Knatchbull Savile Row’s CEO on bespoke tailoring for women and flying the British flag in fashion

0:01Daisy Knatchbull:In April, Monocle hosts the Entrepreneurs Live in Shanghai, a one-day conference bringing together founders, investors and innovators shaping businesses across China and the wider region. Join us there and visit monocle.com slash conference for more.

0:38Daisy Knatchbull:Hello and welcome to The Entrepreneurs on Monocle Radio, the show all about inspiring people, innovative companies and fresh ideas in global business. On today's programme, is there a new playbook for great British brands? Historically, two of the UK's most successful exports and most beloved institutions have been Bespoke Tailoring, and the Private Members Club, both with deep roots here in London, just down the road in Mayfair. These have also been built traditionally for a pretty narrow and often male elite. Today, those assumptions, and indeed those worlds, are changing, opening up to new audiences, meeting wildly different expectations, and often driving entirely new ways of doing business.

1:22Daisy Knatchbull:But always while holding on to the craft, the unrivaled hospitality and attention to detail that built their reputation. Coming up today, we'll catch up with a founder who is quite literally tailoring a centuries-old industry for a new kind of customer on Savile Row and beyond.

1:40Toby Gauvain:The American consumer want to buy into and enjoy the very best that Britain has to offer. I love the idea of a woman sitting in Charleston saying that her Savile Row women's tailor is coming to see her for a trunk show. It's quite fun.

1:55Daisy Knatchbull:And we'll hear from a former corporate executive who's rewriting the rules of the members club, replacing bricks and mortar with a roaming experience first community of genuinely like minded individuals. So we wanted to be inclusive and non judgmental and engaging. And that's really important to me. And so if you get that community right and the values right, people will keep turning up. This is the entrepreneurs with me, Tom Edwards.

2:30Daisy Knatchbull:You're listening to The Entrepreneurs. Now, regular listeners to this programme will likely remember our next guest. Daisy Natchbull is the founder and CEO of Natchbull, the first and only shopfront exclusively for women in Savile Row's 200-year history. Today, with ateliers throughout Britain and Europe, Daisy runs more than 20 international trunk shows a year. In 2023, the brand launched its first ready-to-wear collection, offering a stylish, sustainable alternative to fast fashion alongside its made-to-measure service. Monocle's Tom Webb caught up with Daisy in between her many trips abroad to discuss flying the British flag in tailoring and her business rebrand.

3:11Daisy Knatchbull:Daisy began by telling Tom what she's been getting up to since her last visit almost three years ago.

3:17Toby Gauvain:We're famous for all the custom that we do on Savile Row, dresses, skirts, jackets, trousers, suits. And about two years ago, we introduced a ready-to-wear line that kind of was born out of all the data that we had in the bespoke, where we were able to understand kind of really how a woman's body is shaped. And so our ready-to-wear fits incredibly well. And it's all informed by data, colours and shades of colours and where a button sits and things that are missing that maybe are more functional. And that comes with us on these pop-ups around the world with all the Savile Row tailors and the beautiful ready-to-wear collection that complements really well what we do in the bespoke.

3:55Toby Gauvain:So silk shirts, cashmere jumpers, trench coats and also some suiting, dresses, skirts. we really want to be offering the modern woman everything with the assurance that the quality is paramount and the craftsmanship is the best of british and we're really holding ourselves to keeping that quality and the customer service and all the goodness that we offer as we scale

4:20Daisy Knatchbull:so how are you flying the flag for britain around the world if you're not doing fashion shows

4:25Toby Gauvain:you say you're doing trunk shows yes trunk shows so these are pop-ups where we will build out as if we had a mini store but often we do them in clients homes around the world which is really fun so two weeks ago I was in someone's home in Miami a week after that we were in two beautiful homes in Palm Beach next week we'll be setting up in San Francisco LA New York Texas the Bahamas where there's demand we'll go and really flying that British flag is really important for us we are the first shopfront for women on Savile Row a street where the bastions of British tailoring sit and in 2026 we sit there holding the largest shop front we're b corp certified we have some of the best crafts women in the world at our fingertips and we're determined to really redefine the luxury retail experience that is somewhat broken where all we're hearing in the news and we can see somewhat is that quality is is tanking and the prices are increasing and the consumer's tired of it they are lusting for something real for something authentic and for something where they can really feel the quality of what they're paying for and don't feel cheated and how are you able to

5:41Daisy Knatchbull:maintain that quality because other stories in the news that it's very difficult to find the right people the right staff the right craftsmen how are you able to find talent in this environment

5:53Toby Gauvain:it's well it's never easy to find exceptional talent and if it were easy everyone would have it we really try and define ourselves in having incredible people that work with us we're now a team of 45 people 42 women and three men who are somewhat in the minority there but it is an incredible team that's ever growing and for us it's almost holding true to what you believe and what you know and what you do that attracts the talent. I think that you can only pull the wool over someone's eyes so much. I think talent sees through that. I think in the same way of a consumer, they're attracted to people that have values and morals and beliefs and follow through and act upon those.

