Celebrity status

Lights, camera action!

In October I had the privilege of being invited to attend the Ningbo International Fashion fair. A week long exhibition showcasing the design, production and processes of not only the Chinese garment industry but the melting pot of manufacturing happening worldwide.

Henry Bailey London tailors had asked me to attend to help display the techniques and skills of Savile Row bespoke tailoring. We had an eclectic team during this week with gentlemen from Australia, United States, Lithuania, Savile Row and myself representing China. What we all had in common was despite where we may all be located we had all trained on Savile Row or under the instruction of a master who trained on Savile Row. This optimises to me my journey to China and how the training of true British tailoring is now travelling worldwide.

                                 

Our international dapper crew created quite a stir in Ningbo! I have found in my short time in China that I cause curiosity among the locals and that is in the westernised city of Shanghai, Ningbo is much smaller and less familiar to foreign visitors. Upon the opening of the show we were swarmed by teenage girls all wanting their photos taken with our team. It was so sweet to have such appreciation for just turning up! 

We then discovered in what high esteem we were held when we started our demonstrations. I measured customers and cut the patterns rock of eye live in front of observers. Continuing the 

process I struck out the pattern and cut the cloth. Along with my colleagues we basted the garments 

together for basted fittings. All these stages were done in the open to allow people to watch, what we hadn't imagined was how many people would watch.

                             

  

Nowadays you don't see camera flashes when pictures are taken, so I looked up from cutting my pattern to see the apple badge on the back of many I phones and I pads! I am more used to cutting in a basement or back room of a Savile Row house and suddenly to have an audience filming, photographing and watching my every movement was very daunting. Some local students were on hand to help translate for me and I learnt why people were so fascinated to watch me.

Ningbo has their own tailoring history which I explain in more detail in my last post 'The Red Gang' Chinese tailors are men and so the crowd would never have seen a female Cutter before, and definitely not a blonde one! The Chinese tailors often draft straight on to the cloth as well so the 

paper patterns were causing a lot of excitement. One of the audience members was a tailor himself and asked a lot of in depth questions, he wanted me to teach him how to draft a pattern there and then so my interpreter had to explain that cutting is a 7 year apprenticeship in Savile Row and can not be squeezed in to an afternoon session.

As guests of the exhibition we were invited to a Banquet in honour of the Fashion fair. The dress code was black tie so being the representatives of our field our team complied. No one else attending the banquet was in black tie and in most cases not even suits. There were jeans and t-shirts and even baseball caps sat around the tables. This is not at all what I am used to from a formal dinner but it also started at 6pm and was all over and the ballroom empty by 7.30! 

Networking is the name of the game at these events and business cards are being exchanged everywhere you look. People eat very little as you are expecting to leave your seat to go and meet other guests. I was also initiated in to the tradition of Ganbei which translates to cheers or more accurately bottoms up. If someone says Ganbei to you it is expected for you to finish all that is in your glass. At the banquet they were serving red wine so combined with the little food it was a very entertaining hour and a half. 

As the week progressed more an more people wanted photographs with us. I had been featured in several newspaper articles which I discovered the newspapers have readerships of 12 million people. One group of students even asked for my autograph, a very humbling experience as their teacher explained that the fashion students didn't realise that women could be tailors and had been inspired by meeting me. I found all the attention a little overwhelming but was flattered by the response to our team. We did have to giggle when a lady thrust a baby into my arms for a photograph, a politician I am not! 

All in all it was a fantastic week, I met suppliers and contacts and some great friends. It was lovely to see so many other people with the pride and enthusiasm about Savile Row spreading the message and trade worldwide whilst sticking to the pure principles and not compromising the craft. Whether it is made in Australia, England or in my case made in China our suits are still Savile Row. 

The Red Gang

Ningbo international fashion fair

I was kindly invited to attend the Ningbo international fashion fair by a Henry Bailey Bespoke Tailors. Henry Bailey were to be exhibiting at the event and were looking to promote British bespoke tailoring in China, a cause close to my heart. We had a beautiful stand with fine examples of hand made bespoke garments and a team of specialists conducting demonstrations and available to answer questions. We had a diverse team who's locations spanned the globe but were all trained in the traditional Savile Row style. It made for an amazing week and some interesting collaborations for future projects on which I will keep you posted! More information and pictures on my week at the exhibition next time. Firstly I want to explain why Ningbo as a fashion centre of China.

Ningbo 寧波 calm wave. The city of Ningbo is an industrial Mecca of garment production  and manufacturing. Full of sky scrapers and concrete much of what is seen is like any other financial or industrial area world wide. But Ningbo has an interesting history regarding garments, specifically tailoring.

Being a port city the area was key to growth of the economic climate in the 1920's. Many expats moved to China in this time moving to the areas of growth and development which ningbo was fast becoming. The westerners that moved into town had requirements for living and had to source items from home and abroad. Tailoring was now desired in these areas and the voyage back to England too extreme for a new suit. English masters of tailoring visited china and recruited young men and boys to learn their craft to clothe the affluent new population. The young men proved to be good 

apprentices and had quick nimble figures and were thankful not to be suffering the hardships of a 

career in farming. 

