Every now and then you run across a designer that's really terrific, but which no one seems to have heard of. Roberto Angelico is one of these.

Roberto Angelico is both the name of the designer and his company. (You should have a look at their website: there are some lovely things there.) The boutique is a stand-alone, located in a handsome little building at Zähringerstrasse 24 in central Zurich, a quiet side street just around the corner from the "Central" tram stop and about five minutes' walk from Zurich Hauptbahnhof (HB), the city's main train station.

I stumbled across the place some years back while idling through the neighborhood (it's the Niederdorf, the slightly more countercultural part of Zurich) and thinking about finding a tie for my husband, the most reluctant tie-wearer ever to stalk the face of the Earth muttering "I gave up ties when I left the RAF". There were scarves and ties in the window that were evenly divided among lovely bold graphics and very delicate and subtle designs. Angelico also has a seriously whimsical bent that comes out in some of his work (I have a scarf of his decorated with cartoon owls who are wearing some of the most droll and cranky expressions you could possibly imagine). 

The quality of his silks is very high indeed: he seems to lean toward semi-lustrous, lighter silks. The ties tend more toward heavier silk twills -- I finally got my husband to go for one in a beautiful lustrous gunmetal gray, and he liked it so much that he came back another time and bought two more (it didn't hurt that they were on sale). Prices are moderate: not cheap, but not as expensive as some of the high-end names like Hermès. The last couple of scarves I bought there went, if I remember correctly, for around SFr 100.- or thereabouts.

Definitely worth a visit if you're passing through Zurich. Here's a link to a Google Map.