Philadelphia

[Guest]

I know that Philadelphia earns snickers from the NYC crowd, and to be honest I like my city's being snubbed by New Yorkers. This keeps my city's real estate affordable and my beautiful city habitable, in a way NYC will never be. For the Europeans reading this message, you have to understand that Philadelphia (and Baltimore) are the two most European cities in the USA. By this I mean they are not absurdly crowded, one can get around comfortably by foot, and the pace of life is slow enough to allow for daily food shopping and reading the paper over an espresso on days other than Sunday. My city is beautiful for other reasons too: its architecture is a joy, it has real neighborhoods that can be traversed in a reasonable amount of time, the food is wonderful, and rents are affordable. Geographically, it is well-placed to allow for day trips to NYC and Washington DC.

One of my city's weaknesses is retail, but ironically, there are several treasures here that even NYC can envy.

Of course, there is my beloved tailor Joseph Centofanti. Now, to get an idea of who this guy is, you have to know that there is no tailor who knows him and does not love him. I know Leonard (one of our certified aritisans) is a good friend, for example. Centofanti, who is in an easily reachable (fifteen minutes by car) town outside Philadelphia, is worth a visit for several reasons. First, his price CMT for a jacket is 1500 dollars. A suit including cloth costs 2500 dollars. He has for your enjoyment the largest selection of cloth books I have ever seen, literally hundreds. I am not expert enough to characterize his house style but I would not say it is particularly distinctive. Italian with British influences is the best I can do. I can say that he is an extremely precise craftsman and makes very few "mistakes." He runs an attelier with at least three workers including a pants maker and an assistant, and everything is made there. There is no mystery, it is visible from the fitting area and the workers are always busy as bees. He does a substantial alteration business. His prices are actually identical to other Philadelphia tailors for everything, including custom suits. Sometimes you might not think that because other tailors may quote less expensive jobs that do not involve the same labor. I found a tailor who is not well known, for example, and asked him the price for his best suit, and his price was identical.

Centofanti himself never bad-mouths other tailors. He sometimes criticizes RTW, however. And when I was at the beginning of my search for tailors and I asked him what other tailors in Philadelphia he would recommend, he named one, Ray Partito, simply because he said his was the only work he had seen and could comment on. Partito has an enormous reputation. As a practical matter, he sews for a select clientele with money to burn and has a long waiting list. His advantage over Centofanti is that he works in the center of town on Walnut Street.

I can recommend only one RTW source in Philadelphia, Uomo e Nella on Locust. I recommend this boutique with reservations. First of all, I do not think much of RTW anymore. Second, NYC shopping, one of the glories of the western world, is 1 1/2 hours away by train. But this small boutique sells a lot of brands that are not commonly seen in the USA, including Marol, d'Avenza, Lamatta, and Valstar. He also usually sells everything at half-price very early in the season, which makes the outrageous suggest retail prices into merely expensive ones. I bought several suits and jackets from this store for an average 1500 dollars, as well as numerous Giampaulo shirts, which I happen to love and are comparable to, and in some ways nicer than, Barba.

To be continued....

[maxnharry]

As a former New Yorker who had the opportunity to live in Philadelphia, I think it is one of the most undervalued cities in the US. It has world-class everything, as it was arguably the most important US city economically up until the end of the 1800's