
Tradition. Simon Cundey of Henry Poole in a dinner jacket on Savile Row in July 2017.
I spent a week in Oxford and London.
Savile Row Bespoke Suits
One afternoon I went down Savile Row. I was lucky to meet two of the leading men there, Simon Cundey of Henry Poole, and Joe Morgan of Chittleborough & Morgan.
Simon Cundey was waiting for cab that should take him to an evening tailoring event. Funnily enough, he was in a dinner jacket. I mean, Henry Poole can claim to be the first tailor to have made a dinner jacket – in 1865. The client was the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII. So seing Simon Cundey, owner and current managing director of Henry Poole in a black dinner jacket (tuxedo) outside Henry Poole, was almost epic.
A bit before I said hello to Joe Morgan. I’ve met him a couple of times before. He was in a signature long jacket with wide peak lapels and firm roped shoulders. I think of him as almost a Dickensian character.

Safari jacket (bush jacket) at Meyer & Mortimer’s in Sackville Street, made by shirtmaker Sean O’ Flynn. I think it is fair to include it in the category Savile Row Bespoke Suits.

“Quality is never an accident. It is always the result of intelligent effort.” John Ruskin in a frock coat, painted by John Everett Millais (1852), at Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.
Photography: Sartorial Notes
C & M jacket button positioned where it is best.