Buttons have become an integral part of Small's design elements. Each one is a work of art, playing its own key visual and tactile role in the total composition of a piece. Whether custom made by Italy's best artisan makers in Parma or Padova, or hand picked from dozens of the best vintage and antique suppliers in Europe, or actually refinished and created in his own studios, the average cost per button reaches over 5 euros a piece, wholesale, with many clothing designs having between 50-100 euros worth of buttons sewn into them alone. "We spend more for our buttons than most designers spend for their main fabrics - it's part of our Art." Add to that, the incredible amounts of time that such a complex and intense approach in both design decisions and production efficiency to a detail that normally is just done with all the same buttons, and the costs go into the stratosphere. "Our production goes very slow when it comes to buttons -visually and functionally it's so critical."

Here, special real horn button designs from Parma are finished with 2 different types of West German sandpaper, one at a time in Small's studio before they can be sewn to a Piacenza super cashmere blazer in their exact and precise order and position. Each jacket will have 11 buttons and  buttonholes,requiring well over 3 hours of work from preparation to completion per jacket.