6:35Toby Gauvain:And I think that's why we've been really lucky to attract some of the best talent from all over the world. I mean, between my six tailors, you know, you have some of the best tailors that have worked in some of the greatest fashion houses in the world. My head tailor was Queen Elizabeth Taylor for the longest time. We feel very lucky and privileged to have that level of talent. And I think that's because of what we're doing. It's not just clothing. It's a mission. It's a belief system. It's an ethos as well as being in retail. It's something that people can truly believe in. And clothes, we always say clothes won't change the world, but the women that wear them will and if we can make them feel the best versions of themselves and give them a confidence and make it feel like a kind of modern armor we really are helping someone to be happier

7:23Daisy Knatchbull:and and better and you are creating for all situations all environments the business women the modern women in which regions do you find that some of your tailoring performs better than others

7:38Toby Gauvain:it's funny there there is you know you do see the geographical lean where you might in texas have someone i mean these are large stereotypes but you might have someone that loves more color and more fringing and more kind of extras and things that make it sparkle or shine or whatever it may be to the busy new york executive that loves black wears lots of black and is able to wear pencil skirts because they wear a lot of heels in england we don't love necessarily wearing heels in the same way our American cousins do. And the British woman leans more towards a midnight blue. And then looking at someone who might live in a warmer climate, whether that's Abu Dhabi or Palm Beach or the Bahamas, they're looking for more pastel shades.

8:26Toby Gauvain:And the same with age in Palm Beach, there are lots of different demographics. But if we look at that older demographic living in Palm Beach, they're very big on their pastels, big on their whites. So it's lovely you start to really build a portrait of kind of what people in each cities look like and what they like and what they enjoy but then again this is what I love by the next minute you'll have someone walk in who wants the entirely opposite thing and that's wonderful we can make yellow velvet dresses in the middle of 30 degree locations and we can make beautiful linen suits in the middle of a minus eight degrees in a trunk show we did in Toronto so again we're not held by trend or season or anything like that.

9:07Toby Gauvain:We really are somewhere where you can, your wildest dreams of what you'd like to wear can come true. And we can either guide you and handhold you the whole way, or we have women that really know what they want and we can facilitate that and make that happen.

9:20Daisy Knatchbull:And you are spending a lot of time in the US and it is a very important market. Why do you think it's growing? What do they love about British fashion? Why is the US market important to you?

9:31Toby Gauvain:The US market has always been kind of central to our strategy. I mean, now it feels that the whole world in fashion are doing trunk shows. Trunk shows originate from Savile Row, where trunks would be packed and sent on boats over for fittings. And so it feels very fitting that we continue doing these trunk shows over in the US. The American consumer, you know, the Anglophilia that they have over there for all things British is lovely. And I think it's important. And I think that they want to buy into and enjoy the very best that Britain has to offer through not just beautiful fashions and the great designers we've had, but the cloths and the tweeds and the, you know, things that make the UK and British fashion so wonderful.

10:17Toby Gauvain:And I think that as Savile Row's first shop front for women and now a global luxury women's wear label, we feel very proud of the fact that we come from the beating heart of Savile Row. And we always say there's nothing cooler. I love the idea of a woman sitting in Charleston saying that her Savile Row women's tailor is coming to see her for a trunk show. It's quite fun.

10:38Daisy Knatchbull:Now, loyal listeners will remember you on the program three years ago. There's been a lot of change since that moment, not least a big rebrand a couple of years ago. How did that go for you? And what did your loyal consumers make of it?

10:52Toby Gauvain:It's funny because doing anything like a rebrand is very scary for so many reasons. You build a lot of cachet as a business. We were to those that listened three years ago, if there are any of you. I'm very grateful for following on my story. Of course they're there right now. We were the deck. And it's funny because when I launched this business, you never imagine, and this is nearly seven years ago, and this is pre, I don't want to talk too much about all the macro stuff going on politically, Brexit, COVID. This is before any of these things existed in our minds. And the deck felt fitting. It was four suits and a deck of cards at the time.

11:29Toby Gauvain:I was focused solely on suiting women. And at the time, it was a very different world. I remember Lady Gaga wore a suit on the red carpet nine, eight years ago around the Me Too movement. And it was seen as a huge kind of statement. Whereas today, all we see is suiting on the red carpet, which is lovely. And we've had some amazing designers through time do suiting. By no means are we the first people to do this. But it was a very different world to the suiting that we see now in every high street store and every designer today. So it was amazing to be quite early in that. again. And the deck was about changing up the deck, reshuffling the way we think about tailoring, prioritizing women, putting them on top.

