Revealed
January 20, 2025
Simon Holloway wowed Milan on Sunday evening with a set impressed by the Duke of Windsor, staged within town’s toniest golf equipment.
Successful a hearty bathe of applause as he took his tour across the Società del Giardino, based again in 1783 again when Milan was managed by Habsburg Austria. After a set that climaxed with some bravura tartans – a fetish material for the duke – and a superb show of traditional tailoring primarily based on the English drape, a softer jacket fashion invented by the previous king’s famed tailor Frederick Scholte.
Simon Holloway – Courtesy
Although this assortment was removed from being retro, exactly as a result of Holloway revolutionized the look by lightening each material and ripping out any cumbersome building from coats and jackets. His reasonably distinctive profession path, as we focus on under, meant Simon had the wanted experience to rethink Dunhill, at the same time as he recentered the model on British classicism.
Different standouts within the assortment included sensible light-weight cashmere variations of Donegal tweed worn with velvet; a raffish French lambskin spy coat with bonded tartan inside; regimental peacoats; and virtually feathery gentle flannel chalk-stripe fits. After a peripatetic profession, Simon now lives in Kennington, in south London close to the Oval cricket floor. In an outdated Victoria college constructing, the place supposedly Charlie Chaplin went to highschool, made into residences in early 90s.
Although we first meet for espresso in Paris in December, and this weekend at a pre-show transient Milan, when he revealed that his bible is the two-volume blue catalogue for Christie’s sale of the contents of the Duke’s dwelling in Paris.
Dunhill autumn/winter 2025 assortment in Milan – Courtesy
In Paris on the Chateau Voltaire, Simon wearing a wool and cashmere flannel go well with. In Milan, sporting a freshly clipped moustache, he took his bow trying just like the long-disappeared son of David Niven. Dunhill, which is owned by luxurious large. Richemont, boasts annual gross sales hovering beneath £45 million. The Milan present marked Dunhill’s second in Italy, and the fourth by Holloway. And his most full expression of Dunhill. A superb second to listen to his plans for this 132-year-old British luxurious establishment. FashionNetwork: The place do you wish to take Dunhill?Simon Holloway: For me, Dunhill is the pre-eminent British menswear home. So, the thought is to restate that and make it extra famend to a contemporary viewers. Not essentially about age, however individuals who knew the identify however by no means shopped there, our youthful individuals who have simply found it.
FN: What are your plans in additional element?SH: Folks come to London significantly within the spring and summer time to benefit from the British social calendar, whether or not it’s only a celebration or a marriage. However the Brits do it with a really codified means of dressing and a bit of pomp and circumstance. Latched on the thought of the royal household and aristocracy – every part from the Chelsea Flower Present or Royal Ascot to Glyndebourne to Goodwood and Wimbledon, these are occasions the place folks gown up. Final yr, we had the inaugural Alfred Dunhill Paddle Traditional held out on the Hurlingham Membership the place the gamers have been all in white and the observers have been all in navy blazers or windowpane examine fits. We didn’t gown them as a result of we didn’t have the wardrobe then however that’s what they turned up in anyway.
And for those who have a look at Wimbledon, David Beckham was there in a pinstripe go well with, and Tom Cruise and Bradley Cooper drop in, as do Tom Hiddleston and Benedict Cumberbatch. All dressed to the nines, and that’s what my final present in Milan was about. A pinnacle model of that however made in lighter and finer materials and in a extra trendy expression. FN: What key adjustments are you eager to result in?SH: Make issues lighter. We’ve been actually working with the heritage mills of Biella and the mills of Somerset, Yorkshire and Scotland to direct translations of our archival garments – mixing wool and linen, mohair, wool and silk. A extra up to date material.
Dunhill autumn/winter 2025 assortment in Milan – Courtesy
And our building of the tailoring is way lighter – lighter weight canvas, no shoulder pads, a suggestion of rope however nothing in there. Going again to the Duke of Windsor, and the way he and his tailor Frederick Scholte did one thing referred to as the English drape. What I liked was it had a pure shoulder, not that built-up Savile Row shoulder. Which I like and respect however it’s not one thing I’d personally put on. FN: Outline the DNA of Dunhill?SH: Dunhill was born in three components, throughout the daybreak of the age of motoring. Alfred Dunhill inherited his enterprise, outfitting horse drawn carriages. And determined to go all in on the automotive in 1893 on the age of 25. Creating an emporium to decorate the inside and exterior of the automotive, after which gown the driving force themselves. His catalogues have been the scale of an outdated cellphone ebook. Headlamps to trunks to dashboards, which laid the groundwork for the onerous luxurious of Dunhill. The unique automotive coats in tweeds, and in summer time, made in linen. Among the earliest items date to 1908, and what they name Alfred Dunhill Motorities (a mix of motorist and priorities).
That concept of onerous luxurious got here from steel devices; helpful leather-based trunks and tweed coats that’s the origin of Dunhill – a really wealthy starting. FN: What attracted you to Dunhill?SH: It has the attract of the British gent with a lightweight worldwide swagger. Once I seemed and realized extra it turned out to be true. They opened in New York and in Paris within the Twenties, and in Paris apparently by that time he was a tobacconist and pipe maker. However he was denied a tobacco license in Paris! We nonetheless make handmade briarwood pipes in Walthamstow. Our enterprise is principally menswear, secondarily equipment, however with a really robust resurgence in onerous luxurious in the mean time. Particularly lighters, and items – from video games to cigar cutters. FN: What are your plans in your Davies Road membership?SH: It’s two buildings in a single – the members membership and our retailer. Equipment and tailoring, with a full workforce of bespoke tailors and cutters, Savile Row educated. With clients in New York, the West Coast China and Japan. And I work with that workforce to make the pre-collection, utilizing materials and concepts unique to Dunhill. FN: You may have labored at Chloé, Ralph Lauren, Jimmy Choo and Agnona. What was probably the most formative expertise?SH: I lived within the States for fairly a very long time – working twice for Narciso Rodriguez and for a very long time with Ralph. He was undoubtedly a mentor. He had a terrific cinematic imaginative and prescient, and an understanding of way of life, which he virtually invented; who has had a consistency and aspiration of high quality in his complete profession that was solely admirable. He’s additionally a really good man and really respectful of his workforce. And I hope I realized that from him.
Dunhill autumn/winter 2025 assortment in Milan – Courtesy
With Agnona, the expertise was very pushed by textile growth – to contemplate material designs earlier than we reduce the material. FN: Would you like Dunhill to be recognized for ‘quiet luxurious’?FN: Dunhill is timeless luxurious, not ‘quiet’. There’s not likely something quiet a couple of coral pink go well with with a giant striped shirt. We will have quiet moments for certain. What I’ve tried to do is constructed a rugged, masculine, informal expression together with its refined tailoring. Reaching again to the Truman Capote for the Black and White Ball of the Nineteen Sixties. FN: The place will the enterprise develop in subsequent 5 years?SH: We’ve made an intentional pivot, primarily again to the UK. Placing numerous power into our London flagship at Bourdon Home. We opened in Selfridges, proper the place we needs to be nestled alongside Loro Piana and Zegna. Although now we have a special look, extra Anglified. A future flagship can also be deliberate for London.
We’ve an unique relationship with Neiman Marcus within the U.S., with shop-in-shops in Beverly Hills, San Francisco and Chicago. And there an instantaneous understanding by them that we’re this timeless concept of Britishness.
