Makers - Outerwear factory, North-east London

They’re never satisfied at the outerwear factory in north-west London. Nothing ever quite up to scratch. In a factory, this is a useful instinct to have. In fact, in the trade today — always competitive and now contracting, even more so — it’s indispensable.

Here they take it further than most. This is down to the people who work there, and in particular, to the two men that run the place. The first of them runs the floor, and specialises above all in finding faults. He can find a fault — too much fusing in a collar or lacklustre finishing on a pocket-bag — in any garment. It might be a garment made in a far-off factory, in a nearby factory, in his own factory, or made by himself just the other day. It is a restless competitive quality — sometimes admirable, sometimes unbearable. Many are the noses it has put out of joint, but it is all because the first man refuses to be out-done, can’t stomach the idea of anyone getting one over on him or on his factory.