12:11Toby Gauvain:And it was a lovely analogy and image. And we worked a lot with the suits of a deck of cards, the spades, the diamonds. I never imagined that we would be sitting here today employing 45 people and doing trunk shows around the world, but the business doubling every year. It just, it's not something you ever imagined. The stats are so heavily against you. One in 100 businesses passed their first year. Being a female founder, I could do a whole hold show, a whole talk with you just on how that, you know, is rigged. Two percent of VC funding today goes to female founder businesses and so on and so on.

12:45Toby Gauvain:And so the idea of sitting here seven years later, holding the largest shop front on Savile Row and talking about with you expansion and where we're at felt like another world. And so the deck served its purpose at the beginning, but more and more clients were asking why it wasn't my surname. And it felt very odd, the idea that I would name anything after myself. And slowly I came to realize that it looked less egocentric than I thought. And it was more that people really wanted to feel part of something. And by having a name, it felt that Nashville Savile Row felt like something that was going to be around for many, many years to come and stand amongst the bastions of British tailoring, but also now as we grow, building out as a global luxury women's wear brand, having this name feels like it comes that my own personal values imbue themselves into this business as I step away as we grow and allow my incredible team to flourish and carry on that mission, not just through years to come, but through my lifetime.

13:47Daisy Knatchbull:If we go back nine years, 10 years and Lady Gaga's walking around in a suit. What would you like to have told yourself back then that you know now?

13:56Toby Gauvain:I think at the very beginning, I raised money before I launched privately. I raised a small sum. And I remember going to investors and people kept saying, so you're doing men's suits for women. Okay, talk me through that. You know, and the idea that we were going to be a shop front on Savile Row for women. And it feels like a lifetime ago, the fact that anyone would ever question that or understand it. So I think looking back now, it's feeling proud that there are, you know, Savile Row has made for women forever. We are by no means the first tailor to make for women. But the menswear tailor's focus was on menswear.

14:29Toby Gauvain:They could always make for women. And that was how it used to be. Today, to see women's mannequins in the windows of other Savile Row tailors, to see a woman win the Golden Shares Award, which for our industry is slightly Oscars. These are all things that are not because of us, but we're part of that change. And it is an honor. And so looking back, I think I would never imagine that we would get this far. And it's taking a moment to feel incredibly grateful to be part of that.

14:58Daisy Knatchbull:And finally, to look forward this time, what's on your radar? What are you most excited about for the rest of the year?

15:06Toby Gauvain:It feels like the rest of the year will be over in a second. A lot. There's a lot of very exciting things that we have upcoming. Definitely just more growth, sustainable growth, meeting more incredible women and doing some exciting things to meet more incredible women. So I can't say too much, but if you are interested, please follow our journey and tell your friends and watch closely because I think there's some very cool things about to happen.

15:34Daisy Knatchbull:That was Daisy Natchbull, the founder and CEO of Natchbull Savile Row. And you can find out more about the business and what it's got up its well-tailored sleeves by heading to natchbull.com.

15:56Daisy Knatchbull:You're listening to The Entrepreneurs. Toby Gavain is the founder of Gaudium, a private membership community for the over 40s. After years in corporate finance and luxury lifestyle services, Toby realised he wanted to build something that put experiences and happiness first, rather than profit for a few. Inspired by his love of travel and music, he set out to create a space where people could dance, explore, and meet like-minded souls without judgement, and all with a respectable curfew. He stopped by Midori House to discuss Gaudium, his other venture, Solara, and the creative freedom that comes with building not one, but two businesses centred on joy.

16:38Daisy Knatchbull:Here's Toby. Gaudium is the Latin for joy. And I wanted to create a platform to give people over 45 in their midlife years, whatever that number is to them, it's different to different people, some joy. You know, people who've been super busy, whether it's in the workplace or raising families, maybe they've fallen on tough times maybe they've been through difficult relationships lost someone they love whatever it might have been i said look that we can't have enough joy in the world it would be a miserable place without it so how can i create some joy and it started off by being club nights for the over 45s so taking over nostalgic nightclubs with our djs and our music and saying you might not have been there for a while but it's time to go back and let's go and hit the dance floor and then somebody said to me you know you're doing this on the side for your friends and your friend of friends but actually it's a concept that's got a lot of appeal and you should broaden this out and go much more mass market and so I decided to take the original Gaudium off and develop a private membership club which we'll come on to and I wanted Solara to be the core dance platform for everybody.

