Stephan Shipe This week, we're dedicating the full episode to a conversation I had with Anthony Bolognese, founder of Capitol Hill Clothiers. Anthony is a custom clothier based in DC who builds wardrobes for attorneys, lobbyists, and business owners. We cover the differences between off-the-rack, made-to-measure, and bespoke, why he manufactures in the US, and how he approaches everything from custom linings to bulletproof suits. Let's jump in. Stephan Shipe Anthony, welcome to the Scholar Wealth Podcast. To start off today, give us a little bit of your background, how you got into this business. Anthony Bolognese Sure. So it was completely an accident. I'll start there. I used to do video production and editing for a website called gentlemansgazette.com, and through the process of editing, you know, forty, fifty hours a week of menswear videos while in my sweatpants and hoodie in my bedroom, I kind of learned a whole bunch about menswear and really had an inkling, an itch for it, but really had no way to flex it because I lived in rural North Carolina. There was nothing, there was no reason for me to be out there wearing a suit. So then when I moved to the DC area, I realized, huh, there are people out here wearing suits. I should be one of those. So I started to get into the traditional retail side of things, just got a normal job doing suit sales, got good at the sales portion and good at the custom portion, but I didn't like what I was selling because it wasn't true custom. It wasn't really even true made-to-measure. It was just an overinflated price for the sake of the overhead of that company. And around the same time I started to get jaded with that product, I started to network my way around the DC area, found a lot of the menswear bloggers and influencers and business owners, and got introduced to a manufacturer out of Salt Lake City, and it kind of took off from there. So I decided to leave full-time with this other company and, as almost a side project, start Capitol Hill Clothiers. Just as a, hey, I'm going to be out doing stuff anyway, going to events, meeting people, I might as well represent myself well with something that my company makes. And also, hey, if you happen to be in the market, I can help you there. And it's grown from that kind of side project to my absolute full-time. This is what I do. I am a custom clothier, and I wouldn't have it any other way. Stephan Shipe Love the story on that one. And before — because we're going to talk a lot about suits today and the work you do — give us the background, maybe set the stage at the beginning. Going from what you do to off-the-rack, where the range is there. Because you mentioned made-to-measure versus off-the-rack, completely bespoke. What does that look like, or where can people find comparisons there? Anthony Bolognese So off-the-rack is just what it sounds like. It's a garment that's pre-made, ready to wear off the rack. And RTW and OTR are both the acronyms that the industry will use for that — off-the-rack, ready-to-wear. You grab it, you put it on, and most people just leave it right there. Most people don't even bother to get their off-the-rack stuff tailored, which you need to. Unless you're one of the few people that fit into the model size and you're truly a perfect fit off the rack, which is an exceedingly rare position to be in, and a lucky position if you happen to be — you need to go get yourself tailored. That is the best thing that you can do at the lowest end. One step up from that is made-to-measure. So these companies will take a kind of pre-sized garment. Say that I'm, you know, a 38 regular. They will put a 38 regular garment on you and kind of pre-alter — like, okay, this is how long your sleeve should be, this is how do you want your lapel. There's a range of made-to-measure based on the company and how much production capability and customization capability they have. But at its core, it still starts with a stock size that they then pre-tailor and build to the rest of your specifications. So you can't really adjust the shoulder, you can't really adjust the chest. So if you happen to be a larger size or an exceedingly small size, or have more hunched-over posture, or are more athletic, there are a lot of different caveats where made-to-measure is probably not right for you. Then there is sort of a bridge with semi-bespoke, where it's not quite made-to-measure and it's not quite true bespoke, in that there's a trial garment that does have all of the bells and whistles possible. There's a lot of opportunity to adjust all of the seams, but it's not from scratch, laying a piece of fabric on you and building around your body the entire time. And then true bespoke is just that. You go in for multiple fittings, you go in and try on just the basted garment, which is canvas for the most part, and get a feel for where every single seam needs to be. And there are those multiple