The Piccadilly is the first design I did for Five Star Tack. I wanted to provide an alternative to the many similar looking hunter bridles. When you look at a row of fancy stitch bridles, for the most part they are all very similar in pattern; angular with not much imagination. I wanted to do a more organic pattern and one that when lined up alongside other bridles you would recognize as a Five Star bridle.
I wish I could say that the design process was very technical but usually it's a doodle on a piece of paper or a finger drawing on a foggy mirror. I have no idea how to do a vector drawing! After a couple of edits this is what I came up with.
I thought it was pretty good and I liked it. Unfortunately because of the high stitch count it was hard to find a company to reproduce it. Most wanted to stay with the same pattern they had been using which I thought was boring and really what was the point of starting a new company if I was going to copy what was already being done? Eventually I was able to find a company that was willing to engage in the labor intensive process of stitching my pattern onto the bridles.
This is how the Piccadilly looked when it first came out:
It has undergone a few revisions such as changing how the noseband hanger is attached to the noseband. Initially the noseband and browband were wider but the bridle sometimes over powered smaller horse's faces so I made it more narrow. Everything else about the bridle is your classic hunter bridle. From the Australian Nut Sedgwick leather to the neat and tidy stainless steel buckles, the Piccadilly can go into the best hunter rings and give you just a boost of style that I think is lacking with other bridles.
This is the Piccadilly now:
This is one of my favorite pictures!
It has become a very popular bridle for Five Star Tack. I have customers that tell me how they saw someone whose horse was wearing this bridle and they felt a kinship with that person and their horse. I think the Piccadilly bridle is close to achieving cult like status!
The Piccadilly has a cousin in the Wembley hunter bridle that came out in 2011. The Wembley is the same as the Piccadilly but with an integrated crownpiece. The funny thing is you either love the integrated crown on the hunter bridles or you hate them. If I had to choose just one of the two to carry I'm not sure which one I'd keep because I like them both.
Which one would you choose if you could only have one?
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