Domenico Spano, a New York custom-made clothing maker whose dandy style has attracted much attention on the streets of the city and in the fashion pages of newspapers, has dressed captains of industry and Hollywood stars, and on October 23 He died in Manhattan on the same day. He was 79 years old.
His daughter, Elizabeth Spano, said the cause of death at the hospital was idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.
Spano, known as Mimmo, was born in the Calabria region of southern Italy. But he grew up in a country known for its glorious fashion history, including Fred Astaire, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Cary Grant and Gary Cooper.
In his own attention-grabbing costumes, painted in colorful patterns and bold prints, complete with felt fedora, paisley scarf, suspenders, bow tie, and always a carnation on the lapel, he wears The New’s I became a regular on street style columns like . The York Times’ On the Street was written and photographed by his friend and fashion guru, photographer Bill Cunningham.
In a 2014 column, Mr. Cunningham referred to Mr. Spano as “the star of this movement” and praised what he saw as “a sign of a new peacock revolution.”
“He likes my style because he’s quintessentially American,” Mr. Spano said of Mr. Cunningham in a 2012 interview. GQ magazine. “Everyone is always trying to look elsewhere for inspiration, but there’s a great tradition here. In Hollywood in the ’30s, we were dictating style around the world.”
He tailored his sartorial flourishes to the needs of billionaires, CEOs, and leading figures like Al Pacino and Anthony Hopkins. He first worked as a custom clothing salesman and manager for Dunhill and Alan Flusser, and later as a custom suit designer for Bergdorf Goodman. then Saks Fifth Avenue, and finally his own studio on West 57th Street.
With suits starting at around $6,000 these days, Spano’s look didn’t come cheap. But money wasn’t an issue for some clients.
Spano told the menswear website. film noir mania Once, a billionaire client flew Mr. Spano to the Caribbean on a private 737 jet to relax in his new villa and sample wines from his wine cellar so that Mr. Spano could buy his creations (eventually The idea was to give people a feel for the lifestyle created by a linen suit worth $283,000. It will live in things like dinner jackets.
Quoted in the 2013 book “I Am Dandy: The Return of the Elegant Gentleman” by Nathaniel Adams and Rose Callahan, Mr. Spano said the old green herringbone cashmere fabric that his Japanese customers are fond of. He talked about a time when he was looking for an exact copy of the jacket. Mr. Spano informed him that the fabric he needed was no longer available. “The factory has to make at least 70 meters,” he told his customers. “The jacket only needs two meters.”
Undeterred, the client raised the necessary tens of thousands of dollars and used the remaining 68 square meters to decorate the private plane.
Domenico Spano was born on August 17, 1944 in the town of Siriano, the middle of three children of Salvatore Spano and Elisabetta Oliva.
Because he was born into a long military family, there was little in his background to suggest what career he would pursue later in life. He followed in the footsteps of his predecessors, graduating from the Florence Military Academy of the Italian Gendarmerie Carabinieri in 1970.
But love took him in a completely different direction when he met his future wife, American Lina Ganemi, who was studying in Florence. “Three days after I met her, I told her I was going to marry her and left everything for her. Follow her to this country” he said in a 2013 interview. Style site Keikari. “At heart, I’m an incorrigible romantic.”
The couple married in 1972 and settled in Jersey City, New Jersey. Mr. Spano worked as a bookkeeper for his father-in-law, Joseph Ganyemi, who ran a custom clothing business in midtown Manhattan, before striking out on his own.
As a traditionally-minded haberdasher with an eye for an old-fashioned, classy look, Mr. Spano found himself swimming against the tide in a style world dominated by baby boomer casuals. “My generation was the worst,” he said. “Long hair, leisure suits, flared pants. It was a terrible generation.”
He also had to remind people that he was not a seamstress. “The truth is, I don’t know how to sew a button,” he told Keikari.
In addition to his daughter Elizabeth, Mr. Spano has another daughter, Christina Spano. her granddaughter. and her sister Tina Spano. His wife died in 2003.
Mr. Spano’s instincts have always been towards the abstract. “I dream 24 hours a day,” he reportedly said on “I Am Dandy.” “Dreaming is cheap. It costs nothing.”
“Sometimes I dream that I’m in a movie from the 1930s,” he added. I can’t be a Humphrey Bogart guy because of my accent, but I can play a scumbag or a gangster.
“I pity people who don’t dream.”