fittings to make sure that as the suit is made around your body, it's dialed in as much as it possibly can be. Stephan Shipe Great. So when you talk about dialing that in, how does somebody start typically when working with you? Because I know you offer a variety of services, and one of the services is full custom — come in, take out the closet, replace the closet with everything custom. Is that typical, or is it more typical somebody comes in for one or two suits? And if that were the case, those one or two suits, what do you recommend for those first one or two custom garments that you're putting into the wardrobe? Anthony Bolognese So most people do come in — and I say "come in" in the more traditional sense; I go to them. It saves me the overhead, and it's just more fun for me that way. But for the sake of the conversation, they come in looking for, most of the time, just a single suit or a couple suits to replace either stuff that's been old or outdated or whatever in their wardrobe. My favorite clients, though, are the ones that want everything from scratch. Like, I'm sick of wearing off-the-rack, I'm sick of my old boilerplate custom stuff, I want a full custom wardrobe. And sometimes they have a vision for it, but most of the time they just want me to kind of go hog wild — go through the fabrics with them, go through all the design options, and just create them a new personality via their wardrobe. Which is a lot of fun. Unfortunately, that is the less common client that I get. Most of it is, you know, it's DC, I need stuff for work. But it's always a gift when I get to work with someone who has that mission of, I want to dress better, I want to be intentional about how I put my wardrobe together and what I wear. And I am honored to be trusted with that when I am. Stephan Shipe Do you see a difference from where your clients are? Obviously I imagine the majority of your clients are in the DC area, but with those traveling in, is there a different type of suit that you typically see somebody from New York or from LA or Miami or DC want, especially with your background of being one to know about these different areas? Anthony Bolognese I think it more depends on profession than anything. I tend to work with a lot of attorneys and lobbyists and private equity, business owners, that kind of world. As it pertains to work suits, most of the time it's pretty conservative. But like I said, when I get to work with those people that want to dress well because they like to dress well, they are a little bit more informed and therefore a little bit more willing to go out on a limb and wear even a slightly off-standard color. I've noticed that green has been a very, very popular color for the past like five years. And it's started to catch up and evolve in the off-the-rack and designer, couture side of things. But as far as custom goes, even for the more conservative attorneys and lobbyists and the like, that green is still versatile. And it's not like we're going for the green of your plant above you. It's a little bit more of a dark, muted — like in interior lighting it almost reads as a charcoal or a black. But then when you step outside, it's just, this is interesting. And it works for every skin tone and a lot of people are into it. Stephan Shipe Then if that's the case, if somebody's not out to step on the limb that is green, then it's mostly more of the classic charcoal, navy type suit combination there? Anthony Bolognese Yeah. And I try to shoehorn my opinions in where possible. Even for those that are looking for the conservative suits, I try to get them into something with a little bit of texture or a little bit of a subtle pattern, so it's not just a flat grey, flat blue, just like everything else. It just fits better. I like to have a little bit more fun where possible. Stephan Shipe Well, and that's, I'm sure, where the benefit of having you comes in, right? I mean, I'm not going to know what type of pattern works well for a certain type of meeting or certain type of environment. How does that process actually work, then? When do you interject those types of opinions and guidance along that, whether it's the first suit or the fifth suit that you're building for somebody, day one someone shows up for our first fitting — if that is even day one — until here's the final garment? Anthony Bolognese Yeah. So the first thing when I get an inquiry — and all inquiries start online, because people need to see the website, people need to see what the process is before they decide they want to go out on a limb and work with Capitol Hill Clothiers. The first interaction that I have with them is the intro call. It's usually about a 15-minute call, and I specifically go over — so that I know how much injection of my own thoughts and beliefs and personality I can throw in there — I will ask them, what are your use cases? Like, how often are you wearing suits? Do you need