence of tailor ing – is the key to galvanising contemporary luxury consumers.
This has been proven by the progressive growth of made-to-measure as a service mantra that has extended to all pr ice points and is becoming the defining factor for shopping exper iences ranging from food to high-end accessories. In a world dominated by social media, which drives in its user s a constant search for shareable displays of likeable validation, personalisation has changed the nature of what used to be the aloof outlook of luxur y. Shops and e-commerce sites offer special ser vices to accommodate top-spending customers while experimenting with machine-learning technologies that can intercept user changes in taste. Many goods can be customised online, ostensibly to “empower” the consumer to make the product his or her own.
Department stores meanwhile have set aside areas dedicated to “tailormade’ menswear, while highest-level marques such as Ermenegildo Zegna have
launched bespoke ateliers, such as the one that opened in Mar ch 2017 on via Bigli in Milan.
To service a consumer who is increasingly driven by the unique, tailoredto-him aspects of the item he is looking to pur chase, formalwear brands are ideally positioned to supply staff who have a genuine expertise in customisation. Since 1985 Brioni, which recently appointed Austrian Norbert Stumpfl as creative director, has operated its School of Alta Sartoria in Penne, in Abruzzo, with the goal of training highly skilled tailor s in-house. This was an example followed in 2001 by Ciro Paone, the founder of Kiton, to promotes generational turnover and keeping the tradition of Neapolitan tailor ing alive. Fellow Italian formalwear specialists such as Cor neliani, Tagliatore and Lardini all cultivate these traditional skills from within.
What seems a logical strategy is to connect tailor ing’s long-cultivated mastery of customisation with a digital native consumer who wants personalised products and is willing to lear n the codes of for malwear from a fresh position.
This is the route being successfully followed by Lanieri, a startup founded in 2013 by Simone Maggi and Riccardo Schiavotto, which is the fir st Italian e-commerce capable of offer ing tailor-made ser vices entirely online. Lanieri’s success shows that in our rapidly chang ing marketplace, the “monographic” brands, those specialising in men’s formal and “tailor-made”, have an opportunity to deploy their long-honed exper tise in a fresh way.
If in the past for malwear was the synonym of confor mity then today it should be the opposite. A man is free to choose whether to w ear a suit or not. Should he decide to, it will be because that suit is special, customised to fit his personal needs and wishes and something he can displa y as an emblem of his own individuality. So “tailoring” should be seen not only as the cr eation of a garment designed to accommodate a differ ent body shape or to emphasise membership of a professional club, as it was in the past.
Tailoring should itself be tailor ed – altered and recut to emphasise itself as a future-facing value system that champions fr eedom of expression. That is where the future of tailor ing lies for those companies who ar e flexible and far-sighted enough to seize it.