Raising the Grade: Umit Benan on His New B+ Collection

Photo: Courtesy of Umit Benan B+

On Saturday night at the amfAR event in Milan, the founder and CEO of the Yoox Net-a-Porter Group, Federico Marchetti, hit the red carpet in a fine-looking white dinner jacket. You would imagine that one great advantage of his position is that you can order an amazing white evening jacket from pretty much any label—Brioni, Boss, Kingsman, you name it—and even should some fool spill red wine down your lapel, nobody sane chez Mr. Porter is going to quibble if you “return” it the morning after. Marchetti, however, opted to take a risk and become the first-ever made-to-measure customer of Umit Benan’s new tailoring line, B+.

Benan is a complicated and cultish designer of mostly menswear who had a spell at Trussardi, but is best known for his fiendishly want-able own designs. A couple of years ago, he stepped off the show carousel, had therapy, and then later launched as an online-only concern. Now, he is launching this very small-scale, high-quality unisex line of mostly tailoring, but with a few more casual pieces, in partnership with Parma’s Fabbrica Sartoriale Italiana, the high-end tailoring operation behind the recently Chinese-purchased Caruso business.

Today, Benan had a barbecue at his Milan home to launch the label. Designer Neil Barrett was there, as was Vogue Runway’s Nicole Phelps, who reported glowingly of the clothes on show. Benan explained the project thus: “It started through conversations with Marco Angeloni of Caruso, who is an Umit Benan client. The idea is that this is not a fast, seasonal line. We have spent four months working on the construction of our jacket. It’s touched with the ’80s, Armani, and Kiton, and light, with a lapel that is lower than today but not as low as they were then—it’s a balance.” He continued: “It’s important that this is a unisex line, with everything recut and proportioned for women. I want to give this experience of a proper sartoria for women, and, of course, there is a made-to-measure service. It is going to be small—I hope for just one shop in each major city—so I can be personally involved in the process. Now that my collection is all online, I have had the feeling that I am losing a connection with the client, and that bond is very strong and something I am passionate about.”

So if you are a woman or a man in search of a very special (and very expensive) personally tailored garment, consider reaching out to B+. The results should be A+.