daily driver stuff for work? Are you wearing it for infrequent events? Is it date nights? Do you like sport coats? Do you like wearing suits? All of these questions, and the answers that are provided, inform how much I'm able to kind of inject that expertise and personality. If someone is completely hands-off — like, I wear suits because I have to, and I have no idea anything about fashion — that is a great green light for me to just inform them. And I actively try never to talk down to anybody, because I was there. I didn't know anything, and I was in sweatpants and a hoodie while I was learning. So getting a hold of people's wardrobes, and especially when we do get in person, I get to their house or office and I make sure that they bring their existing rotation of garments in. We can put them on, we can kind of go through all of the seams and all of the weird little folds and see what works, what doesn't, what they like about it, what they don't like about it. And then a lot of the time I can inform them of what they actually don't like about it that they didn't even know. Like, it feels tight when I do this — am I getting fat? No. It's just because this specific part of the suit is not made for you. Like, the armhole is a little bit too deep, therefore when I do this, the entire jacket comes up and the shoulders come up to your ears. There are a lot of little things that have synergy across this whole garment, and a lot of people don't know it. So informing them in person is a lot of fun. But to answer your question directly, when I first start injecting that is when I've learned enough about them to know what I can do that they'll be comfortable with. Stephan Shipe Gotcha. And you said multiple fittings, so typically two, three times you're doing fittings? Or is it really you're able to take the measurements and build something out from there? Anthony Bolognese It depends on the person. I would say most people is two to three fittings. Sometimes it's just an absolute slam dunk first time, and we're good to go. But the first fitting is putting cloth on them and seeing what they like, getting all of their body measurements, doing mockup measurements for their tolerances — so, between the skin measurement and the final garment measurements, how much fabric this is, based on their preferences and their existing wardrobe and their shape. So that's number one. The second fitting is, for the most part, a completed garment that we put on them. And then from there, I can either take measurements for alterations and adjust their pattern and profile accordingly, or we build another garment of a different fit profile, just to see if they like it. So I defer to the client a lot based on what they're comfortable with, but I will also still inject my expertise and knowledge of garments to make sure that it actually fits. Stephan Shipe And you mentioned that you make these in Salt Lake City — same manufacturer that you've had when you started. Anthony Bolognese Yeah, so I still have the manufacturer that I work with in Salt Lake City. I also work with one in Rochester, and then all of my bulletproof garments are done in Connecticut. Stephan Shipe Okay. I definitely want to get into the bulletproof garments a little bit. But before we get into that, what is the reason you choose the US for suits? Is there any big philosophical reason, or a reason for quality? Because you and I know you've heard this — it's like, I'm going to go fly to Vietnam and go get a bunch of custom suits and come back. Juxtapose those two options for me. Anthony Bolognese So there's honestly nothing wrong with that Vietnam option. I have plenty of friends and know plenty of people that have gone over there and spent three hundred dollars on a couple of new suits and they turned them around in twenty-four hours, and that is insane. And how do you say no to that deal? It's not like the Temu discount option. It's just labor is cheaper over there. That's just the fact. So you can still get great stuff over there. But the amount of craftsmanship and handwork that can be done in 24 hours is severely limited. So you're still going to get what you pay for to some extent. You still might get to work with good fabrics, but there's also, unfortunately, a lot of counterfeit in every industry. So there's fabric mislabeled as something like Loro Piana or Zegna or something like that, that is just a cheap polyester blend. And chances are, those who are going to Vietnam or Thailand or something like that to have a suit made won't know the difference just by the feel of the cloth. So there's a risk there. As far as US manufacturing, for both the bulletproof and the standard garments — the language barrier is easier. Just as a monolinguist, that's a non-starter for me. Stephan Shipe Yeah, makes it difficult, I'm sure. Especially with the types of customizations you're doing. I can't imagine — it's not like you're