Tailor of Naples comes to Istanbul’s Bebek district

Ahu Özyurt

Enis İnci (L) and Serkan Kızılkaya (C) are the founders of Sartoria Napoletana in Istanbul. Antonio Riccio is tailoring for customers in the city.

Menswear tailoring has taken a nice and surprising twist and turn in Istanbul lately. If you had the chance to stop by Bebek, you would be amazed to see an store with classical Italian tailoring and some very fine espresso to go with it.

Enis İnci and Serkan Kızılkaya are the founders of this vintage looking store, Sartoria Napoletana, on Bebek Yokuşu. They have worked in menswear business for a long time. Kızılkaya had 12 years of experience in establishing tailoring houses and small companies. İnci had worked in Saville Row in men’s clothing. They have been friends for five years and have opened up their first store 5 months ago.

Kızılkaya and İnci had both freelanced for Italian suit makers so there was natural chemistry when joined forces with one of Naples’ finest tailoring house for menswear and suit designing Sartoria Napoletana. Antonio Riccio, is now tailoring for customers in Istanbul.

“It is an opportunity to have him as a suit-maker” said Kızılkaya, “Antonio comes every month to meet with customers, do their measuring, asks their taste and then creates the suit.” Enis İnci adds that everyman should invest in a good suit. “We know that there is fast fashion consumption, but everyone should have a good suit he should feel great in. That is what we aim for. And you may be surprised to see that it is not as expensive as you think.”

A good suit takes a long time to make. A month to be precise. So why bother? “We need 3 meters of Tasmania superfine wool pettinato and the best horsehair canvas. Our suits are totally handmade, they are a unique product because we follow the ancient rules of the traditional sartorial style” says Antonio Riccio.“Sartoria Napoletana Luxury is a familiar company. It was born 50 years ago, founded by my grandfather and my uncle. I studied at the Accademia della Moda in Naples, then I started working for the company. At the beginning, we had just a little laboratory. Then by working hard we grew up, becoming a very Huge company” adds Riccio.

Sartoria Napoletana also has a store in Arbil.