The Ningbo trainees learned quickly and are now considered world class tailors and continue to pass on the skills learnt through the generations. Being a tailor was considered of a low social status in China but the skills were respected by their piers. Many tailors have since moved into Shanghai and are producing high quality work at a fraction of the Savile Row price tag. Tailoring schools and cutting books have been created recordings the teaching of the traditional ways. The Garment museum in Ningbo documents the rise of tailoring and the modern effects on the city to date. 

These skilled tailors were named the Hong Bang 鴻邦 which translates to the red gang or red guild. This is rumoured to be in homage to the masters that taught the tailors and the customers of the time of their founding. Apparently many of the western men the Chinese came in contact with had wild red hair and big blue eyes. The name still suggests quality worldwide, even if the red hair is fading out in the west.

China is proud of these craftsman and earlier this year a musical was performed, Hong Bang Tailors
musical focused on the rivalries between Shanghai tailors and ningbo trained tailors. Ningbo tailors are quoted as making the first western suit and Sun yet-sen jacket made famous by Chairman Mao. As a celebration of this garment in 2011 an anniversary edition of this jacket was produced on a large scale by traditional Ningbo tailors.

After Sun Yat-sen's death in 1925, popular mythology decreed that the garment had many meanings as well as functions. The four pockets were said to represent the Four Virtues cited in the classic Guanzi: Propriety, Justice, Honesty, and Shame.The five center-front buttons were said to represent 

the five Yuans (branches of government)–legislation, supervision, examination, administration and jurisdiction–cited in the constitution of the Republic of China and the three cuff-buttons to symbolise Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People: Nationalism, Democracy, and People's Livelihood. Finally, unlike Western-style suits that are usually composed of two layers of cloth, the jacket is in a single piece–symbolizing China's unity and peace. The garment is still popular today worn as wedding suits and by celebrities. 

The Hong Bang tailors future may be endangered as there is a severe drought in youth coming into the trade. Young Chinese people especially young men are not interested in learning a craft. An apprenticeship is 3-4 years similar to The Savile Row cousins and the youth of China are more demanding of immediate results. There are less then 100 descendants of the Hong Band tailors left in Ningbo and with the mass growth of machine cut and produced garments being made in the region the future of the Red gang may be shadowed by the looming development of commercial China.

China's original dating agency

China's original dating agency

On a sunny Saturday afternoon I was out walking up by People's square. I had only been here at night before at Barbarossa for cocktails so I decided to go and see the infamous lily pad pond during the daylight hours.

The entrance to the park was heaving with people and I nearly turned away until I remembered that at weekends the park is host to The Marriage Market.
So I weaved my way through the crowds to explore this unique tradition.

Forget your dating websites this is how the locals find a mate, but it is not young professionals in the park this afternoon but their parents! The parents will hang an advertisement for their grown children with a biography and in some cases photograph. One mother explained to me that she was here to find her daughter a husband (she did point out her daughter was 30 and therefor old!!) This caring mother explained that the advertisements have family name, occupation, height, weight and horoscope sign (which is very important apparently) She also told me that it is nowadays common place to list assets, for example if a young man owns an apartment and what kind of car.

A tailoring wonderland

The fabric market

As soon as I tell anyone I am a tailor here they say "oh you have to go to the fabric market!" So I had visions of a market full or rolls of fine fabrics and silks so I got straight of google to find out where to go thinking I may have found a gold mine of suppliers.

                               

The Shanghai fabric market is not as it sounds, it is a four storey market or tailoring stalls. Just like Bangkok and Singapore you can get a suit made in a couple of days for a very reasonable price. I am a big believer in you get what you pay for in life so if you are only paying £40 for a suit be prepared for what you will receive. Definitely worth investigating but do not expect a complete handmade suit, If it seems to good to be true it probably is.

The possibilities are endless here and there are lots of garments on display as examples of what you could have made. I later found out that 'the tailors' you meet on the stalls are just salesman and the suits are all produced in the same factories. The cloth quality and production is not to the standards I am used to but it is all a bit of fun and part of the experience.

I got talking to one of the tailors Mr Chang Hua at his very neat and compact store (smaller than most Savile Row fitting rooms) I noticed that his measurements were different to what I was expecting and he explained that the Chinese use a different tape measure. So be aware that however much you want to think it, your waist is not as small as he is measuring! Mr Hua very kindly gave me his tape measure saying if I was going to be a Chinese tailor I would need it. I think I might stick to inches for the moment.

What did catch my eye whilst walking around this shopping mall of clothing stores were the leather stalls. With the widest array of colours and finishes I have ever seen, you can commission a beautiful leather piece for next to nothing. A petrol blue suede biker jacket caught my eye and the lady running the shop had it on me before I knew what had happened. She told me to bring her something I wanted copied or a picture from a magazine. Walking around I realised that this is the key to this place, reproductions of items currently on the catwalk can be made to fit you in your choice of fabric. I rushed home and started flicking through my back copies of Vogue looking for inspiration.

