Cesare Attolini’s suits in La Grande Bellezza
by HIGH-TONED on May 24, 2013 • http://www.high-toned.fr/en/2013/05/cesare-attolinis-suits-in-la-grande-bellezza/
Film director, Paolo Sorrentino’s “La Grande Bellezza (The
Great Beauty)”, a nostalgic, melancholic ode to the eternal city of Rome, is in
the official selection at the 66th Cannes film festival. Neapolitan tailoring
firm, Cesare Attolini labels the timeless elegance of Jep Gambardella, the
leading protagonist played by the great Italian actor Toni Servillo.
Clothes were selected by the Neapolitan actor himself and by
the costume-designer Daniela Ciancio. On Wednesday, Paolo Sorrentino and Toni
Servillo of “La Grande Bellezza” walked up the red carpet in beautiful Cesare
Attolini tuxedos.
A history of passion and Know-how culture
«In the world nothing great has ever been accomplished
without passion», as unparalleled German idealist philosopher Georg Wilhelm
Friedrich Hegel sentenced, during one of his academic lessons. Before that of
tailoring that has written the history of contemporary elegant menswear,
Attolini is the name of a family, a big family. Inextricably united, over three
generations, by a profound passion, because truly simple and visceral. The
tireless engine is fueled with dedication and enthusiasm, taste and know-how
culture, uniqueness and unrepeatability, creativity and handcraft knowledge.
Attolini managed to face without any trouble the journey along a pathway
lacking easy shortcuts towards absolute genuineness and quality. These are the
meaningful values that have accompanied the Attolini family for the past eighty
years, leading it to be the protagonist of renowned Neapolitan haute couture on
the world stage of sophistication.
THE ORIGINS • Vincenzo
It is in 1930 that he designs, cuts and sews a jacket from the line that
had never been seen before and with unusual finishes. A garment that would have
been considered alternative even during the Sixties, to then be permanently consecrated as a
paradigm of elegance in the Nineties. Disarmingly simple but able to delete,
all of a sudden, all the rigours of male elegance, making the English garments
look like something from the Jurassic. All pads off, on the shoulders too, and
inner lining off. Only the essential stays, making the jacket soft and light
like a shirt. So deconstructed that it can be folded six, eight, ten times. No
tailor had ever dared so much in the previous fifty years. It is a revolution.
It is the invention of the Neapolitan style and of the garment that, unconsciously,
everyone in the world today simply calls “the jacket”. But that which the young
Vincenzo brings to life is not only an opportunity for a new practicality, a
relieving lightness, but it is the image of a fully performing man. His
scissors capable of almost miraculous cuts allow, with those draped chests and
sleeves that border lined shabbiness, with the unusual pocket shape and the
very bold “boat style” pocket, the transition from a man who dresses with
sophistication for etiquette reasons, to one that, while dressing, does no more
than express himself. He is finally free of indulging in all freedom his taste
as well as his spontaneous motion. Needless to say, many noticed it. The most
prestigious men of the time come, day after day, like pilgrims, to the tailor
of Via Vetriera in Naples, just one hundred steps away from the point in Via
Filangieri where the refined Cesare Attolini atelier stands today. Their aim,
needless to say, is to redesign their own style in the name of softness and
curvedness of master Vincenzo’s jackets. If Totò, De Sica, Mastroianni and
Clark Gable, from the Fifties onwards, are its main ambassadors in the world of
International stardom - King Vittorio Emanuele III and the famous Duke of
Windsor are the two most extreme cases of how even the aristocratic conventions
had to bend to the temptation of a new and captivating fashion. It is not a
legend that the impeccable Duke, always dressed with clothes sewn by English
tailors only, fell in love, walking through the magical Piazzetta of Capri,
with a creation by Vincenzo Attolini. This occurred just at the point of
stopping the passer-by who wore it and ask of whose fatherhood it belonged. It
is also not a legend that tells of the endless debates between the prince of
tailors and that of comedy, the great Totò, on the themes of painting and
opera. «My father and Totò were great friends! - Cesare Attolini recalls – they
debated a lot and shared numerous artistic interests. Totò often came to Via
Vetriera to visit my father. He liked to watch him at work. Those moments had a
unique, unrepeatable taste».
«In 1930, my father Vincenzo dared to question the British
model, accomplishing a true revolution. We make good use of his teachings daily
and work constantly to make the jacket more and more suitable for the
contemporary lifestyle. Our secret can be summarised in a simple formula: we
always work seriously, without looking for easy shortcuts that can reward you
in the short term but that inevitably turn you down in the long run».
«The sense of proportion is our leit-motif. We love to
express ourselves giving up questionable extravagance. In our work, the
essential guide is first of all quality fabrics and cut. As one can see, our
secret is indeed that of succeeding with simplicity and ease in the very difficult
link between tradition and modernity. The result of such synthesis is indeed
that balance and harmony one can perceive every time a garment labelled Cesare
Attolini is worn».
«Elegance is a concept which is incomprehensible in many
ways. We want our garments to help people express their natural way of being.
Their value is to make the wearer always feel at ease. We have always dipped
elegance and sophistication into contemporary living, because it is our belief
that wearing a suit labelled Cesare Attolini should always be a unique and
distinctive experience built on style and pleasure».
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