Don’t ask Joe Farage if the suit is over. “God, I tell you, we are far from it,” he tells me with a roll of his eyes and a wry smile. “The suit’s never going to be over. It’ll always be reinvented.” A master of the sartorial arts, Joe, along with wife and business partner Katy, is innately qualified to speak on the matter. For over 25 years, the menswear icon has styled athletes, celebrities and even members of the Australian Defence Force, adding a certain touch of personal elegance each and every time.
Ashamedly, I’m not here to talk to Joe about suits, tuxedos or even tailoring in general. Instead, I’ve arrived, dripping wet from the pouring rain outside, at the fashion icon’s Darlinghurst maison to discuss something a little more moving. After nearly three years of setbacks, collection refinements and soft introductions, Farage is finally ready to unleash his latest project out into the world. Two.One is an athleisure brand, weaved from the same cloth as his namesake’s tailoring business, but with an entirely fresh appeal.
“To a certain degree, there’s a very similar thread between the tailoring and the outdoors,” Joe tells me. “Two.One was born from the heritage point, but the technical aspect is what is new and exciting. We really think that men these days want to be smart enough, want to be comfortable, but want to be super practical as well.”
On this particular morning, the Aussie menswear icon is in full flight. Greeting me at the door, I hardly have time to shake off my umbrella before Joe ushers me upstairs and into the design studio. He talks a million miles a minute, barely pausing to take a breath, and it’s impossible not to get caught up in his nervous excitement.
With Two.One, you can see the boyish exuberance bubbling up in Joe. He races from one side of the showroom to the other, pulling jackets from intricately styled hangers and ripping coats out of neatly folded piles, eager to show off every minute detail of the new collection. However, when his hand brushes over a woven field jacket, he pauses. Unfurling it slowly, he turns back to me and begins to explain.
“Because we stand for classic tailoring, we decided to take a jacket, which is a Vitale Barberis classic flannel fabric out of Italy and rework it,” he reveals. “It’s made from 100 per cent Merino Australian wool, but from a Biellese mill that has been operating since 1636; they do the highest quality wools.
“So we took a classic flannel out of Italy and we sent it to Japan to Toray to get that three-layer membrane. You’ve got classic traditional meets urban street meets highly technical performance; that’s the DNA of the brand.”
Farage has been one of Australia’s most influential menswear designers for over two decades. A proud Sydneysider, the charismatic craftsman’s journey started, somewhat fittingly, in the city’s fabled Strand Arcade. It was here, in the brand’s proverbial home for years, that Joe and Katy hatched plans for national expansion, even going so far as to open their own production facility in Surry Hills.
“When we first started, we kind of dived in. In 1998, there was no online. We went into physical retail and we had to grow quickly because I didn’t know enough about production and construction,” he says. “Once you stuff up a production or two and it hurts, you then learn every little detail about it. So Katy and I really learnt on the job, but we learnt quickly. We were on a bit of a mission.”
Growth was steady and the business was thriving but around five years ago, Joe hit the wall. Helming a national portfolio of stores and an ever-increasing catalogue of products, the entrepreneur started to feel as though he’d lost sight of the goal. A took a step back for him to realise that perhaps he’d had it right to begin with. A complete overhaul of Farage’s retail strategy saw seen the brand move away from the traditional Westfield outlets in favour of the European-style high-street locales. And Joe has never been happier.
“We kept growing for a number of years, and I got to a point in my life where I looked and thought, my real DNA is not to keep growing, but really keep innovating and keep delivering things that we love and we stand for.”
“I felt like we became way too accessible.”
“We’d always wanted to be that hidden little treasure like we did in the early days of the Strand. We had Westfield Bondi, but to be totally honest with you, I hated visiting my own store. It was a box in a box. That environment doesn’t really inspire me, so why would I expect my cool customer, my VIP, to want to go there? We thought, rather than having four stores in the Sydney CBD, why don’t we consolidate them into one beautiful heritage building?”
