Fashion / Global
Fashion
Briefing
Corelate, Ode to Sunday and Narifuri.
Q&A
Sebastiaan Vadasz
Co-founder, Pelikamo
Switzerland
Zürich-based menswear brand and retailer Pelikamo has garnered a loyal following for its “Made in Italy” pieces, which span classic blazers, knitwear and shoes. When the time came for a revamp to its flagship near the city centre, it was executed with serious Swiss precision.
Tell us about the shop’s refurbishment.
We doubled the size of it, taking over our neighbour’s space, an auction house for ancient coins. We stripped everything back and designed the furniture ourselves, working with carpenters, handymen and metalworkers from across Switzerland.
What was your brief to them?
We tackled the process in the same way we design a garment: creating style sheets and discussing every detail. We paid as much attention to the carpentry on the inside as on the outside. This is a Japanese philosophy: if the parts of the furniture you can’t see are as beautiful as the parts you can, it adds to the value.
pelikamo.com
Acne
Sweden
Denim has always been at the heart of Acne: the label started in 1997 when Jonny Johansson created 100 pairs of indigo jeans with bright red stitching. Now Sweden’s favourite fashion house has launched Blå Konst, a men’s and women’s jeans line comprising six models – from the baggy Land to the slim-cut North – in white, black and shades of blue.
acnestudios.com
Stutterheim X Marni
Italy/Sweden
Milanese house Marni has teamed up with Stockholm’s raincoat guru Stutterheim to create a trio of patterned waterproofs for men and women. The designs combine the hallmarks of both labels: Marni’s playful accents (one model has tangerine arms) and Stutterheim’s rubberised-cotton coats with bold snap-back buttons.
marni.com; stutterheim.com
Ode to Sunday
Lithuania
Airy, durable and biodegradable, linen woven from natural flax fibre has long been used for clothes in the Baltic states. Now Agne Kundrote and Vaida Buceliene, who launched Ode to Sunday last year, are bringing it to a new generation of women. Pieces include T-shirts, trousers and shirt dresses in neutral tones, all sewn in Vilnius.
odetosunday.com
Fay Andrada
USA
“I started making jewellery as a hobby,” says Fay Andrada. Her geometric earrings, cuffs and pendants are made from brass, silver and gold.
fayandrada.com
Three sunglasses brands to look out for:
1.
The Bespoke Dudes
Italy
This Milanese label’s acetate shades are hand-cut in Italy.
thebespokedudeseyewear.com
2.
Mykita
Germany
The new Studio 4 collection is filled with colourful stainless-steel frames, all made in Berlin.
mykita.com
3.
Belstaff
UK
The clothing brand’s first eyewear line consists of elegant titanium-framed models with Carl Zeiss lenses.
belstaff.co.uk
Narifuri
Japan
The new Tokyo flagship of Japanese cycling brand Narifuri looks like a regular fashion boutique: sharp wool suits, smart rucksacks and casual cotton trousers line the shelves. Look closer though and you’ll see that every item has been designed for the city cyclist. The seersucker summer jacket is washable, lined with a ventilating mesh and can be jammed into a rucksack and emerge still looking fresh. The “denim” trousers are not real denim but cotton with a touch of stretchy polyurethane. Most pieces have an extra dart in the shoulders or knees to accommodate a cyclist’s pedal motion. There are breezy trilbies, made with Tokyo hat brand ca4la, and stretchy leather-weave belts, made in Italy for Narifuri by renowned belt-maker Anderson’s. Even the face of the Seiko-Narifuri watch is turned 15 degrees clockwise to make it easier for a cyclist to tell the time.
Narifuri has been in business since 2007, offering urban cyclists fashionable gear that functions properly. “I used to wear outdoor brands,” says Narifuri’s brand manger, Keishin Tahara. “I love them but they were too high spec for what I needed.” Tahara, like his team, is a keen cyclist: “It makes sense: we can road test all the garments.”
The new shop in Sendagaya was designed by Tokyo-based Studio Koaa. Clothes can be found upstairs, next to bicycles for sale and rent, while the ground floor has a workshop. As well as working with large manufacturers on its clothes range, Narifuri has its own bicycle: the elegant Helmz made in collaboration with Bridgestone. Also in the pipeline is a fragrance for cyclists that will skip skin-irritating chemicals.
narifuri.com
Three things we’d buy:
Steele-Tech tailored suit Top of Narifuri’s “Extreme Commute” range, this summer wool two-piece is stretchy and waterproof.
Collaboration waterproof rucksack Made with bicycle-bag-maker Beruf from super-tough nylon.
Air Taffeta travel jacket Smartly cut from a breathable ripstop fabric.
Pras
Japan
Okayama-based fashion company Balance is all about Japanese manufacturing and, for Pras, its offshoot sneaker line launched in 2015, it has partnered two top factories. In the village of Kojima in Okayama prefecture, Shibata Textile weaves robust hanpu canvas while in Fukuoka, 100-year-old shoemaker MoonStar sews the canvas onto comfortable rubber soles. The results are a handsome take on a 1940s US navy deck shoe: low-cut or high-top lace-ups and slip-ons in black, indigo or off-white.
pras2015.jp
Bather
Canada
Kyle Kaminsky set up his men’s swimwear label in his hometown of Toronto in 2013. Now Bather’s bright trunks, a cross between short European and long Australian-style shorts, can be found in 150 retailers around the globe.
bather.com
Corelate
Italy
Launched in 2013 by Matteo Catellani and Maurizio Tedeschi, Italian menswear label Corelate offers a casual approach to classic tailoring. Manufactured in Emilia-Romagna, the line includes Oxford-shirt designs in a heavier fabric with side pockets, T-shirts made from shirting cloth and shirts featuring cotton drawstrings. “We go for an informal look, adding subtle twists to staples of a man’s wardrobe,” says Catellani, who stocks the range at Store 333, his shop in Parma.
corelate.eu