Chanel style jackets grace many of the stores in every colour combination imaginable. This is a very tempting purchase and one I am going to consider. How very British I would look walking around Shanghai in a Chanel style jacket and pearls. Now to choose a colour.......

Fur coats can be commissioned here also and the price of fur is low. I have always appreciated fur and think the artistry of furriers is astounding. My view on fur is that I would wear vintage fur as it has already happened but I do not feel the need to commission a new piece.

Attempting to find my way out of this maze and a little overwhelmed from the sales patter, I passed a rain mac stall. With pictures of Burberry macs on the wall and direct copies underneath it is interesting to see how closely they have been replicated. I am typing this looking out over a very soggy Shanghai skyline as the weather is on the turn yearning for a mac from this picture! They have many waterproof fabrics available and the shades of blue and red definitely had my attention, but maybe a classic mac might make it into my wardrobe too!

When talking to a friend about my experience of the market she told me to look closely at the shirts. Some of the makers boast of 24 stitches per inch and hand sewn buttonholes, I would love to put this quality to the test. You can have a shirt made for just 7 or 8 pounds, and you get discounts for buying multiples. It is all about the bartering and who holds their nerve the longest!

Well I'm going to go and make more green tea and wait for a gap in the rain so I can head back to the fabric market.

Going Gatsby

Going Gatsby!

With all that has been going on this summer I missed the opportunity of getting to the cinema to see Baz Luhrmann's adaptation of Gatsby. I am a fan of his work and have always been captivated by the attention to detail of the costuming of his films so was very excited to see the execution of this classic. Upon boarding the plane to China I realised Gatsby was on the entertainment bill so I ordered a g & t and was a very happy girl! 

The oppopulace of the evening attire of both the women and men was incredible. The black tie outfits reassured my life long obsession with the dinner suit (or tuxedo depending which part of the world you are from!)

But it was the day wear of the gentlemen of the plot that stole the show for me. In the heat of the summer what would the well to do have worn, an array of linen and cottons graced my little aeroplane screen. 

The pink suit.

There is no way of avoiding this suit when referring to this movie, it is key to 

the plot and the character of Gatsby. Many mainstream companies have produced lines this season with the 20s styling and Brooks Brothers have created an impressive ready to wear version. Now I don't know many men who can pull off an entire pink 3 piece suit but a pink sports jacket is both bold an elegant. I have been looking at the Irish linens of W Bill as inspiration or a patterned Dorsilk from Dormeiul and Scabal always provide some beautiful lightweight options.

Having absorbed the cinematic beauty of this film and doodling ideas on the napkins that accompanied my gin I am already scrolling through my mental address book of clients who would love this look. 

Imagine my delight when arriving at our hotel to find we are staying at the infamous Jin 

Jiang hotel, a historic Art Deco haven. With its exquisite ballroom and classic elegant European style I felt like donning a flapper dress and headband! 

The roaring 20s were prolific in Shanghai, with wealth and women and western influence. The echoes of the excess and riches still ring through this cosmopolitan city with it's designer stores on every street corner and love of luxury. The heat and the humidity have me thinking of Fitzgerald's great work as I sit here watching the nets billow in the breeze wondering what this city of sin may have in store for us. 

Philippa Coates

A little bit about me....

I joined Savile Row in 2002 having just completed a degree and thinking I knew everything! My degree was in Threatrical Costume Production so I had spent three years making everything from period dresses (including corsets and bustles) to trilbys a and 7 fold ties.
Arriving at Savile Row and realising that these old established companies weren't begging this 21 year old girl to work for them was no surprise, but realising I would have to start at the very bottom was.
I worked for free sewing on buttons doing alterations, running errands in the rain making tea, anything I could to enable me to spend some time with the illustrious coat makers. Being self employed the last thing these masters want to do is have someone hanging off the end of their board watching them all day. But by doing odd jobs I started being able to pad collars and canvases and became useful resulting in me producing bastes for fittings at No1 Savile Row Gieves and Hawkes.

It was at Gieves and Hawkes I was given the opportunity to work in the cutting room, trimming jobs and trotting errands at first but finally I managed to secure a job as an undercutter to Kathryn Sargent. I worked at Gieves and Hawkes for 3 years before moving onto H Huntsman and Sons for 5 years working under the Head Cutter Mr Patrick Murphy after that I then became Head Cutter at Cad and the Dandy a young company that moved onto Savile Row this year and needed my experience to start a truly bespoke department.



It was in August 2013 when things all changed, I married my Savile Row tailor boyfriend and we moved to Shanghai! Peter Coates was a Master tailor currently making bespoke coats and was offered a role with Alfred Dunhill in China. We decided to make the move and I intend to see what opportunities are available for me in Asia now.  So those of you who knew me as Pippa May of Savile Row I would like to introduce myself as Philippa Coates of Shanghai! 

This is my blog, it is a bit about me, a bit about our journey and a lot about tailoring. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy what follows.


Philippa Coates