Several times a year, we travel from Copenhagen to Tuscany, Italy. These trips are an important part of our work, with most of our time spent sourcing fabrics, visiting factories and looking for vintage references.
The photographs in this journal entry are from our visit in May 2026.
Alongside our usual fabric sourcing, we had two important meetings planned with the factories that would soon become our new partners for denim, workwear and shirting.
After landing in Pisa on 5 May, we went straight to the denim factory in Calenzano, near Florence.
We looked through their showroom, examined their previous work and discussed how we might work together.
Impressed by their approach to construction and the attention they paid to details, it became clear that we shared the same commitment to making clothes, without compromising on the construction of the garment.
The factory still uses techniques that are less common in denim production today. One example is their use of double-tucked belt loops, with a smaller inner loop to accommodate a narrow belt and a larger outer loop for a wider one. The loops are secured with bar tack stitching and sewn into the waistband for reinforcement.
By the end of the meeting, we knew we wanted to work with them. We sat down with the owner and began discussing which styles we were going to start out with.
Nerina, 19 years old, denim cat
From there, we drove to our hotel, set on a hill overlooking the Tuscan countryside.
On 6 May, we visited a fabric warehouse recommended by our Italian agent. We had not been there before and arrived to find a large space filled with deadstock and surplus fabrics.
Each warehouse tends to have its own specialities. This one held a wide selection of surplus materials from major fashion houses. We spent the morning looking through the stock and selected several fabrics, including those we later used for our first productions with the new denim factory, first our ’Elme’ Raw 12oz Bootcut Jeans and then later our ‘Molard’ Corduroy Trousers.
Our next stop was Alessandro, one of our longest-standing partners in Italy.
Alessandro stocks a carefully chosen selection of surplus fabrics. We have returned to his wool fabrics several times over the years. One example is the material for our 'Aksel’ Cashmere Coat' from 2025, which from Alessandro We later shot our early dec’ 25 lookbook in his warehouse.
This time, we bought selvedge denim from the renowned Japanese mill Kourogi, which we used for our ‘Molard’ Japanese Selvedge Jeans.
By then, the boot of our rental car was full, so we had to leave the selvedge denim behind for the time being. We returned to the denim factory to deliver the other materials and get sampling started.
A close friend had joined us on the trip, and with our work finished for the day, we took the opportunity to show him some of our favorite places in Tuscany.
We drove to Montecarlo, a small fortified town on a hilltop between Lucca and Montecatini Terme. It is a place we return to whenever we are in the region, both for the town itself and the views across the surrounding countryside.
The view from Monte Carlo
That evening, we had dinner at Ristorante La Baita, a restaurant situatated on a hilltop in Marliana.
Ristorante La Baita
The following day, we met with Gulliano, who has been making tailored shirts in his Florence workshop for decades. Our Italian agent translated throughout the meeting, as Gulliano does not speak English.
We were impressed by his work, and he has made all of our button-up shirts since that first meeting. His great experience in traditional Italian shirtmaking provides great value, while also adding small challenges. He is used to crafting traditional italian shirts, and doesn’t always understand why we want to add untraditional details. We’ve found our way of working together, allowing us to combine classic italian tailoring, with our thoughts and ideas about what the ideal shirt is.
The remaining days moved at a slower pace. We returned to the surplus warehouses, where the sheer volume of fabric makes it difficult to see everything in a single visit. Taking another look often leads us to something we missed the first time.
On our last day, we went looking for furniture for our new store. Unfortunately without any luck.