Bespoke Ties

[Will]

Hober and family have set up shop in a village in Thailand where they plan to add some additional help to sew neckties. The shipping times have increased a bit but there is no duty and I'm told they hope to shorten their lead time on bespoke orders to make up for the increased transit time.

[David Hober]

Concordia and Will are correct. We have family in France, Thailand and the US so we are not always in one place.

With that said we have purchased a new building in Buayai which is a small town in rural Thailand in the Isan silk region about 5 hours from Bangkok and a world apart. We also have a working farm in a village about 15 minutes from the town.

There are many very experienced seamstresses here who have years of experience in weaving and sewing. we have hired several and are currently training them in our style of bespoke tie making.

Our workshop is very quiet, friendly and peaceful. With soft Thai music in the background and a gentle breeze. Baby Ben sleeps in his crib and Samantha "Sam" is usually running around - Nursery school starts in May - which is good....

In the south of France about 45 minutes from Avignon we have a family farm house. Although we do not actually do any farming in France. We use an old building that is next to the main house as a studio.

In addition to growing in our ability to make ties faster as Will mentioned, we also are working on a number of long term plans to dye and weave new silks.

Today my father-in-law and I spent some time talking about where we are going to plant "dye" crops including madder root. One challenge is finding the correct micro climate. We need to use land with a low clay content for the madder root. Plants like indigo should be easy to grow.

Currently we have our wool interlinings woven for us in Italy but I would like to weave some wool by hand on our farm. I am not sure if I would use wool yarn from New Zealand or Australia, I have to do some more research.

Reducing the number of yards required for a custom woven silk is an ongoing project.

Back to the original poster's question about bespoke ties:

It is an enjoyable process and as Cantabrigan has mentioned the knot can be adjusted.

Interestingly the width of tie at its widest is not a big factor in the knot of a bespoke tie. We can adjust a tie by using different silks and interlinings and more importantly by changing the shape of the tie around the neck.

Please note that wool interlinings can also have a layer of cotton added for thickness without the weight of wool. This week we tested a group of handwoven Thai silk ties with a variety of different interlinings and for summer I liked a wool interlining with an extra layer of cotton.

So in the end if you can find a bespoke tie maker that you can work with you will have a tie that like a bespoke suit fits your personal taste.

As for Sam Hober ... is there a brick & mortar shop?

No-- in fact, I don't even know if he has a totally fixed address at this point. His family has interests in Thailand and (I think) France, and he had been living in Colorado.