There she stands, one of the most glamorous women to be snapped by the paparazzi, on the most romantic occasion of her life, her wedding day. Yes, she's dressed in white but the ruffles, the flounces or the meringue are nowhere to be seen. The woman is Bianca Jagger, the year is 1971 and she's wearing her famous Tommy Nutter trouser suit. This was a white wedding with a rock'n'roll twist.
The marriage faltered but the image of a besuited Bianca endured, an iconic fashion moment that launched a thousand imitators. Jagger was not the first to mix sartorial opposites - Marlene Dietrich sported a white tux and top hat in Blonde Venus in 1932 - but her decision to adopt the ultimate in masculine dressing, the suit, spoke to a whole generation. Not only could liberated women walk and talk like men, they could dress like them too.
Despite the pinstripe's appeal to the feminine, this spirit of emancipation never quite hit the traditional world of Savile Row, the accepted seat of men's tailoring. The Row, as it is known to aficionados, is only a stone's throw from the women's wear emporiums of Bond Street. But what it represents is a world apart from the handbags and must-haves of these stores. From the clean, grey stone of the buildings to the shop fronts displaying men's dress in all its finery, this short, narrow street seems to have manliness cemented into its very bricks.
Unsurprisingly, then, Savile Row and women have never really been bedfellows. Sure, ladies of a certain background would visit for their riding habits but that was pretty much it. There are, however, signs that this might be changing.
Demand from women for a bespoke suit (occasionally made with a skirt but most often with classic trousers) is increasing, particularly from successful women working in the City. This trend may well receive a boost next season with the emerging women's fashion trend for tailoring. Suiting was all over the international catwalks this year with designers such as Yohji Yamamoto, Jasper Conran, Max Mara and Dries van Noten heavily influenced by the skills of Savile Row.
Even a denim brand, Radcliffe, boasts a Savile Row-trained pattern cutter and tailor, who spent 30 years working at Andersen and Shepherd. Radcliffe claims this skill gives its jeans a perfect cut and fit. "When I first started I asked a male friend who had his jeans narrowed who did them for him and he said his tailor. So I asked him if he'd do it for me," says Susie Radcliffe, founder of the fashion brand. She says the tailor's input "enhances the product hugely. The increase in the fit of our jeans has been unbelievable".
Away from Savile Row, the popularity of women's suiting is growing. Paul Smith, who has already seen a 10 per cent female take-up of the bespoke men's tailoring service at his Westbourne House store, used his winter catwalk show to introduce a new Men Only range for women that is directly inspired by his men's tailoring roots. At Charles Tyrwhitt, an essentially men's tailoring company that sells 80 per cent of stock online or by catalogue, managing director Ashley Potter says that its women's suiting launch "has been tremendously successful. As a category it has had the highest sell through percentage season to date, so much so that we have had to pull it out of the last three catalogues of the season as we cannot fulfil demand."
Designer Stella McCartney is a staunch fan of men's bespoke suiting. "It's very much my thing," she says. "I have an absolute love for bespoke. My mum always wore bespoke suits and had a lot of Tommy Nutter suits made and that inspired me. I always liked trying on my mum's suits and definitely felt very held in by them, very sculpted and very safe. And I think there's something very sexy about a woman in a man's suit."
As always, McCartney has acted on her beliefs. Not only did she train with tailor Edward Sexton (who partnered Nutter and helped make suits for such high profile women as Jagger, Joan Collins and Twiggy) during her time at St Martins fashion college, but she also opened a women's bespoke suit atelier in her Bruton Street shop in 2003 and asked Henry Rose, another former Nutter tailor, to run it for her.
For women brave enough to go one step further and turn to Savile Row for the "real deal", the good news is that established tailors such as Kilgour and Gieves & Hawkes are happy to welcome them. "We have gone from zero to 8 per cent in the bespoke percentage for women in only four years," confirms Mark Henderson, Gieves & Hawkes's managing director. "It's interesting and encouraging and certainly something to keep an eye on for the next few years."
David Coleridge, chairman of Huntsman, believes that the personal touch a bespoke suit offers has a value and appeal to both sexes. "It's hard to generalise but I think the fact that you can come to Savile Row and have your needs met and have just what you want has resonance. You can buy something from a label that's a luxury brand in every way but it's just one of many others. But if something's bespoke, it's unique and individual and I think that's a factor that women are interested in."
