Editorial
Front Page - Friday, January 22, 2010
Yacoubian Tailors dressing people for success
David Laprad
Master Tailor John Yacoubian has dressed royalty. So when he says the clothes make the man, his customers take his advice seriously.
“If you don’t know a person, you’re going to meet him first time, the best impression is how he dressed up,” he says. Seated at his desk in his upscale Broad Street store, a tape measure draped around his neck, Yacoubian offers an illustration.
“When first year I start my business, 1969, man walked in, want custom suit in three days,” he says. “I said, ‘Why you so rushed?’ He said, ‘I have an appointment in New York to bid on a project.’ We made him two suits, and he went. Two weeks, I receive big box of gifts.”
The value of the presents nearly exceeded that of the suits, prompting Yacoubian to call the man and ask why he sent them. Elated, the customer said he’d received a several million-dollar order, even though he’d put in the highest bid, because of his suit. “He was nice and clean. The other guys were sloppy,” Yacoubian says.
One need not worry about leaving Yacoubian Tailors looking less than exceptional. When producing a custom made suit, Yacoubian is like an artist, skillfully considering the shape of his client’s body and the color of his skin.
“Not all of us same shape,” he says. “A stooped person needs a longer version in the back and shorter in the front. The average retail store doesn’t know this.”
While tending to a client, Yacoubian is as delicate with his comments as he is with a needle and thread. Instead of remarking that one shoulder is higher than another, for example, he’ll let his customer see and feel the results of his eye for detail.
To keep Chattanooga’s well-heeled looking the part, Yacoubian says he uses the finest tailoring houses in the world, whether he’s ordering a custom made suit or purchasing shirts, ties, topcoats and trousers to fill his racks. From Hart Schaffer Marx in Chicago, which custom made suits for President Obama, to Samuelson in Montreal, Canada, which Yacoubain says uses only the finest Italian and British fabrics, to the world renown Ermenegildo Zegna, which makes high end Italian garments, the tailoring houses with which Yacoubian does business have a reputation for using the finest materials and producing quality work.
There is a price to pay for the luxury of wearing the finest clothes available. At Yacoubian, the cost of a Hart Schaffer Marx suit off the rack begins at $400, while custom made suits can go as high as $7,000. However, with a few adjustments, even a suit off the rack can look and feel almost as good as a custom suit, Yacoubian says.
When a customer wants something special, though, Yacoubian says he can deliver. “We had colorful customer. He was a big man, had good posture, loved unusual clothes. One day he said, ‘You need to make me suit nobody has.’ So I ordered him a pinstripe suit, and the stripe was his initials all the way down. Holyfield boxer saw it and wanted the same.”
Yacoubian smiles as he tells the story, and when he finishes, his daughter says he has many more he could tell. Perhaps none are as interesting, however, as the account of his life.
“My uncle used to be the largest custom house in Beirut, Lebanon,” he says. “All the dignitaries used to come to our store. So I was a young man, 15 years old, when I started learning tailoring from scratch up.”
In 1963, Yacoubain earned his master tailor credentials in Paris. Five years later, he traveled to the United State to visit his brother, who was attending Tennessee Temple University. “To earn little bit pocket money, he was working at a tailor shop,” he says. “And this man hired me because I could make a complete suit. After a year, I said, ‘These guys don’t know much about tailoring, and they have a shop, so we can start our own.’”
Yacoubian opened his first shop at 928 Market St., where he stayed for four years. He then moved to where Starbucks currently resides. Seven years ago, he settled in at 721 Broad St., where he’s doing business today.
As Yacoubian’s son and daughter are learning the ins and outs of the business, with his daughter handling women’s clothing, odds are Yacoubian Tailors will be around for years to come. As will Yacoubian, who has a great passion for what he does.
“I love it. This is my hobby,” he says. “When a person comes in, if I can make him look better than what he is for his shape, choosing the right fabric, color and style, then I’ve accomplished something important. That gives me joy.”
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