Saville Row (with Sass) Comes to Bangall
Interior designer Selina van der Geest does the sort of work—high quality, fundamentally fitting-and-proper, but with just enough edge to make it simultaneously lively and au courant—that leaps off the pages of Elle Décor, where it is routinely published. It follows, then, that her renown for balancing innovation with tradition would make her Dutchess County showroom a magnet for like-minded souls. Which helps explain the inexplicable: Two years ago, her friend and fellow-Brit Katherine Hooker toured the U.S. with a trunk-full of samples for beautifully made, bespoke dresses, coats, jackets and vests. Bangall, tiny, challenging-to-find-even-on-a-local-map Bangall, against all reason, turned out to be her most successful stop.
This Saturday and Sunday, February 28 and March 1, Hooker will return to Van der Geest’s showroom on Hunns Lake Road with new samples of her tweedy-with-a-twist designs.
For example, her zip-up Scooter Jacket (above, £525 or about $753) has a thumb hole in each cuff so they may be turned down and stay snug over gloved hands when riding a bike or a motor scooter. Her shawl-collared, fitted waistcoat (right, £325 or about $466) takes tweed to new heights of sexiness.
Customers may select from a range of fabrics, then the clothes will be made to their measurements in England by master craftsmen for delivery in early fall. And the prices? As fortune would have it, there is a much more favorable rate of exchange than the last time Hooker visited. In 2007, the British pound to U.S. dollar was £1.00 = $2.10. Today, £1.00 = $1.44. Think: bespoke quality for about what you'd expect to pay for high-end pret-a-porter.
Katherine Hooker
at Selina Van Der Geest
97 Hunns Lake Road
Bangall; 845.868.7130
Saturday, February 28; 10 a.m. - 6 p.m.
Sunday, March 1, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.
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