Marilyn Lownes, a writer and Kilgour bespoke suit customer, says she has been buying tailored suits since she was 17. "I saw Rod Stewart perform and he was in a Harris Tweed suit. I immediately went out and had the trousers made. And I had a tux made when I went to see Sinatra sing," she says.
Lownes is an established customer but savvy tailors realise that to encourage other women to follow, it would help to have more women tailors on Savile Row. At Gieves & Hawkes, for instance, there has been an increase in requests from female fashion students to train in its workrooms (due in part perhaps to the training that Alexander McQueen gained during his Savile Row years; he is renowned and respected in fashion circles for his tailoring skills), and an increase in women who stay on after college. The house further boasts that next year its cutter, Kathryn Sargent, will graduate as the first female Master Cutter after 10 years of training. Last year, another of its trainees, Jo Baker, won two out of three Tailor's Guild Golden Shears Awards (for Best Overall and Best Women's Wear).
Gieves believes that having more women in the cutting room has helped to build the numbers of its women customers, made up mainly of successful City figures, who first started turning to the tailors for interesting evening wear and appreciate a service that can cost from £3,000 upwards. "High-powered women who were attending awards or important functions wouldn't wear long frocks," explains Ray Stowers, the workroom and bespoke manager. "They wanted to appear smart, but not too masculine, in dinner suits. So they opted for more feminine, tailored dinner jacket options. And having a girl taking care of them - and understanding their requirements a bit better - has added value. We do produce mainly business wear for ladies but we now offer more variety. Our main value is to produce what these women would be able to find in Bond Street but done exclusively in Savile Row."
At Huntsman, female clients make up about 15 per cent of the bespoke business. This is a comparatively high figure compared with other tailors, probably because its traditional cut of men's suit is very slimline and so quite suited to the female form. Huntsman is also developing the ladies bespoke lines. Once the blocks are perfected (in around six months), it plans to have some women's bespoke clothes made up for the shop to help guide female customers though possible tailoring choices.
"It's our job to demystify the process for women so they feel comfortable when they come in. And the more women that come in, the more that will come. It's a sort of self-perpetuating thing," says chairman David Coleridge.
Even so, there are pitfalls when trying to fit the male suit around a female frame: making a suit for a woman is a different discipline to that of tailoring for men. "It's a totally different system," explains Edward Sexton, who served his apprenticeship on Savile Row and makes suits "for a tremendous amount of ladies today. A lady's garment will hang on the bust point, that's the key. But a man's must centralise in the centre back and neck. The garment must balance - without balance it won't fit anybody."
Women must also be careful to wear the same underwear to all fittings as this can seriously alter the cut and ultimate drape of the suit. And before you even start being measured up, you'll need to be sure about what shoes you'll wear with your suit: heels or flats. This decision will alter the entire silhouette and thereby the fitting and pattern cutting. McCartney recommends women have two pairs of trousers made to get round the problem.
However, according to Catherine Hayward, fashion director of Esquire magazine, who has had a bespoke suit made at both Kilgour and Richard James, it's not as simple a process as you might think to twist a male-focused tailor to the whims of a woman.
"When I first went in I was quite naive. As a woman you think you know about clothes but it's quite a special thing to do. When I went in I said I wanted a YSL Le Smoking-type suit, but you have to be firm about what you want. Most tailors are catering to men most of the time and so originally what I got was too big." Hayward was after a very fitted, very sexy look and sent the suit back for alterations. "There was nothing wrong with it, it's absolutely beautiful, but I just didn't feel particularly womanly in it," she says. Areas to pay particular attention to, she says, are sleeves and the front of trousers, where a cut for a man will naturally incorporate more room for movement.
This is why, in spite of the upturn in interest from women, some on Savile Row are reluctant to embrace the trend: it's simply too much hassle. Soho-based tailor Tony Lutwyche says that although he had quite a few female clients when he started six years ago, he has ended up doing "less and less. It tends to be a lot more hands-on, if you'll excuse the expression, and realistically most women don't seem to want to spend the money that the men are willing to pay for their suits. Plus you tend to lose your focus of what you're doing. If you are a men's tailor you really want to spend all your time making men's suits."
