# Allen Solly (est. 1744) history?



## Isaac Mickle (Nov 28, 2006)

A search of the AAAC archives yields little about Allen Solly suits except the fact that they were sold about fifty years ago. These days they appear to be mainly a woman's brand, mainly focussed only on casual or business casual clothes, and mainly popular in India. Yet the label says "Established 1744 / Nottingham, England."

Anyone know anything about the rise and fall of this brand? 

And, were the Allen Solly suits ever any good?


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## RJman (Nov 11, 2003)

In Making the Man, Flusser mentions that Solly used to be a maker of fine-gauge cotton garments, and that John Smedley bought their machines when Solly changed its focus. This must have been decades ago. I've never heard of Allen Solly suits. I know that at one point they were sort of a house brand at JC Penney.


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## shoefan (Oct 30, 2003)

My recollection is that Alan Solly was a store label for some of the Federated Dept stores, rather than Penney's. I don't recall seeing any suits in that label, but rather things like shirts and perhaps ties and socks.


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## AlanC (Oct 28, 2003)

Isaac Mickle said:


> ...and mainly popular in India...


Yeah, it's odd. You see Solly stores all over the place there.


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## wgb (Mar 2, 2007)

*Alan Solly suits*

Back in the early-mid 90's I had a gray Allen Solly suit in a glen plaid. I bought it at Rich's -- it was mid-priced at the time, nothing special contruction-wise except it just seemed to fit really well.

Bill Bain
Atlanta


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## Isaac Mickle (Nov 28, 2006)

Thanks Bill. What is Rich's?

I still wonder if they were not of better quality back in the 1960s. The well-respected forum member Ken Pollock says he sold them in that long autobiographical comment often reposted in the trad forum. Or maybe they were middling back then too?

And what of the C18 and C19? This is a brand that claims to have been around since before Brooks Brothers. There must be some kind of rise and fall story to such an old brand now relegated to business casual and women's wear.


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## RJman (Nov 11, 2003)

Isaac Mickle said:


> I still wonder if they were not of better quality back in the 1960s.


 They may have been. Flusser's implication was that Solly had gotten out of the high-end knitwear business around then. I don't think Solly made suits until it became a department store brand.


> The well-respected forum member Ken Pollock


 Well, that's one way to refer to the forum's answer to Jerry Springer. :devil:


> And what of the C18 and C19? This is a brand that claims to have been around since before Brooks Brothers. There must be some kind of rise and fall story to such an old brand now relegated to business casual and women's wear.


The suit you linked to above has a tag stating it was made for Lazarus. While wikipedia's not the most reliable source for info, here's a quick squib on the Lazarus dept store, which was part of the Federated group of dept stores -- a mid-level department store, and the suit posted appears to be a fairly standard, middling suit -- nothing special.
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The fact that a brand was founded in 1744 doesn't mean particularly much, only that someone decided to keep the name alive. The business of the company holding the brand can evolve, change drastically, shift focus from upmarket to downmarket or vice versa. John Smedley was allegedly founded around that time as well, but was mainly an undergarments manufacturer for much of its existence before beginning to make knitwear in sea island cotton and merino, and more recently cashmere. Barneys New York began decades ago as a cut-price suit retailer.

Edit: Very little history on the Allen Solly site, only a 250-year jump from founding in 1744 to a 1990s acquisition by an Indian company, and an online game called "Hang the Alien". www.allensolly.com


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## Benjamin.65 (Nov 1, 2006)

In the Fifties, Sixties and Seventies, AS made very good knit wear and lisle polo shirts (like the Lacoste) that were offered in America.. They also made for or were offered by Brooks Bros. and other of your traditional American shops. Previous to that they had made up market respectable kit (including sporting kit) in the UK. They also manufactured hosiery, as I recall.


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## SGladwell (Dec 22, 2005)

Isaac Mickle said:


> Thanks Bill. What is Rich's?


A defunct Atlanta-based department store chain that (for as long as I've been in the area, at least) has been a Federated chain. Now they're all either closed or Macy's.


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## RJman (Nov 11, 2003)

Isaac Mickle said:


> and mainly popular in India.





AlanC said:


> Yeah, it's odd. You see Solly stores all over the place there.


There's an odd mix of retailers colonizing India. On one hand, Tommy Hilfiger's moved in recently to capture the youth crowd, and, rather sickeningly, Vuitton and Vertu have shops in Bombay already. On the other, I find it random that Daks has been there for a while, and, more to the point of the original post, Scottish cloth brand Reid & Taylor is present there as a suit label.

Reid & Taylor is a famous old clothmaker. It was acquired by an Indian company a few years ago. I think it still makes cloth in Scotland, but its name is also used to sell suits, in ads that featured Pierce Brosnan (and the tagline "Bond with the Best") and Amitabh Bachchan, who's India's answer to Cary Grant, Robert Redford, Al Pacino and Harrison Ford rolled into an unfeasible one.


