School ties, otherwise known as custom ties for schools were invented way back in the days of Old England in the late 1800’s and were inspired by military and university traditions.

In fact, Oxfords Exeter college rowing team created the first sports tie around 1880.

From 1890, many schools started to adopt distinctive ties to signify identity and status.

This is how today’s school ties as we know them originated and mushroomed into many schools across the United Kingdom and then across the whole world.

The whole idea of creating identity and belonging was and still is the driving force behind virtually all custom ties from school ties through to club ties, sports ties, matric ties, corporate ties, branded ties, promotional ties and company ties.

To this effect, custom ties cover virtually every area of tie manufacture.

It is important also to note that custom ties are made by tie makers and tie manufacturers with the difference between the 2 entities being extremely close but not the same, exactly.

Tie manufacturers generally are very large bulk tie makers who exist very much through bulk type, more retail orders which require bulk production.

Tie makers on the other hand are more specialised (although these days not always) and generally run a much smaller operation or if not smaller then certainly more specialised.

One might also refer to tie makers as the more elite or upmarket of the 2 entities.

These days, it is such a fine line and in fact, to be honest, there are very few tie makers around. The reason for this is quite simply that the days of more bespoke custom ties is pretty much over apart from the very high level brand who still know how to make proper custom ties, mostly in the form of fashion ties where the ties for example would not be stitched all the way down to the bottom of the tie but rather stitched and then tacked some 5-10cm from the bottom v of the tie.

The reason for this was intended to denote how well the custom ties were made simply by being able to open up the bottom of the tie and inspect the lining which one would think is not that important but actually really is.

It is almost like having an open kitchen in a restaurant whereby one can view the cooking and prep going on aswell as view anything that may be untoward or out of place or perhaps un hygienic which one would be very unlikely to see if the kitchen is in a closed area and not subjected to inspection by the patrons of the restaurant.

These days, the only custom ties that are still made this way generally originate from China where I have to say that great ties are still made.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not dissing our own production sector when it comes to custom ties and custom scarves but we simply don’t have the attention to detail when it comes to the construction of custom ties.