By the ’80s and ’90s, Japanese style had become much more sophisticated. America (and
to a lesser extent Britain) was still a major sartorial influence, but kick-started by Armani’s meteoric rise, many
tailors also began looking to the soft shapes coming out of Italy for inspiration. “Lots of tailors started going
over to Italy and many of them actually trained there,” says Marx. “The idea of going to the source and studying,
training and learning the craft and bringing it back and just mastering it – that, I think, is an old pattern [in
Japan]. What was new was having Italy in their eyes.” This had a huge influence on both bespoke tailors such as
Tailor Caid, Tailor & Cutter, Sartoria Ciccio and Pecora Ginza as well as larger, more established makers like
Ring Jacket, which today is famous for its distinctively Neapolitan influence.
Anyone who has worn a Ring Jacket garment knows how expertly they’re constructed,
from the beautiful collar-shoulder-sleeve line, to the gently suppressed body shape and beautiful cloths, many of
which they weave themselves. The lines are distinctly Neapolitan, but there’s possibly an even greater emphasis on
extremely fine hand-work that belies the country of origin. Where Italian tailoring is louche, here it is both soft
and sharp at once. “If you look at Ring Jacket, it’s a good time for them because they’ve spent decades behind the
scenes honing a lot of stuff that now people are educated about and really care about,” says Marx. “It’s given them
an opening to emerge and make that story of really beautiful construction and elegant style be enough.” It’s a trend
that Marx calls the “cult of production”. “Suddenly it’s not about the designer or brand name, it’s about how it’s
made, who made it and what it’s made from – those kinds of things that 15 or 20 years ago people might not have
cared about.”
How did the Japanese become so good at this kind of tailoring? Firstly, there is an
undeniable culture of craftsmanship in Japan, with a great many businesses and traditions leveraged around making
very intricate things at a very high level of quality. Secondly, it’s important to remember that to learn a foreign
craft, the Japanese often have no choice but to learn it at its point of origin. “If you think of Neapolitan
tailoring, if you grew up in Japan, you have no actual experience of seeing the people around you wear this
clothing,” says Marx. “So if you’re suddenly like, ‘I’m into Neapolitan tailoring and this is my thing’, the only
way to know how to legitimately do it, because there’s no natural and organic way, is to go to the source and try to
be as detail-oriented as possible about learning what makes it perfect, so that when you go home to make it or teach
it to other people, you’re beyond reproach because you learned at the source and you know it as closely as anyone
else.”
The Japanese tailoring fraternity is also famously competitive, with makers striving
tooth and nail to make the most American or most Italian garment possible. It’s an environment that has driven
makers to greater and greater levels of sophistication, and to both master authentic techniques and grow beyond
them. “They’ve got all the knowledge in the world but they’ve also got this creative, competitive impulse,” says
Marx, “so they are just ahead of the curve. The best Japanese tailors are so far past the ‘just-make-replica’ kind
of stage of interest in this stuff. They’re now into ‘let’s push it somewhere new’. By virtue of being so far ahead
in that men’s traditional heritage clothing world, Japan can’t help but be influential.”
More than anything, it’s created a sartorial subculture that caters explicitly to
style obsessives; guys who understand the intricate techniques of the craft and its history. Japanese culture is one
of the most dressed-up in the world, but this tailoring tradition speaks to those who love to dress up in a way
beyond what’s required. “[In Japan] the suit is kind of a boring uniform for most people,” says Marx. “What you see
with these tailors is that, not only the tailors themselves, but their clientele are people who really
loveclothing and want to build around really interesting, distinctive
suits.”
After years of catering exclusively to a Japanese clientele, it’s exciting that this
elegant sartorial subculture is finally drawing international attention. Tailors like Sartoria Ciccio are now
beginning to offer international trunk shows, and brands like Ring Jacket now command a cult-like international
following. They may not be the originators of the styles they create, but just like with Ivy, when it comes to fine
tailoring, Japan’s dedicated students are proving to be the ones worth learning from.
Ring Jacket's houndstooth coat, paired with the brand's calm twist suit. Photograph by James Munro.