placing an order and trying to just figure out a quantity. The amount of detail that would be going into that, I imagine has got to be difficult even in the US, transferring that from doing a fitting to actual creation of a garment. Anthony Bolognese Yeah. And the more custom you get something — I'm working on two clients' garments right now. One, I'm doing a custom cape for them in conjunction with their suit. And the other, I'm doing a vest with a fully sheer back with a floral, like a delicate floral appliqué on it. That would be impossible to try to logisticize. Stephan Shipe Yeah, I can't imagine. Anthony Bolognese So I'm there, I'm marking out and cutting the pattern myself, and then sending it out to be done. Stephan Shipe Where does one wear a cape? Where is the — Anthony Bolognese So this one's for a wedding, and it's a very anime-inspired cape. I'm super excited about it, actually. She also might be getting a sword to go with it. I don't do custom swords — that might be a new venture in the coming years, but we will see. But yeah, she wanted — she sent me a whole bunch of reference images of, you know, Stephan Shipe Okay. Anthony Bolognese I want this side exposed so that I can dance unrestricted, but I want this side cloaked with kind of overlapping cape fabric so that I can sheath and draw my sword. I'm like, I love this. This is so not the traditional DC suit, and I'm all about it. Let's make it happen. Stephan Shipe Yeah. So I guess related to that — when you're talking, maybe not as much the swords, but the bullets. What made you get into bulletproof suits, or that as an option? Did that come as something that you wanted to add and then other people were drawn to it, or a request that you were receiving that you fit that need for? Anthony Bolognese So it was a little bit of both. The United Healthcare CEO being shot gave me the idea to start offering it. And not for any reason related to him specifically, just — hey, people are and can be targeted, people need the protection, and chances are people don't want to wear a bulletproof vest around just out in the world. So if they have a suit that's maybe a little bit heavier than they normally would wear, but they look normal and they're protected — great. That was just kind of a floating idea in my head, and it wasn't nothing that I was prepared to act on, because that's entering a whole new product category. It was not something that I expected to be the new direction of Capitol Hill Clothiers. And then I was working with a client, a former military client, and we were talking about linings. And he mentioned jokingly, like, can we do Kevlar? I'm like, actually, yes. And we got to that conversation, and he didn't decide to pull the trigger on it, but it gave me the thought, maybe I should offer this. Because it's not going to cost me anything up front. I don't need to buy a mile of Kevlar and just warehouse it. It's something that I can order on a per-order basis, and it's something that if someone really needs it, they can have it. So there are a couple clients that I can't speak about, but that are absolutely the type of people that need that level of protection, domestically and abroad. And luckily it has not been put to the test, in the sense that they have not been shot at. But to put anyone listening at ease, it has been put to the test as far as like the Kevlar rating and proof of it actually doing what it says it does. Stephan Shipe So give me an idea of weight-wise, how it differs from a comfort perspective. If I have a suit with and without Kevlar, is it noticeably heavier where I'm putting out — where I'm not going to wear this jacket all day, but it's good to throw on? Or maybe you have two jackets, one where you're more out in public and one that you're going to be in the office. Is that typically how that's structured? Anthony Bolognese It's definitely heavier. I know we're looking at each other online, but you're what, like a 42? Okay. So for someone your size, it would probably be about eight or nine pounds of Kevlar built in. Stephan Shipe Oh, well, yeah. Anthony Bolognese And the reason that I do the lining the way I do is because of that. Everything is removable. So the Kevlar panels — one, need to be washed, like taken out, and they can't be dry cleaned, so you need to be able to take them out, clean the panels, clean the jacket, without either of those interfering with each other. But that also, just as a happy byproduct, makes it so that you can wear the jacket without protection and nobody can tell the difference. So if you just need — like, you're going somewhere there's absolutely no chance you're at risk, then you can just take the panels out, wear it. It's going to fit a little bit looser because of that extra tolerance, but not in a way that's going to be a problem. And then if you find yourself going into a possible threat situation, you can put them back in, and it will add