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Davies and Son stakes its claim as the oldest independent tailor in and around The Row. Thomas Davies inherited the Cork Street tailoring business left by his deceased brother and moved to Hanover Street in 1804. Before inheriting the business, Thomas Davies worked for Greenwalls who were procurement agents for the Royal Navy and Davies boasted tailoring for the famous sailor of the age: Admiral Lord Nelson whose victory at Trafalgar led to a buoyant naval officer class keen to order their uniforms and civilian suits at their leader's bespoke tailor. During Thomas Davies's tenure as guv'nor, Davies and Son claimed to dress "all the crowned heads of Europe".
Sir Robert Peel, founder of London's first Police Force, was a famous customer and, in 1979 when the firm moved from Hanover Street, a bill of the great man's for £128 was discovered dated 1829. But it was one particular uncrowned head in the British royal family who unintentionally led the firm into the middle of one of Savile Row's greatest scandals in 1892. In the 19th Century, labour subcontracted to sweatshops in London by the great houses on and around Savile Row became the focus of unwelcome attention. Angelica Patience Fraser, "the tailors' Florence Nightingale", began religious readings in these sweatshops in 1875.
In 1880 Miss. Fraser called a conference about "sweating" and held a tailors-against-drink rally in response to the notorious "Carnaby Boys": the clique of drunkard tailors centred around Soho. A House of Lords inquiry followed and led to no less a firm than Henry Poole (an icon of Savile Row then as now) condemning sweatshop labour. Davies and Son signed a resolution to improve conditions.
It was a Miss. Fanny Hicks who, in 1892, told her Trades Union Congress in Glasgow that she knew the Duke of York (later George V) had his trousers made in a sweatshop where she knew fever to have broken out and told the tribunal that the subcontractor was Davies and Son.
The Duke's brother (heir apparent and grandson of Queen Victoria) Prince Edward, Duke of Clarence, had died suddenly in January 1892 as had the daughter of Davies and Son customer Sir Robert Peel. But the Duke clearly did not lay the scandal or the death of his brother at Davies and Son's door. As King George V, he awarded the firm his Royal Warrant and, according to The Savile Row Story, "created a room for his exclusive use (in Hanover Square) and fitted it with panels and a tube like a hose pipe which communicated with the tailors upstairs". George V was as solid a customer of Davies and Son as he was King and introduced his sons to their father's tailor of choice.
Though the Prince of Wales was a famous customer of Scholte, he also patronized Davies and Son and continued to do so when he became King Edward VIII then Duke of Windsor well into the 1960s. Incidentally, Scholte sold out to James and James who was later acquired by Davies and Son anyway. The last Davies exited the firm in 1935 and the firm was taken over by its cutters who continued to run the firm until 1996. These times were glamorous but turbulent. Davies and Son was swift to capitalize on the Duke of Windsor association and attracted Hollywood royalty such as Clark Gable and Tyrone Power. In 1952 another Davies and Son stellar customer, Douglas Fairbanks Jr, was moved to declare "Savile Row has recaptured the tailoring supremacy of the world".
In 1979, the firm left Hanover Street and George Vs private room. It took fitting room chairs, fenders, fireplace screens and records rediscovered after a century of neglect. By now 90% of Davies and Son's turnover was international trade. The firm announced, "our business was built on the clothing requirements of the aristocracy of Europe and Great Britain. Today our business is mainly with the affluent and famous abroad; an ideal commercial profile, we are advised, in times when exports are of prime importance".
The Company Today: Visionary MD and custodian of Savile Row's history, Alan Bennett bought Davies in Son in 1997. Bennett, trained under Dege and Skinner MD Michael Skinner, has over forty-years' experience in bespoke tailoring. Davies and Son had already incorporated Bostridge and Curties and Watson, Fargerstrom and Hughes (Bunny Roger's tailor) but Bennett went on to add great bespoke tailoring houses Johns and Pegg (the 19th Century Royal, military tailor and Household Cavalry), James and James (who had acquired Scholte when the great man retired) and Wells of Mayfair (established on Maddox Street in 1829). Bennett had his name above the door on Savile Row in the late 80s servicing his own book of "businessmen, stockbrokers, a few Lords, Earls".
He gained a reputation as a tailor to the Court of St. James's overseas ambassadors and continues to tailor for the remaining High Commissioners in the remaining British colonies. Today, Davies and Son on Savile Row is the only old school bespoke tailoring house left on the West side of the Row. The great name still attracts the great and the good of the British establishment.
Royal Warrants: HRH The Duke of Edinburgh (Military Tailors).
House Style: Masters in the "English cut: a combination of style, cutting and craftsmanship essential to creating the look that flatters the figure and communicates substance. A waisted jacket, straight shoulder and egg shaped armhole evolved from the military riding coats of the past".
Famous/Infamous Customers: Admiral Lord Nelson, Sir Robert Peel, George V, the Maharajah of Cooch Behar, The Duke of Windsor, HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, Ambassador Joseph Kennedy (father of JFK), Douglas Fairbanks Jr, Sir Oswald Mosely, Colonel Edward Boxshall (British spy chief), Lord Alexander of Tunis, Filed Marshall Haig, President Harry Truman, Benny Goodman, Irving Berlin, Clark Gable, Tyrone Power, Bing Crosby, Calvin Klein, Michael Jackson, John Frieda.