Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Travelogue # 5 | Tokyo 1.09


We went to Tokyo a few weeks ago, and visited a huge amount of stores in a few days. Tokyo is a brilliant source for inspiration, and among the highlights this time were Standard, Ku, Sophnet, Free & Easy and Opening Ceremony. In addition, the usual supects in Tokyo; Beams, Ships, Loveless, Porter, F.I.L (Visvim), Original Fake, American Rag, among others. See below for a picture guide to our favourite stores in Tokyo.































So long,
BA

Monday, November 30, 2009

Brand profile : Duvetica



Duvetica is an Italian down jacket brand founded by Giampiero Vagliano and Stefano Rovoletto, who both have a history at Moncler, where Vagliano was President and Rovoletto held the position as Brand Manager. When they started working at Moncler in 1995, the brand had great challenges both in terms of turnover, positioning and image. Over the course of five years they managed to increase global sales from €2 million to €30 million, while greatly improving both brand awareness and brand equity. After resuscitating Moncler they wanted to make something of their own, and five years after leaving Moncler they launched Duvetica in the Japanese market in 2005.


They are currently one of the largest down jacket brands in Japan with an incredible 1200 points of sales. Duvetica has now set their eyes on the European market, where they are growing at an explosive pace.The name Duvetica stems from Duvet (French for down) and Etica (ethical), and sums up their two main principles; 1. All products from Duvetica contains down. 2. They strive to maintain an ethically sound production. The down is from Perigord, France, and the fur is from Finland. In other words you can be sure that the down and fur is not coming from the aggressive parts of down/fur-production that sadly some suppliers out there are using.





The collections are designed by a Japanese-Italian duo, where the Italian designer also acts as a colour forecasting consultant in the yarn industry. In other words, she is one of the select few who sit and decide which colours will dominate two years ahead in time. The colours black (999 Nero) and Duvetica red (405 Rosso Granato) can always be found in the collection, while ALL other colours are changed each season. For FW09 there were 23 different colours available in the basic styles. Next season there will be all new colours, except black and duvetica red. They operate this way so that there is a constant progression through new colours, small seasonal changes to all models, and a massively large collection with over 600 style/colour options for women’s and 500 for men’s. Duvetica jackets have a tailored feel with clearly defined fits – something that the down jacket market is severely lacking in a segment dominated by shapeless unisex-jackets and fits belonging to a completely different era.


The favourite subject of the people from Duvetica are the qualities where they pay enormous attention to the slightest of details, all the way down to finding the sewing thread that best stops feathers from protruding through the seams. The zippers used are from manufacturers like Lampo (Balenciaga, Chanel, Dior), Riri (Visvim, Number Nine, Marc Jacobs) and Meras (James Perse), but Duvetica has now even started producing their own zippers in collaboration with some of the finest zipper manufacturers.



The down used is exclusively grey goose down from PĂ©rigord (Dordogne), which is the type of down with the best filling power – i.e. the down isolates better per gram compared to white goose down, or even worse; duck down. The composition is 90 % down and 10 % feather, which is the best balance. If you apply more feather the product will feel stiff and heavy, and if you use less feather the product will not balloon out as well after being compressed. Even though the qualities Duvetica uses are supreme, the prices are still very competitive. Duvetica are able to keep their prices down through owning most parts of their supply chain, which drastically cuts the production costs. The jackets are produced in the EU, with the exception of a small percentage of the production which is produced in Croatia.



























Duvetica are available through fine retailers throughout Scandinavia, please send us an e-mail at info@blender.as for store inquiries.

BA.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Blue Gold



Something really interesting was pitched for us earlier today. Our friend Marius showed us a teaser from the forthcoming denim documentary Blue Gold : American Jeans.

Denimology has spoken to the director Theis Jessen, and the persons and companies involved in the movie, certainly raise the expectations:

Jean Touitou - APC, Tommy Hilfiger, Seven jeans, Mark Ramone (The Ramones), Daryl Hall (Hall and Oates), Models, Edun, Ralph Lauren, Cheap Monday, RRL, Calvin Klein, Jim Moore - GQ Magazine, Renzo -Diesel, The Gap, ISKO - denim mill, Andrew Olah - Olah/Kingpins, Levi's, EVISU, Dao-Yi Chow, Sean John and Scott Morrison.




We are definitelly looking forward to this one, and it is reassuring to see that our friend, and CEO of Evisu, Scott Morrison is involved.


By the way, check out photographer Marius' new project: Without Sun.


Best,
BA

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

James Perse Tricycle



The kings of natural-coloured basics, in the softest and best quality there is, give you their own take on a classic tricycle. In their own words:
"The James Perse Tricycle is a 1970's inspired design. Custom made with an extra low center of gravity design so it won't tip over. Sturdy construction made with heavy duty steel and powder coated for superior chip resistance. Attached deck is made of teak wood."

Head over to James Perse, for more details.

Best,
BA

Monday, November 16, 2009

Common Projects Q&A

The people at Selectism have done an Q&A with Peter or Flavio from Common Projects. Follow this link. Below are some pieces from the FW09 collection.

Keep it common!










Sunday, November 15, 2009

Inventory Magazine





Inventory Magazine is the new project from Ryan Willms, founder of the discontinued and highly rated h(y)r collective online magazine. Inventory is a continuance of h(y)r collective, but now also offers a hard copy issue. The quality of the work presented is irreproachable, and in addition to the hard copy, Inventory offers an online magazine, in addition to their online store (Inventory Stockroom) and blog (Inventory updates).





In June, we spent a day with Ryan in Paris, during the mens fashion week. We spent the day buying Visvim and Junya Watanabe MAN for Secret Society, and joined Ryan at Nigel Cabourn. The outcome of the day will hit Secret Society in februray, but until then, head over to Inventory Magazine, to get some insight in how a day buying in Paris can be.



Kyrre at Visvim



Yuketen & Nigel Cabourn collaboration


BA