Flinders Lane’s last tailoring workshop moves out

The final tailoring workshop on the street that was historically the centre of Melbourne’s rag trade is moving to Carlton following CBD rent hikes and post-COVID business challenges.

When Andy Cossar opened Houndstooth Tailors at 333 Flinders Lane in 2019, he knew he was moving into a workshop stratified with Melbourne’s clothing history.

The workshop has passed through six generations of ownership and has been in operation since 1905.

Flinders Lane was a hub of the textiles industry throughout the 20th century; a one-stop-shop full of haberdashers, tailors, belt-makers and other clothing manufacturers who lined the street.

The workshop that has now become Houndstooth was able to survive the decline of the rag trade throughout the 1960s and ‘70s because it was heavily focused on government work, including the manufacturing of Victoria Police uniforms and ceremonial garments.

The workshop started solely as a manufacturer, then began doing alterations, and then started producing bespoke suits when Mr Cossar bought the business.

“It’s a sad thing that this workshop is going to move,” Mr Cossar told CBD News. “I remember coming in here when I first started selling suits, and I remember asking the tailors, would they teach me to sew? And one of them was like, no, you go learn first, and then you can come in here.”

“From that, I went from selling suits to then doing sewing classes on a Saturday morning. I remember a friend of mine saying, you know, ‘Why are you doing this?’ I said, ‘If I don’t do it, who will?’ It’s a dying trade.”

Before the pandemic, the vast majority of Houndstooth’s clientele were corporate workers.

Mr Cossar said he could count on one hand the number of wedding suits Houndstooth had made back then.

But since lockdowns, many corporate clients have continued to work from home for all or most of the week.

As a result, 60 per cent of Houndstooth’s business now comes from weddings and 40 per cent from corporate.

A handful of other tailors making bespoke suits still exist in other areas of the CBD, but Houndstooth is the only tailor that also manufactures the suits onsite.

The business’s Flinders Lane lease is up in January, and Mr Cossar is currently preparing to sign the lease for the new shop.

He’s hoping to keep Houndstooth’s showroom in the city, even though the workshop itself will be moving to Carlton.

He’s looking forward to continuing to do the thing he loves.

“Where we kind of differ is that we will do bespoke [garments]. Sometimes people will come in with the weirdest things,” he said. “We made an A-line skirt for a lady out of alligator leather that was meant to be for a couch. I was like ‘Yeah, we’ll take it.’ Anything, with a needle and thread, we will have a go at.”

“Tailoring is a beautiful thing,” Mr Cossar said. “What the tailors do here, turning flat fabric into a finished garment, is amazing.”

“When you see someone’s face change when they’ve had something made for them, that’s what drives me to keep doing my job. And I always warn [customers] it’s a dangerous game once you get something made, because you won’t go back.” •