Gladson

New York merchant of European cloth

Gladson has sold cloth in New York for the better part of a century. The story starts in the late 1930s, with Benjamin Solomon and his brothers selling English fabrics from Manhattan warehouses, and the business took its name in 1948: Gladys, Ben's wife, plus son. It still trades from midtown Manhattan.

A merchant does not weave; it selects. Gladson's book draws on mills such as Vitale Barberis Canonico and Reda, alongside its own ranges, Bedlam among them, and it carries the Fresco book from Huddersfield Fine Worsteds. The jacketing bunches stretch as far as Harris Tweed, and in 2009 the parent company, HMS International, bought Huddersfield Fine Worsted, which put an English mill inside the family.

For us the value is coverage. One Gladson book can settle a brief that would otherwise mean opening five, and every length in it has already been argued over by people who handle cloth for a living.

Gladson lengths rotate through our cloth library rather than anchoring a fixed collection. Ask at a fitting to see what is current, laid over a shoulder in daylight, which is how cloth should be chosen anyway.