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How do did two lawyers start making shoes in Turkey? We blame Jerry Seinfeld. Kind of. When we started Res Ipsa almost three years ago, we were both practicing law full time. We were talking about how bad most lawyers dress--even though they can afford to dress better. During a Seinfeld re-run we were laughing at how dated one of Jerry's neckties looked. The seeds of Res Ipsa were planted.
Most neckties were either too wide (3.25 inches or wider) or too narrow (2.75 inches or thinner). Why was it so hard to find a three-inch wide necktie. We call this the Goldilocks width--the perfect compromise between hipster-skinny and get-off-my-lawn-wide. We decided to make our own ties, using timeless fabrics so that if you see a picture of yourself wearing one of our ties you wouldn't know when the picture was taken based on how dated the necktie looked (sorry, Jerry. Serenity now!)
We spent about a year sourcing tie materials from all over the world: wool tartans from Scotland, mogadors and wool challis from England, and rare grenadines from Italy. We found a manufacturer in New York City to make each tie by hand. We were on our way to becoming a tie company.
We decided to visit Istanbul because we thought we might find some interesting fabrics in the Grand Bazaar that we could bring back and incorporate into our tie program. What happened next changed our lives.