17:37Daisy Knatchbull:So are you a kind of you're a nostalgic raiser is that fair to say? Yeah I mean yeah raver sort of conjures up all sorts of images doesn't it? I mean I was not using that pejorative though just to be clear i i you know yes i seem to be part of a dying breed of men in their 50s who still love to dance and that's something that my wife and i always did and actually we're very lucky we traveled a lot we've lived in new york we spent 10 years living in madrid and we got to that point in our lives where we felt that london sadly as much as we love this great city it's quite an ageist city you reach a point where there's not too many places where once you get a certain age you feel comfortable going and dancing there so we thought well how we're going to have to create this for ourselves i love that so it's not as late night it's kind of tailored for that slightly more i don't know it's not i don't say more mature sounds weird but a slightly calmer or just i don't know people don't want to go too wild right yeah it's really interesting so personally i'm a night owl and i love i love being out late and that was obviously what going clubbing in the 90s was all about but you know we recognize that times have changed and people have different perspectives and so although the original club nights were club nights is now Solara, just sticking with the music theme.

18:43Daisy Knatchbull:That has become really a daytime rave. I mean, we kick off at four in the afternoon and we finish at 11. People want to dance, but they want to be tucked up in bed by midnight with a cup of tea. So he just got to adapt to the market. I may be betraying my own age here, but I love this idea. Gaudium, let's come back to that. So it kind of, it's interesting. It sort of changed iteratively, even in a relatively short period of time as you say and then this taps into some of your experience in the sort of private well what you call it in the sort of private membership community from before and some of your past lives tell me a bit about how you have distilled some of those experiences and those learnings to be into making Gaudium a kind of 2.0 of those so I spent the first 15 years of my life working in a very busy job in finance and the best part of that was that it took me all over the world I did a lot of traveling, I met a lot of people, experienced a lot of cultures, and that became a very important part of who I am today and the people I like to hang out with.

19:41Daisy Knatchbull:I then spent 15 years working for a travel and lifestyle concierge firm. And that was all about, you know, building a service platform for people to be able to reach out and get stuff done, go to restaurants, book tickets to shows, book travel, etc. I suddenly got to that point in my life where I felt that I needed to exit the corporate world. I couldn't really comprehend how this was just the beginning of the end as I ended my 50s. I thought very strongly, this is actually the beginning of the next chapter, and it's a really exciting chapter. And so the opportunity to create new experiences and a lot more joy and places to go to, people to meet, and get people to come along on that journey, I sort of felt I'd learned enough along the way as to how I wanted to structure that.

20:21Daisy Knatchbull:So that's why it's funny, because I used to look out on the original club nights and see a lot of very happy people, but most of them were women. because they were either people coming without their husbands who thought, actually, I'm in my 50s and 60s, I don't want to go clubbing. But I thought, well, how can we actually make this more inclusive? And the way to make it more inclusive is to create more events across art and theatre and live music and wellness and sport and travel and bring people together and understand what it is that makes them tick and where they want to spend their time. There are some sort of red threads that run through lots of the things you've done, but many of them, I think, speak to this idea of fostering a sense of community, the powerful impact of face-to-face interacting with people getting out in the world and meeting why do you think that is to be was that i don't know did you grow up that way did you always have that kind of curiosity about people why do you think you've returned to that well you may maybe disagree but that seems to me something of a core value why do you think that's been so foundational i i i really love meeting people i love just being able to find like-minded adventurous souls and to chat about the stuff that we love.

21:24Daisy Knatchbull:And I think if you look at London as a city, there's more private membership clubs here than any city in the world. But actually, these are bricks and mortar clubs where you pay a huge amount of money for the privilege to walk into the building to then spend a huge amount of money. And actually, not many of them have understood the power of community and the power of how you look after one another and that sort of level of empathy and how you engage with people. And so a lot of people, they're going there with their friends, but they're not necessarily meeting other people. So we wanted to have this sort of roving club that has no bricks and mortar, where we could go wherever we want and bring people together and to be inclusive and non-judgmental and engaging and make sure that people were carving out the time to spend their precious time doing exactly what they want to do and meet new people across so many different areas that we've put together into Gaudium.

22:13Daisy Knatchbull:And that's really important to me. And so if you get that community right and the values right, people will keep turning up. They'll enjoy it. They'll want to see people again. And they'll meet people that are not part of their network. Some people are very comfortable with their family and their friends, and they say they don't have enough time in their lives. Other people are still ambitious and keen to do more. And I guess that's what we appeal to. And it's interesting because this is a bit of a narrative. It reminds me of conversations that certainly here at Monaco we have, whether that's with leaders in luxury brands certainly in premium hospitality which is people are looking for something extra i don't know if it's a reaction to the digital realm and the sort of ennui that has gripped people with that life but this the primacy of experience the importance of offering people something beyond it's not just a product it's exactly as you said it's about a sense of community it's about doing something that brings joy given the name is this the perfect time for Gaudium do you think because of yeah people's frustrations with the digital realm and the soul sapping tone of social media etc do you think that that in a way helps the idea of Gaudium?