Richard James has made suits for the likes of Nicole Kidman, Bianca Jagger and Patsy Kensit but doesn't promote that side of his business. Though he does admit "it's a lovely process to go through". At Henry Poole, chairman Angus Cundey says its business for women "sort of jogs along", accounting for about 5 per cent of sales. Most often he finds these women have come in with their husband and then see some lovely bit of cashmere and ask to have a jacket made. The house may find itself the focus of more female interest when the historical novel The Tailor's Daughter is published in the autumn - it is making a bespoke suit for the author, Janice Graham, who loosely based the plot on the history of the house.
Yet despite reluctance from a few, most Savile Row tailors are welcoming the ladies and it's not simply that it would be impolite not to. Though most of the tailors report good business at the moment, the Row has been through some very lean years in recent history and new opportunities cannot be ignored. They must, says a spokesperson at Gieves & Hawkes, "adapt and develop". Savile Row, agrees Coleridge at Huntsman, "will always remain an essentially male environment but one that is utilised by women".
James Ogilvy, publisher of Luxury Briefing, the journal that tracks the luxury industry, believes this trend is set to rise and that the Row should "clearly take account of it". He says: "There are still several professions that require women to wear suits and for them the pleasure to be derived from a bespoke suit is probably a Damascene moment."
Nor does Ogilvy believe the pricing will keep women away. "Off-the-peg designer suits are not cheap and for the price of two or three of these that might last only a season, you can own a beautiful hand-made suit that you might want to keep for your granddaughter."
This isn't the first time Savile Row tailors have started down a more female-friendly road. Holland recalls that the last time the Row saw similar inklings of a serious female bespoke customer base was back in the early 1990s and Kilgour made a positive attempt to chase them. "It was a pretty dire time for tailoring and it was a string to our bow. We felt we had to try to woo other parts of the population that weren't necessarily our customers." Hugh Holland, the managing director of Kilgour, recalls that it "proved very popular for two or three years - we had a lot of coverage at the time and a lot of work." But after an internal shake-up, which took the company from Kilgour French Stanbury to simply Kilgour, the focus went elsewhere and by the end of the decade the women's market had become "a poor relation".
So what makes the current resurgence different? Well, for a start, the modern female customer is already more used to customised shopping with fashion houses such as Gucci and Anya Hindmarch all launching successful "bespoke" services that allow for more self-expression and personal choice with accessories. It's only a short leap to decide on a proper bespoke suit.
Tara Falk, chief executive of Paragon International Insurance Brokers, who works on the trading floor at Lloyd's in the City, is already on her second Gieves & Hawkes bespoke suit and plans to come back for more. "Next time I will have a special occasion creation, something that I can wear for work with flat shoes, then change just the top, slip into a pair of Jimmy Choo high heels and go off for an event or awards evening - which are becoming more and more frequent." Buying bespoke, says Falk, allows her to "fit in but stand out" and lets her have a piece "of those beautifully made suits that the boys were having made for themselves but still retain my femininity. It's an amazing experience and I feel I'm getting the VIP treatment."
In the end the joy of the real thing is not just that it offers a working uniform, a natty wardrobe twist or even a sense of true liberation and success in a man's world. No, the real joy of a man's bespoke suit is quite simply the wearing of it. "It honestly feels like you're walking along the street naked, you don't feel as though you're wearing anything and that's what hit me when I had my Kilgour suit, that this is what men want and have in their best suits. I suddenly understood it fully," explains Marilyn Lownes. "You feel so light and unencumbered, and the confidence that gives you is amazing." And why should that feeling be restricted to men only?
MADE TO MEASURE
Are you ready for your measurements? Don’t worry; this is not a nerve-wracking experience. You do not have to strip down to your underwear or reveal even a millimetre of flesh - unless you specially want to.
I tested the process at Kilgour and it is such a totally professional service that I didn’t feel self-conscious or ill at ease, even though it was a man wielding the tape measure. You needn’t even hear the circumference of your hips if you don’t want to.
The only thing you must not do is turn up in a skirt; ideally wear a pair of trousers you like to give the cutters an idea of the silhouette you have in mind.
You will have to stand in front of a full-length mirror, have your figure assessed for any slight irregularities (such as slightly uneven shoulders), have a band tied round your waist so it’s clearly marked to ensure accurate measurements, and be measured down your back and arms, across your shoulders and chest, up and down your inside and outside leg, and round your hips. This should be traumatic but it’s surprising how in such a masculine environment you can accept your body and its faults in a more detached way.
All in all the process will take about 20 minutes; the time consuming part can be deciding on cloth and cut.
Edwina Ings-Chambers is the FT's deputy fashion editor