That line of thinking, coupled with Joe’s love of architecture and interiors saw the brand shift focus entirely. Embracing the brand heritage, Farage repositioned to focus on luxury top-tier tailoring, which ultimately led to the flagship Martin Place store. Despite being situated right in the heart of Sydney’s bustling business district, the boutique still feels like a home away from home, and it’s not by accident.
“What I love the most about it (Martin Place) is that the entrance is off the side lane, which is like a hidden little treasure right in the middle of the city. If that door had been right on Pitt Street, we wouldn’t belong. I love the fact that it was off the side lane and it was a bit European.”
With a shift in business practices, Joe was finally able to reconnect with the industry that first captured his heart. Refreshed and reinvigorated, he attended the men’s fashion trade show Pitti Immagine Uomo with a whole new perspective. What he saw on the streets of Italy was exactly what he’d been looking for.
“There was this outerwear type of technical clothing that was really different from our classic tailoring area, but it was innovative and great,” he says. “Not only were the suit pieces very deconstructed, but they had no shoulder pads, and they were very easy to wear.”
Teaming up with former Tom Ford and Macpac designer Quentin Hart, Joe quickly set to work on crafting what he describes as a “classic meets urban street meets outdoor” technical brand. With that, Two.One was born.
Comprising a series of lightweight rain jackets and elevated casualwear, the initial Two.One collection is a seamless blend of the two creatives. With Joe’s tailoring expertise and Hart’s unique outdoor design background, the pair have managed to create something that feels innately premium and yet at the same time, entirely functional. Part of that comes from the creative process, but much of the range’s aesthetic prowess can be attributed to Joe’s uncompromising approach to material quality. Fabrics are sourced from Australia, before being taken to Biellese mills in Italy, and constructed in Japan. International doesn’t capture the half of it.
“The expertise and technical strength that you get out of working in classic tailoring is the very best that you can get. And it’s really fun and innovative to work with fibres to have a really practical outcome,” Joe says.
“It’s reinvigorated my creativity, to be honest, because my passion still lies in the heritage of the brand. I will always love that classic tailoring part, but Two.One is a fresh new approach to men’s casualisation. It’s practical meets comfort meets street, which is something different and exciting for us.”
As a collection, Two.One is undeniably premium. From the expert finishes of the Japanese Toray membrane right down to the subtle Two.One-inspired buttons, every square inch of the range has been lovingly presided over. As Joe explains, even the name is a hidden message in itself. “When you get one plus one, it normally equals two, but when you get Joe and Quinton, it’s a little bit more than that. It’s a bit extra.”
For Joe Farage, Australia’s most formidable tailoring entrepreneur, success has been a unique journey. Twenty-five years after starting his eponymous label, the Sydneysider has seen firsthand how the industry, much like fashion’s sweeping trends, can change on a dime. A lesser creative might view that as a challenging prospect, but not Joe.
“The one thing that I recognise now is that the only secret is there’s no secret to success; it’s just persistence,” he reveals. “Show courage when everyone shows fear. And whilst I say that, it’s just as important to show fear when everyone shows courage. Stay true to yourself and who you are, and don’t get too caught up in the competition.”
“A lot has changed from 1998 when we first went to market with Farage, but what hasn’t changed is the fact that each and every season, you’ve got to be creative. Each and every season, you’ve got to feel reinvigorated. That is what keeps me hooked; that nothing stays the same.”
Watching his face light up as he cycles through the new Two.One collection, I can’t help but wonder if Joe is steering away from his tried and tested market. This new baby, full of potential has undoubtedly revitalised his love for the industry and helped to produce some of his best work, but what about his first love; the business he built from the ground up? When I quiz him on how he plans to grow Two.One without neglecting Farage, he cracks a smile and gives me a wink. It’s as if he’s been waiting for this question all morning. To Joe, the answer is simple; he’s played diplomat before.
“I’ve got three daughters, and honestly, I think if you don’t love them equally, they won’t shine equally,” he laughs. “The one thing I’ve learned in 25 years of business is to do your own thing and love it. Just keep driving and don’t take your eye off the prize.”
