Hong Kong has long been world famous for high quality tailoring. While the heyday of bespoke menswear and womenswear has passed, echoes of the city’s earlier international reputation remain.

In the popular imagination, the local tailoring business appears entirely dominated by ethnic Indian – or more precisely, Sindhi – entrepreneurs. Walk along the southern end of Nathan Road in Tsim Sha Tsui and it’s almost impossible not to be accosted by tailors – especially if the person being attacked is a European man of a certain age who may seem suddenly susceptible to a new sports jacket or shirts.

Until after the Pacific War era, however, the best-known tailors in the colony were British. Mackintosh’s, in the old Alexandra Building in Central, was founded in 1913 and continued to operate from Alexandra House into the 1970s. Known for being both expensive and of high quality, items bought there were therefore expected to or long-term investments.

Occasional items bought there could become lifetime, one-time purchases that were eventually passed on to others. The firm also supplied premium brands such as Aertex vests. Mostly forgotten today, these garments were essential in Hong Kong’s humid summer climate in the days before widespread air conditioning, as they helped ensure that shirts did not get wet almost from the moment they were worn.

Founded in 1884, William Powell and Co was known in the Far East for London quality men’s tailoring and accessories and operated from its own premises, Powell’s Building at 12 Des Voeux Road Central, now part of the Landmark complex. When first established, Powell’s was a wholesale and retail drapery business and a ladies’ dressmaker and milliner, as well as a tailoring establishment. Between the wars, Powell’s was popular among Europeans living in smaller regional ports as the closest high-quality establishment; a visit to Powell’s was an essential component of any Hong Kong holiday from these places. Eventually absorbed into Lane Crawford, the firm went out of business in 1952.

From the late 1940s, as the Chinese civil war intensified, Shanghai’s high-quality tailors left their hometown for Hong Kong and brought their skills with them. More arrived after the Communist takeover in 1949; in the late 1950s, most of Hong Kong’s luxury men’s tailoring was made by émigré craftsmen from Shanghai. These tailors were more attuned to the latest American styles and tastes, so those who preferred a more New York or San Francisco influenced look usually gravitated to these establishments.