Zoltan and his daughter were among the first tailors we met when starting The Tailor Network. Zoltan provides high-quality tailoring while his daughter assists with the administration of the business when she can. She also works in the tourism industry outside of Hungary. They live in one of the larger industrial cities in Hungary, with around 150,000 people.
However, Zoltan has not always been living his dream of being an independent tailor. When Zoltan’s wife died 15 years ago, his focus was to simply support his two children by working as costume designer and producer for different theaters in the country. When the children were finally grown and independent, they encouraged him to fulfil his lifelong dream of opening a tailor shop to sell suits under his own brand. This was just at the time when Hungary started to prosper after becoming part of the EU.
What they did not anticipate was the steady decline in the demand for tailoring in their hometown. Over the years, many independent factories became part of larger, often international, companies and the local management jobs became either obsolete or moved to Budapest. The suit-wearing demographic has all but disappeared.
To survive the constant economic downturn, he has been going back to costume production jobs as well as mending and fitting, but his heart still beats for applying his master craft - creating beautifully tailored suits.