I think one of the characteristics to be observed in artisans must be the way they make you perceive time. I refer to both the time spent together and the ability of a few to make you feel in a distant era, where the evils of our time where still hidden by calm, class and gallantry. Saverio Santillo, my shirtmaker, has this talent.
Santillo 1970 is a small family business based in Calabria, southern Italy.
I met Saverio, one of the Santillo brothers, almost by chance and I was immediately fascinated. Saverio has the great ability to make tradition coexist with a current and lucid vision of the present that leads him, also because of his personal nature, to experiment continuously (and in the ready to wear collection it is clearly evident).
Thanks to a maniacal knowledge of techniques and fabrics, the result is always interesting because, although outside the box, it maintains its consistency.
I have always met Saverio in Milan or Verona but finding myself near his laboratory I tout I’d visit him to see with my eyes how a shirt entirely handmade is produced.
Let’s say that he is a man with the manner of the past projected into the future and this is the strength of Santillo: a classic tradition that marries a conscious and really never inappropriate experimentation.
Author and photo credit: Niccolò Martari for @elegant_sauvage