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## Nantucket Red (Jan 26, 2006)

Fascinating thread.


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## rip (Jul 13, 2005)

RJman said:


> There's an odd mix of retailers colonizing India. On one hand, Tommy Hilfiger's moved in recently to capture the youth crowd, and, rather sickeningly, Vuitton and Vertu have shops in Bombay already.


Not to move this thread in a different direction, or to arouse the ire of the Interchange police, but why do you find it "sickening" that 
Vuitton and Vertu have shops in Bombay? That statement, coupled with your comment about retailers "colonizing" India might lead one to believe you are part of the India for Indians alone crowd.


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## RJman (Nov 11, 2003)

rip said:


> Not to move this thread in a different direction, or to arouse the ire of the Interchange police, but why do you find it "sickening" that
> Vuitton and Vertu have shops in Bombay? That statement, coupled with your comment about retailers "colonizing" India might lead one to believe you are part of the India for Indians alone crowd.


I used the word colonizing without any political intention. As Allen Solly is owned by an Indian company, I don't see how the spread of Allen Solly stores could be colonization in the politically freighted sense.

I am certainly not part of the "India for Indians alone crowd", whatever that may be. Else I would have called it "Mumbai" and not "Bombay", no?


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## AlanC (Oct 28, 2003)

RJman said:


> Reid & Taylor is a famous old clothmaker. It was acquired by an Indian company a few years ago. I think it still makes cloth in Scotland, but its name is also used to sell suits, in ads that featured Pierce Brosnan (and the tagline "Bond with the Best") and Amitabh Bachchan, who's India's answer to Cary Grant, Robert Redford, Al Pacino and Harrison Ford rolled into an unfeasible one.


It's hard not to like Bachchan, though.

There's big money in Bombay these days, a lot of big 'new' money, which often leads to (not surprisingly) nouveau riche type purchasing. India's just the latest place to experience it.


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## RJman (Nov 11, 2003)

*How can you NOT like Bachchan?*



AlanC said:


> It's hard not to like Bachchan, though.


Tun Baneya Crorepati?


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## rip (Jul 13, 2005)

RJman said:


> I used the word colonizing without any political intention. As Allen Solly is owned by an Indian company, I don't see how the spread of Allen Solly stores could be colonization in the politically freighted sense.
> 
> I am certainly not part of the "India for Indians alone crowd", whatever that may be. Else I would have called it "Mumbai" and not "Bombay", no?


Yes, I noted the use of the anglicized name; I'm still curious (only that, no other intent, political or otherwise) about your comment re: Vuitton and Vertu. Is it that you dislike these particular companies or see them in some light that I'm unaware of?


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## RJman (Nov 11, 2003)

rip said:


> Yes, I noted the use of the anglicized name; I'm still curious (only that, no other intent, political or otherwise) about your comment re: Vuitton and Vertu. Is it that you dislike these particular companies or see them in some light that I'm unaware of?


It was my gut reaction to their iced-out bling (for Vertu) and icy blingy monograms (for Vuitton) in contrast to the extremes of wealth and poverty outside, neither extreme of which is icy cool but rather active, living, and dynamically changing -- we can only hope for the better. The same could likely be said about many other countries in which Vertu and Vuitton have footholds.


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## wvuguy (May 29, 2006)

RJman said:


> The suit you linked to above has a tag stating it was made for Lazarus. While wikipedia's not the most reliable source for info, here's a quick squib on the Lazarus dept store, which was part of the Federated group of dept stores -- a mid-level department store, and the suit posted appears to be a fairly standard, middling suit -- nothing special.


Back in the late 80's/early 90's, I used to see......and periodically purchase.....lots of Allen Solly-branded clothing (usually shirts) at Shillito-Rikes (which later became Lazarus, which later became Macy's) in Cincinnati. Believe it or not, I just saw some Allen Solly shirts recently; perhaps at Marshall's, or maybe at Burlington Coat Factory.


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## jamgood (Feb 8, 2006)

****Don't forget to insert "witty" remark in this space****

Confining commentary to the US, ain't never been to Eeenjahaa. Allen Solly, for several years, appears to have been a private brand of Marshalls (a TJMaxx company). One may spot skivvies to relatively good quality Asian made lambskin leather jackets and cashmere sweaters labeled "Allen Solly" there. At one time, several years ago, I think AS was a brand of the same folks who were concurrently proffering GANT brand shirts. The Allen Solly shirts were the premier brand, made by the GANT maker. I don't recall who owned the name then. I think the same company owned Palm Beach suits at the time. General Foods?? I believe Smedley purchased the fine gauge knitwear machinery of Allen Solly when it became defunct in England, perhaps in the 50's or 60's. Apparently until that time AS had been strictly a knitwear company. Subsequent brand owners have slapped the name on various wear-ables, if not watches and bicycles. The preceding subject to correction. We were mistaken once....


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