eight or nine pounds probably. But it's something that — it's either that, or not be bulletproof. Stephan Shipe Yeah, exactly. And that kind of opens up another area I was wondering about, which is the linings just in general. I know you're talking about the Kevlar linings, but a lot of the suits you're making, the custom linings are awesome. How do you balance having a suit that you could have for daily wear — a suit that's going to be your charcoals and your blues — and then matching that to a lining? Do you see a lot of people going a little bit more adventurous in the lining, then? Or is it more of a — that custom lining tends to fit more of the more unique colors for the suit? Anthony Bolognese That is where I am probably the most flagrant in my suggestion of injecting personality. Because even for the most conservative, standard navy suit, I'm still going to heavily recommend that we do something directly related to you in the lining. Like, it's a custom suit, why not make it fully custom? You can do a light blue paisley lining if you want, but wouldn't you rather do a collage of your favorite albums, or a collage of photos, or literally anything? I've done some crazy stuff on the inside of jackets before. And it is surprisingly difficult to get some people to jump off that bridge, because of their concern for the — I don't want to say lack of formality, but the less conservative nature of something custom. But because I'm designing it from scratch in Photoshop or Illustrator myself, I can make it blend in nicely. Like, for the client that I have that's doing the mesh-back floral appliqué vest — it's a white suit. And she has a thing for elephants, so she wanted to put elephants in there. But her mom and her sister were both like, whoa, that's going to be too much. Like, this needs to be a classic suit, it needs to not show through the external fabric. There are a lot of things to consider here. I'm like, don't worry, I got this. Collage of elephant images, just reduce the opacity so they're very, very subtle. And now she's got her elephants on the inside, and they don't bleed through, and they're not super loud. I've done that for a bunch of different things. And some of the most popular stuff is actually patent drawings. So taking public patent designs and cutting those out and overlaying them into a collage. And I've done them for weapons, I've done them for F1 cars, I've done them for watch movements. I've done them for — I mean, you name it, there's a patent for it. So it can be done with anything. And it's a way to kind of help get close to the heart or the career of the person for whom I'm making a garment. Stephan Shipe Yeah, that's neat. I wouldn't have thought about the patents or the designs, but it does fit — if you're worried about that, it aligns well with the classiness of a custom suit, and then you have watch designs or car designs inside of a suit. It would fit very well. So I'm curious on you personally, when you pick out a suit — if you were to go all out and you're saying, I'm going to build the best suit, understanding that everyone's different on what they consider the best. But if somebody said, what is the quintessential suit — if money was no object, you were going to build something — what does it look like? What kind of fabrics are we talking about? What type of style is it? Give me that. Anthony Bolognese So I actually have two answers for this. And I'm going to start with the money-is-no-object. Stephan Shipe Okay. Anthony Bolognese Scabal, a fabric mill that I adore, has a collection called Treasure Box, in which they have 24-karat gold pinstriping in the fabric. And it is beautiful. And it is obviously expensive. So, money is no object, I want all of those. Because they're just so — and they're classic fabrics. Scabal doesn't really do anything super-duper off-the-wall visually. So it's basic pinstripes and basic window panes, and it's just gorgeous. And they're so expensive. And I have yet to convince anybody in my clientele to get one, because — I mean, it's hard to sell something you can't justify yourself, and I'm not at that level yet. That would be my answer. I would love one of those for the price. Otherwise, I mean, it still starts with cloth. So finding a cloth that really stands out and is unique and is interesting and works well with my skin tone and eyes and hair color and everything like that. That's kind of how I like to build my garments anyway. It starts with something that I know is going to be different, because it's an occupational benefit to me to wear something that catches the eye. So I tend to do that more with sport coats than full suits, but I would love, love, love to do a completely custom fabric. So mill a hundred or two hundred yards of my own custom plaid or custom tartan or something like that, and just have that as the standard. Like, this is me, 100%. In the same way that Conor McGregor did