Some founders talk about product like it's a spreadsheet. Tom Horne talks about it like a love letter. The co-founder of LESTRANGE, the London menswear label built on a radical idea (make a few things properly, then never discontinue them), sits down with us to talk mews-house quiet, mezcal he still can't tell apart, and the tequila he'd pour for three men he'd love to see a little drunk.

The Origin Story

Every good bottle has an origin story. What was yours: the moment it went from a half-formed idea over dinner to "we're actually doing this"?

It was a late night at university, complaining about the fashion industry with a friend, now my co-founder. There wasn't one moment. There were about fifty, but that conversation was the one that stuck. We kept coming back to Apple. At that point you could lay out every product they made on a small table, and the care that had gone into each one by Steve Jobs and Jony Ive was extraordinary. Nobody was doing that with clothing. Everything was collection-based, so the piece you loved one season simply didn't come back the next. We wanted to engineer a small number of products properly and then keep making them.

We did that with the 24 Trouser, and recently sold our 100,000th pair.

What's the one thing about the business that's surprised you?

How much of building a brand is about people. You can have the vision, but unless you have people who believe in it and who can express it in their own way, with their own style, it doesn't go anywhere. Finding people who make it better than you imagined is the whole job.

Fast-forward five years and it's all gone gloriously right. Pour us a glass and describe the view.

A handful of shops in the major cities, New York among them. A product range still small enough that I can tell you why every single piece exists. We've moved beyond clothing into design pieces for the home. And there's a real LESTRANGE apartment you can rent, with a proper bar in it. Obviously, by House of Decant.

London: Your Map of the City

Two corners of London that feel like yours. What's the pull of each?

I've always been drawn to places with history and buzz, where you can turn one corner and it's suddenly quiet.

Notting Hill is home. There's always something happening on Portobello, and I spend every weekend around here. Something new opens every five minutes and I love the local characters. It's hectic, but I live in a little mews, and once you're past the tourists and shut the door, you can't hear any of it.

Soho is mental. We had an office there for years, and you'd hear people shrieking at the top of their voices at all hours. Berwick Street is where we bought our first fabrics, where we did our first pop-up, and it's the cover of (What's the Story) Morning Glory? Now we have the LESTRANGE apartment there permanently, designed to be the same thing: an oasis of quiet in the middle of total mayhem.

Where do you take someone when you want to impress them, without making a thing of it?

A. Wong. I know Andrew, and what he does is mastery, so the food does the work. He also tends to appear out of the kitchen wearing our 360° Trousers, which I hope might just impress.

The place everyone breezes past that you'd happily keep to yourself forever?

The Pig's Ear in Chelsea. Best pub in London.

Restaurants & Bars

If London handed you one restaurant to keep for life, which do you choose, and how do you defend it?

The French House, Soho. You get the benefits of a pub and a restaurant in one. And I reckon it does good business. I wouldn't change a thing, and I certainly wouldn't manage it.

Best thing you've eaten lately. Where were you sitting, and who was across the table?

The most amazing cold roast beef at Bagno America in Forte dei Marmi, with their Autunno salad on the side, and fresh anchovies with pickled onions. Wow. Tess was across the table, and we'd just got married.

The bar that reads you before you've said a word. Where is it, and what do they put in front of you?

The mezcaleria downstairs at KOL. I still have no idea what the difference between any of them is, despite being told patiently every time I go. The Mezcal Martini is exceptional, and that's as far as I can tell.

Favourite Brands

A brand you quietly study because they simply get it. Who, and what are they doing that everyone else misses?

Perfumer H, by the perfumer Lyn Harris, who founded Miller Harris. Their scents, packaging and stores are immaculate. And they also sell marmalade. Any brand that can sell expensive perfume and marmalade under one roof must be pretty strong.

The one bottle that's always in your house.

Botivo...I've been trying to drink less during the week. Am I allowed to say that?

Your latest obsession, hobby or interest.

Vintage tech. I have an unreasonable interest in objects from the era when design in technology was more considered. I've got every iPhone, every iPod, early hi-fi, phones like the Prada LG. It's geeky, but it gives me a huge amount of pleasure.

The Nightcap

Red, white, or something sparkling?

Red.

The round's on the house. What's arriving at the table, and which three people are joining?

A bottle of very good tequila and a bucket of ice. José Mourinho, Steve Jobs and Tom Ford. I'm not actually sure they'd be great together, but I'd enjoy questioning them all. I'd have liked to see them a little drunk, hearing their secrets in business.

A bottle of very good tequila and a bucket of ice might be the most honest order in the whole conversation. If you're setting Tom's table, this is where we'd begin.

Pass the Bottle Along

One person you'd like to nominate for us to interview next.

Cubitts founder Tom Broughton, because he likes a drink. And he makes good glasses and beautiful shops.