Former Beauchamp tailor Alfonso Prezioso passes away

With a sad heart I announce the passing of Alfonso Prezioso at the age of 81, a fine Italian tailor who worked for many years at Toronto’s Walter Beauchamp Tailors. Alfonso was one of the first tailors I met and who confided in me about his life and work. Every time I visited Beauchamp’s and entered the back workroom, he greeted me with a broad smile and would pull out a piece he was working on to show me some unique stitch or construction, or to tell me a story from his youth in Italy. I still remember the day when I watched him, for the first time, take apart a basted jacket, wondering if he’d gone nuts. He was, of course, simply opening it up for a recut before final construction. I will forever be indebted to Alfonso for being the first master tailor to reveal to me the sometimes secret, sometimes cryptic world of hand tailoring.

In honour of his passing, here is the feature about Alfonso in the book I wrote with Terry Beauchamp about the company’s history:

Alfonso Prezioso was born into a family of tailors in a small village near Naples, Italy, in 1938. The tradition reached back to his grandfather. Alfonso’s uncle Giuseppe was regarded as one of Naples’ finest tailors, who were known for soft construction that used little or no padding to create a jacket light enough for the hot Italian summers. When Alfonso was eight years old, he began to apprentice under his uncle, doing menial tasks and spending tedious sessions learning the basics of hand sewing. Alfonso attended tailoring school as a teenager to learn pattern making and design and then completed a year of military service. But, instead of training to be a soldier, he was directed to put his superior tailoring skills to work mending and altering uniforms, as well as making garments for officers.

Alfonso left the army in the 1950s and opened his own tailoring shop in Prato, a small town outside Florence, expecting to spend his life there. But Alfonso’s brother-in-law, also named Giuseppe, had moved to Toronto and saw a city full of opportunity. He convinced Alfonso’s wife, Angela, that they would do better in Canada and that it was an ideal place to raise a family. In 1964, Alfonso sold his shop and all his tailoring equipment and the family moved to Canada.

Despite the massive change the Preziosos had just made, Angela was not a risk-taker. She encouraged Alfonso to settle down quickly and find a job instead of opening his own shop again. At first, he tried working at a garment factory but discovered that his talents were wasted. It took a few years, but eventually, he made contact with Walter Beauchamp Jr. and started working for the company part-time in 1968. Alfonso impressed Walter with his immense skill and knowledge of hand tailoring, and in 1970, a few months before the store moved to Adelaide Street, Alfonso joined the company as Senior Tailor. It was a position he would hold until his retirement forty-five years later, in 2015.