Max Mara

One garment carries this house, and Max Mara has reissued it every season for decades with only small adjustments to the shoulder and the length. The camel coat, cut in wool and cashmere, is the reason the Old Bond Street store is laid out around full-length mirrors rather than accessory cabinets.

The tailoring lineage runs back further than the label. Marina Rinaldi, the founder’s great-grandmother, ran a substantial dressmaking workshop in the centre of Reggio Emilia in 1850. Max Mara describes this store as its foremost international expression, which is a considerable claim for a house with shops in most major cities.

Trying a camel coat London style, properly

A coat that falls to the calf behaves differently standing, walking and seated, and it cannot be judged in a fitting cubicle. The floor here gives it the distance and the mirrors it needs, which sounds like a small thing until you have bought one that looked right for the three seconds you saw it.

What sits around the coat

Tailoring, knitwear, dresses and accessories, all built on the same preference for line over decoration. The house works in cut and cloth rather than embellishment, so the pieces reward handling far more than they photograph.