Under the domed Serpentine Pavilion, on a searingly hot evening in the heart of Hyde Park, the capital’s freshly fat-jabbed high society types cackled over champagne, caviar and mostly untouched chicken nuggets. It was the Serpentine’s annual summer party and, as ever, the outfits on show fired off at every end of the fashionable spectrum: from Cate Blanchett’s extraordinary, appliqué seashell creation right down to the plague of figure-squeezing, ruched poly-blend dresses which populate these sorts of get-togethers in 2025.
But it was one electric pink tweed dress, with its low scooped back and rather short hemline, that caught my attention through the crowd. The frock in question belonged to Lady Amelia Windsor, the Duke of Kent’s granddaughter, and had been custom-made by Hattie Glendenning, the founder of HAX Tailoring. “Having it tailor-made for me made me feel like I was going back in time,” Lady Amelia says. “I also have a matching cropped jacket that means I can wear the look in winter and summer. I really will treasure it forever.”
In a world in which it-girls and actors alike tend to borrow off-the-runway looks for parties before being woken up by couriers, ready to motorbike their freshly stained Versace frocks to a magazine shoot on the other side of town, there is something charming about a renaissance in bespoke outfits designed to last longer than the canapé course.
I find Glendenning in her small studio on the third floor of Clifford House, sandwiched between New Bond Street and Savile Row. She rents the space from the cloth merchant Dugdale Bros & Co, where her father Simon has been managing director since 2015, and from where she has sourced a great deal of her fabrics since opening her own custom-tailoring business in 2023. It is a very different experience from visiting one of the heritage tailors on the Row. Glendenning, 27, beams a smile and swishes her billowing blonde hair over her shoulders before wrestling with the fabric books.
“The pink tweed fabric is the star of the show,” she says, of Lady Amelia’s outfit. “But we actually started by talking about her grandmother, the Duchess of Kent, how it was such an incredible thing that women at that time would have so many of their outfits made, and how great it would be to bring it back and normalise the custom clothing world,” she says.
Two years in, and Glendenning does appear to be making some ground on this frontier. Her bread and butter is customers coming in for special wedding suits, but “often those one-offs can go on to become regular clients”. Model Laura Bailey is the proud owner of a boxy shoulder, pinstripe grey wool HAX suit “comfy enough for her to ride around London on her bike all day,” while actors Sophie Turner, Naomi Ackie and Dame Harriet Walter have all been lucky enough to be measured up by Glendenning for suits you will see them wearing on screen soon.
“I had the idea of founding a company during the first week that I was working as a Saturday girl on Savile Row when I was 16,” she says, of her time starting out at tailor Cad & The Dandy. “Their clothes and approach — that kind of shopping experience — I was blown away. I didn’t want to have the same top as everyone had Zara, and that was the moment I wanted to get into it.”
Initially, she intended HAX (a spin on her name, which she cooked up with her father) to be a trouser brand (“because I couldn’t find any trousers that fit me”), but by the time she launched the label, she was ready to offer whatever a customer wanted to throw her way. Prospective clients today can expect an hour-long consultation, where they can chat through reference pictures or be guided by Glendenning, who has a tendency to encourage customers to push boundaries.
“A really big part of me doing this is that I genuinely think I’ve got quite a good understanding of how people dress, based on what they like and what they are wearing on that day,” she says. Requests for huge 1970s lapels, super-high waisted slacks or an excessive amount of buttons all make up a usual day.
“I like men’s style and I like to adapt men’s style for my body, but it was really hard to describe that to some of the more traditional tailors who are looking for what they think is the perfect suit for a woman,” she says. “I didn’t want the sleeve to end here, or it to squeeze me there, so I did it myself.” Anyone after a similar service should get in line.
“There are more women on the Row than when I first started, but there’s still more men,” she says. “I hope that it can evolve into a place where women want to go in and dress, because I can understand it’s not that appealing for them to walk into traditional male tailors and get their stuff made today.”
She notes new players including Knatchbull and clothsurgeon as key companies changing the Row’s stuffy reputation. “Regardless, Savile Row needs to have a light shone down on it for all of the incredible craft it’s got going on,” she says.
And she does not want to surprise you with a hefty bill at the end of the eight-week process, either. “Our starting price for a two-piece suit is about £1,100,” she says. “The price of the suit doesn’t change whether it’s single-breasted or double-breasted, everything is just dependent on the cloth you choose.”
“I want it to be competitive pricing,” she says. Although it might seem steep at first glance, she stresses this is more than just another outfit you return after the ball. “My main thing was thinking: what would I pay for a suit that I would keep forever? And that’s where we are at the moment.”
Lead photograph by Poppy Thorpe
