Inside Amy Powney X Finisterre’s design-led capsule wardrobe for your outdoor adventures

Amy Powney began her career “sweeping the floors and working her way up” at Mother of Pearl, the London-based ready-to-wear label founded by Maia Norman. She became the brand’s creative director in 2015 and, for nearly a decade, worked to modernise the its business model by moving away from runway shows, offering seasonless designs and investing in natural, environmentally friendly materials. Her impact has been felt across the fashion industry – she has helped to educate consumers to make better shopping choices and held her peers to higher standards.

At the start of 2025 she decided to go out on her own. She launched Akyn, a women’s ready-to-wear brand, and soon forged a partnership with Cornish label Finisterre, known for its specialist outdoor wear. “I just turned 40 and felt it was the right time to go my own way,” says Powney. “The world has changed so much, I wanted to say something different.”

Building a sustainable supply chain is key to her strategy, with Akyn producing in small Portuguese factories and using only four fibres: cotton, lyocell, regenerative wool and European linen. “Until the industry finds a viable recycling solution, I don’t want to take part in the fossil-fuel industry, so I limit our fibre pool to natural or regenerative textiles,” she says. “My ultimate vision is to create a product that leaves no trace.”

This time, Powney is thinking more deeply about the creative process. “We lost connection to the craft and the process. When I think back to my time as a student, we were researching the likes of Martin Margiela, Coco Chanel and Alexander McQueen, and so much was about design. If we can emotionally engage people back to the product, we can get them to be less consumption-focused and more swooned by creativity and connection [to the makers].”

Powney is also ensuring that she is surrounded by people who inspire her, appointing an advisory community that includes the Tank magazine CEO, Caroline Issa, and Textile Exchange’s Claire Bergkamp. “I want this to be a community brand,” says Powney. “That’s why I didn’t name it after me. I believe in being part of a network.”

It’s also why she began working with Finisterre at the same time as she was launching Akyn, having found common ground with its founder, Tom Kay. “What you see is what you get with them, there’s so much heart and soul in what they do,” says Powney, who has been visiting Cornwall, in the southwest of England, to design her first collaboration collection with Kay. “As a designer who was so accustomed to working around the clock and never leaving the studio, it was so nice to visit the Finisterre HQ and connect to nature, to a different way of making products. Going for a morning swim is part of their routine.”

The new capsule includes the kind of coldweather essentials in which Finisterre specialises: a waterproof parka in elegant burnt orange; a quilted jacket made of recycled fishing nets; a long coat that can double as a beach robe. There’s also knitwear, from cosy fishermen’s rib jumpers to knitted balaclavas – part of a strategy to expand the brand’s offer to include more urban wear and fashion-focused designs.

“There’s a massive gap in the market for outdoor products that are also design-led,” says Powney. “Urban brands tend to prioritise design, while most outdoor brands purely focus on function. We wanted to create something beautiful, with interesting silhouettes, that still retains all the technical qualities. Our brands are very similar in terms of our ethos, we just produce very different clothing. It was amazing to meet in the middle.”
akyn.com; finisterre.com