with Gladson with his original suit. If you know, you know. Stephan Shipe Yeah. And one thing we haven't even touched on — let's compare then the gold pinstripe suit. What does that run if you were to have that built, compared to something you'd build? I know there's a lot of variety in what you build, but give us a little bit of a range of what somebody would expect if they called you and said, I'd like something built out, let's talk. Anthony Bolognese So on average, my two-piece suits range from two to six thousand. That two thousand is going to be a standard, you know, Super 100s-ish wool. I try not to do anything with synthetic materials — I have a personal vendetta against that, and I've been on a crusade over the past five years of just getting rid of every bit of plastic in my own wardrobe. That being said, I do offer stretch materials, and the pricing is about the same, but just for the sake of quality, I try not to. So two thousand starting, up to about six thousand on the average high end, and that's going to be for the full cashmeres, the wool-silk blends, like the Super 200s, 220s, the really nice fabrics. And then there's a big gap, and then you get to the 24-karat gold pinstripe, which I would sell for twenty-five thousand for a two-piece. And then all the way at the top is a pure vicuña fabric, which would be forty to forty-five thousand, depending on the source. Stephan Shipe What would cause that to be more expensive than a gold pinstripe suit, fabric-wise? Anthony Bolognese Vicuña fabric is insane. I wrote a style guide about it on my website, just detailing what vicuña is and why it's so expensive. It's one of the rarest fibers in the world. The yield from each of the animals is so small. So you need a massive flock, a massive operation, to just get enough fiber to make one yard of the fabric. It's amazingly soft. I don't remember the exact quote, but something like double the softness of cashmere. Like impossibly soft. Gold is everywhere; vicuña is not. Stephan Shipe Yeah, that's true. That makes perfect sense. So I guess, anything that you would look at as we wrap up today — as someone listening to this saying, you know what, this is something I've been thinking about, or I've heard about it, but I want to get into this. Give me a top tip here. One or two things that you would look at and say, this is what you should know before you go down the street and go get a custom suit. Anthony Bolognese Yeah. I think custom means a lot of things to a lot of people, and I know a lot of the industry has also helped to obfuscate what custom means, same as what bespoke means. Actually, Leonard Logsdail, based out of London and New York, he's a true full Savile Row bespoke tailor. And he does, you know, what I mentioned earlier — from scratch, built on the body, a hundred percent bespoke. And I actually saw just yesterday him speaking about the definition of bespoke being changed, that being set as a legal precedent, because Savile Row tailors got upset — justifiably — at made-to-measure tailors using the word bespoke, and they sued them over this fact. And the Savile Row tailors lost this lawsuit because of the verbiage used. So to bespeak something is to commission something, basically. So a client comes in and says, I bespeak of you a suit. Bespoke is just an iteration of that word. So regardless of whether it's handmade and hand-built on the body, or a made-to-measure suit, if you bespeak a suit of somebody, technically you can legally call that bespoke. So true bespoke is Savile Row bespoke. That's kind of the new parlance that has been associated with it. Knowing what custom actually means to you, and setting your expectations accordingly as to what you're going to get out of it, is the best thing you can do before making a decision. So you can go to Indochino and get a three-hundred-dollar custom suit, or you could fly to Thailand and get functionally a one-hundred-dollar custom suit. You just have to know what you're in for. So do your research on who's manufacturing it, do your research on what the value proposition is and what the customization options are and what actually matters to you. Because if you're a rail-thin person, chances are you're not going to need as much of that real, true handmade custom, unless you really want it. If you are a more athletic build or a more portly build, then chances are, yeah, you're not really much of an off-the-rack fit, so you're going to need that next level of handwork to get it to where it actually properly fits you, and you're comfortable and you look good. Stephan Shipe Gotcha. That makes perfect sense. I love the research and the background there. Hopefully this will be helpful to those looking for this as well. So I appreciate you coming on. Enjoyed it. Anthony Bolognese Of course, thank you for having me. Stephan Shipe That's our show. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next week.