What do John F Kennedy, Jacques Chirac and Mikhail Gorbachev have in common? Ask the Marinella family, who have been creating neckties for the rich and famous for the last 90 years.

It is at the beginning of the XX century that Eugenio Marinella throws the bases of what would become one of the most fabulous Neapolitan "successful stories ". In 1914, at the eve of the first world war, Eugenio decided, showing an undeniable amount of courage and initiative, to open a shop in Piazza Vittoria, on the elegant Riviera di Chiaia in Naples, at that time, as today, one of the most beautiful waterfronts in Italy.

The position proved to be strategic for a little shop of only 20 square meters, in front of which the Neapolitan high society went walking. After having carried out the works of restructuring and having acquired the two studios, a very large one for the manufacture of shirts, and a smaller one, for the ties, Don Eugenio set out on his first journey to London, to meet his future suppliers…

The shop soon becomes a small precious casket in which authentic treasures of refinement and taste can be found, a small corner of England in Naples. In a time when the English style is a lot in fashion, Marinella is the only one to propose, in Naples, a vast range of exclusive products coming from London, exacting the sole right from the English suppliers. At the beginning, the main activity of the shop is not the tie but the shirt, queen of the men wardrobe. With the purpose to be at the top of the fashion and of the quality, Eugenio persuades some artisans shirt-makers, of level without equal, to move from Paris, to teach his workers the art of the cut.

With regard to the ties, they are exclusively realized in seven folds: the square is folded up seven times inwards so that to give an incomparable consistence to the tie. It’s only a long after that the modern tie with the inside structure makes its appearance. The shop has passed through important historical events that have also changed the course of its history: the two world wars, the decline of the ancient nobility and the appearance of the new middle class with the advent of the American products that bring substantial changes to the fashion. Very careful to the evolutions of the society and of the custom, Eugenio doesn’t lose heart and stops the production of shirts for the tie, that becomes the main product of the house Marinella. The true resumption happens, anyway, in the eighties, when Francesco Cossiga, at the time President of the Republic and friend of the family, becomes a real ambassador of the mark, taking habit to bring in gift to the heads of state, in their official visits, a box containing five Marinella ties. So the trademark starts taking the tour of the world. The G7 organized in Naples in 1994 definitely opens wide the doors of the very exclusive entourage of suppliers of the greatest ones in the world, to the small Neapolitan firm: the organizers decide in fact to offer to all the present heads of state, a box containing six Marinella ties, bringing an enormous publicity to the mark.

The passion for the elegance and the quality still today goes on, thanks to Maurizio Marinella, third generation of the family, that has picked up the inheritance of the mark with an entrepreneurial spirit in agreement with the modern laws of the marketing, succeeding in making the mark E. Marinella be affirmed also abroad, from the United States to Japan. The production signed E. Marinella has preserved the scrupulous attention to the quality of the raw materials and the cared manufacture, still today rigorously handicraft , for these “veracious Neapolitan” and at the same time "very British” ties.

The History

The history of Marinella family starts with the founder Eugenio Marinella who, when he was 34, and after fifteen years in the field of the men clothing, decided that the moment had come to change the style and the way of dressing of a man of importance. He is just the founder of the " Marinella philosophy ": more than a sale point, a salon where the human relationships are based on availability, courtesy and respect. After him, his son Luigi and today his grandson Maurizio, have brought forth his philosophy making the Marinella ties a real symbol of elegance. In the years before his death, Don Eugenio had imposed his grandson Maurizio, who was about ten, to spend every day a few times in the shop so that he could breathe its air; so Maurizio received two teachings: the one by his grandfather about the relationships with the old clientele, and the one by his father that manages the advent of the economic boom. Maurizio has been able to conjugate the entrepreneurial spirit with the availability for clientele: in the Christmas period, for example, when the queues at the shop are endless, he offers sfogliatelle and coffee to the people in wait. If the small shop in Naples is, today as yesterday, the place of meeting of the elegant people of the whole world, it’s due to the three Marinella generations, that have never wanted to transform the name in a great trademark, but they have preferred to associate to it the image of small shop that today, as in 1914, proposes products of quality in a discreet and convivial but in the meantime informal background.

Luchino Visconti ordered galore of it, all with blue or red background, unlined as foulard that he coordinated to coloured small pocket Indian silk handkerchiefs. Aristotle Onassis used to buy twelve of it in one time, rigorously black, to discourage the interlocutors and never to make them to understand of what humour he was. Still today, as at the beginning of the century, the Marinella ties are round the neck of the most elegant and famous men: the book of the signatures jealously guarded in the shop enumerates the autographs of a lot of crowned heads and presidents of state, high exponents of the politics and the entrepreneurial world, of the culture and of the show. They have been round the neck of all the American presidents from Kennedy onwards, included Bill Clinton who was given them by his wife Hillary. Today among the noble customers there are King Juan Carlos and the prince Alberto of Monaco, several exponents of Agnelli house, but also Cossiga, Berlusconi and D’Alema.. Men endowed with good taste, who don't want to resign the tie, manufactured to measure by experienced hands, men for whom a Marinella tie is a true "author's knot."

The Decalogue

Here is a tie decalogue based on the Marinella's teachings.

1- As in all the things, also for tie it is a matter of size: the correct one stays between 8,5 and the 9,5 cm. at the widest point

2- The knot: it’s important to learn to do it without tightening too much, avoid the effect “hung.” Always untie it in the evening and hang the tie well stretched during the night.

3- Using the correct material: silk jacquard for the regimental, lighter silk model foulard for the printed cloth, pattern for the ties with an elegant tone, lines wool or Scottish patterns for winter sporting clothing.

4- A tie for every occasion: in the morning prefer a light colour and patterned tie, in the evening opt for a darker tie.

5- Don't take advice and don’t remit the choice of the tie to anybody: the only rule is to follow the instinct. Choosing the tie has to be an irrational action.

6- The instinct has to follow a certain logic, too. Absolutely avoid: too wide and showy patterns, ties with an only central pattern but also too pale and anonymous ones. Remember that the tie reveals the personality.

7- To prefer: even tint ties in definite colours, small patterns (pois, lozenges, little squares, rhombus, small cashmere prints), transversal lines of two or three colours at the most.

8- The colours: the tie must stand out against the suit and the shirt, without clashing. It must be of a colour darker than the shirt’s one and more intense than the jacket’s one. It’s often the only coloured note of a serious clothing, but be careful not to exaggerate! Avoid the pea green, the canary yellow as the fire red and the sugared almond pink. Darker colours, but not anonymous, the bordeaux and the dark red, the blue, the green and the brown.

9- The combining with the shirt is a mine-field where only the good taste can drive you: avoid however the overlap of a tie with a thick pattern on a squared shirt or the combining “all-stripes” of a regimental tie, stripes shirt and jacket in operated material.

10- Never the coordinated tie + small pocket handkerchief: it is as useless as anachronistic affectation. Always avoid to have a too cared and affected comprehensive look and opt for relaxed)elegance.