Bulletin Board 43
A salumi paradise in Upstate NY, a prized Piaget and one man’s necktie “archive"
WRIST CHECK
THE WATCH: A Piaget Polo Cuff Ref 7131
ITS OWNER: Nicolas Amsellem, manager of the French-language watch website Les Rhabilleurs and watch expert for the auction business Sancy Expertise Paris.
THE STORY: This is probably my most-loved watch ever. It was the first one I bought, with the only funds I had in the bank account of my newly born company. The story behind the 1979 Polo and the wildness of life at Piaget in those times is still present in the heart of this heavy 18K gold object. I thought I was going to sell her, because this is part of what I do. But I never managed to do it, and I never will. She’s been on my wrist for years, bore the marks of my life, went under the shower once, and now has settled on the wrist of the woman I love, creating more stories with her.
A MAN & HIS TIE
If the tie really is dead, no one seems to have told Chase Winfrey. A veteran of Drake’s and J. Mueser who now manages the men’s side of preppy retailer of J. McLaughlin, Chase has a necktie collection that runs into the hundreds and regularly appears on his person. As a proud tie guy in the year 2025, we asked Chase to elaborate on his “archive” below.
I still remember my first tie. A block-striped regimental from Robert Talbott—forest green, navy, silver-—pulled from the back of my father’s closet, a relic from some long-defunct men’s shop. I think I needed it for some school function. Looking back, I realize that tie was the key to the lock.
That look—preppy, Ivy, American traditional—just made sense. The colors, the textures, the quiet experimentation. I took to thrift shops, hunting silk repps in schoolboy hues, wool tartans, cotton madras, silk matkas, club ties with cryptic little motifs. Always looking for that perfect woven label in its dignified old English script. And the beauty of a tie? It takes up no space at all. So, I collected.
I always figured I’d start making my own ties one day, so call it “research” for the archive. And the archive at this point is what one might call extensive. In my Drake’s days, and later at J. Mueser, I wore a tie five days a week. Now? Maybe one. But I still collect, especially the odd conversational tie, a pinup girl lining from Trimingham’s of Bermuda, a secret code spelled out in nautical flags from Chipp. Lately, I’ve had the pleasure of trying my hand at designing and refining the neckwear at J. McLaughlin, taking the classic zig zag Royal Artillery stripe and giving it a little life in dayglo neons, finishing them with a featherweight interlining and a hand-rolled edge. My style continues to evolve, but the tie endures. —Chase Winfrey
YOU SHOULD MEAT…
There’s something to be said for the wholly unexpected find. The business you don’t stumble across in Brooklyn, or some scenic European village, but rather in Hurleyville, New York, an Upstate hamlet about two hours outside of the City—but not so far from the Wm Brown farm.
That’s how Matt and Yolanda found themselves spending a recent weekend afternoon at La Salumina, a whole animal salumeria that decided to make little Hurleyville its home in 2020. Its opening was the end of a long journey back to meat for co-owner Eleanor Friedman, who’d spent years as a vegetarian before entering the restaurant industry and working at the farm-to-table Tarrytown restaurant Blue Hill, whose ethos changed her thinking. Looking to get as close as possible to the food source itself, she later left a position at Del Posto to work on a farm outside of Siena.
“I started eating meat again, and I decided that if I was going to do that, I needed to be able to raise the animals, kill the animals and process the animals. And through a long chain of events, I ended up in Italy doing that,” says Friedman.
While in Tuscany, she also met Gianpiero Pepe, a local chef who followed her back to the States and became her husband. Back in New York, the two worked for the Brooklyn restaurateur Andrew Tarlow, with Friedman running the group’s whole animal program. Together, Friedman and Pepe founded La Salumina as a roving operation before going brick-and-mortar in the spring of 2020.
At their Hurleyville facility, the duo intake entire pigs, sourced largely from two Hudson Valley farms, and proceed to break down every last piece of them into the 20 or so types of salumi on offer. Made in the Tuscan style as per Pepe’s background, the assortment varies from reliable crowd pleasers like capicola and 30-month prosciutto to obscure specialties like the cheekily named “ton-no,” which is made by preserving pork in olive oil, much as you would a slice of tuna (in Italian, tonno).
But perhaps no salumi speaks to the business’s mission more than coppa di tiesta, aka “head cheese.” After a pig’s been picked nearly clean for sausage and salami, what’s left behind are its bones, rinds—and head. Following medieval methods, these leftover bits are cooked down to extract all the meat, and then mixed with garlic, fresh lemons and warming spices.
“It is personally one of my favorite products, it’s incredibly unique.” Friedman says. “It can be breaded and fried, which is not very Italian, but is very delicious.”
La Salumina’s meats are sold in dozens of specialty food shops and served in restaurants from Maine to Tennessee. But they’re also available to walk-ins at their facility every weekend, alongside cheeses, antipasti, olive oil, espresso and pastries. On Fridays and Saturdays, panino—one meat, one vegetarian—are served on homemade bread, and on Sundays Pepe sells his scratch-made focaccia by the slice, which can be topped with salumi to form a whole meal. In warmer weather, a few tables are set outside, and there’s talk of soon offering meat and cheese boards.
“The shop was our way to not just plunk down a production facility in the middle of a town and ignore the surrounding community,” Friedman says. “It was our way of saying, hey, we're here and we want to interface with the community, get to know people and have a welcoming place.”
So, if your travels take you anywhere near Hurleyville, stop by. And tell them that Matt and Yolanda sent you. —Eric Twardzik
Hey gang! The new Spring 2025 issue of WMB hits the newsstands this week and you can order it online now on our newly refreshed wmbrownproject.com. Make sure to follow us on our instagram @wmbrownmagazine if you aren’t already!