My dad dusted off his Barbour jacket last month. One he’s had since I was in primary school. Wax was wearing off at the elbows and the corduroy collar had faded to the rough touch of a forgotten teddy bear, but goddamn it after thirty-plus years that jacket still kept the rain out.
He was wearing it to help me tidy my garden shed – I’d called him when I thought I’d found dry rot but actually just had amateur walls – when the heavens opened halfway through. We took shelter under the shed’s pathetic eave – as I dripped uncontrollably from my three-year-old “technical” jacket, he stood there dry as a bone in a jacket that’s been around longer than my career. “I probably should get this rewaxed,” he said casually, pointing to a small patch where the water was just starting to soak through. I looked down at my jacket, trickles of water running down my arms.
And had a brief epiphany about how sometimes my dad is actually right for once. About something.
Don’t tell him I said that, though.
He’s ridiculously arrogant enough as it is. One of the sinister things the fast fashion industry has done is teach us to see garments as disposable – wear them for one season, chuck them, buy more. Journalism and trends partly inform my own shopping habits – but I’ll be the first to blame my industry.
How many “Ten Pieces You Need This Month” lists did I write before recognising how we were training people to shop? Buy it, wear it once, rinse repeat. But there’s another seam of British manufacturing running counter to fast fashion’s churn and burn – proper heritage brands quietly making clothes that are built to last, that aren’t designed to pill after half a dozen washes. <img class=”size-full wp-image-7034″ src=”http://joewears.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/im1979_Proper_British_Heritage_Brands_That_Still_Make_Things__66.21e384-db05-474d-bf95-b61760c99bbf.jpg” alt=”” width=”1166″ height=”823″ /> Take them as you will, but these aren’t sexy brands.
They won’t be dripping off billboards during Fashion Week. They’re often grandads of their industries – based in Northern England rainy towns and founded by jack-booted types who’d rather talk seam allowance than put selfies on Instagram. Brands that still run apprenticeships, will still repair what they sell, and fundamentally believe the point of making something is for it to bloody well last.
My favourite is Private White V.C. Up in Manchester. Factory on Cottenham Lane has been making coats since 1853 – the brand itself is younger, but they share the same ethos.
I popped into their workshop while visiting family last month and was invited on a tour by one of their pattern cutters who moonlights as self-appointed tour guide. She took me through their archive and factory floor, rattling off the history of each process. Jeans have come and gone over the years, including a stint making bombproof parachutes during World War II, but coats have been their speciality for decades. “Heaps of brands come here looking to ‘washashore’ their products,” (she said “washashore” for made in England, if you’re wondering) their pattern cutter.
Her name was Jean. She’d been working there for forty-three years. Forty-three years!
This woman has dealt with more management shuffles and trend cycles than I’ve had cups of tea, and still talks about her job with pride and excitement. “See these stitches? Same ones we used fifty years ago. We’re not constantly reinventing the wheel just because some influencer says velvet is finished.” She pulled out a military style jacket from their archive cupboard – brass buttons, Ventile cotton.
The kind of coat that gets better with age, not bitter. Image: Private White Vintage Clothing She wasn’t bullshit-ing me either. I own a Private White overcoat myself that I bought six years ago and still is the best jacket I own.
Cost-per-wear has decreased so much it’s now actually earning me money. Don’t @ me. Then you have Hiut Denim over in Wales.
Another small business with an epic story. Jeans factory in Cardigan shut after making 35,000 pairs of jeans a week for forty years, leaving the town with barely any clothing industry remaining. Owners David and Clare Hieatt wanted to resurrect jean-making in the town, but with a new philosophy.
Instead of mass-producing thousands of bad pairs like overseas factories do, they make ~100 pairs a week and sell them as premium jeans. I went over to interview them for a feature last summer – spent a surreal morning being fawned over in a cafe by hyper-local relatives who’d come to help with filming. David says they’re “trying to rebuild connections with community.” Listening to him describe their ethos, it’s clear they care just as much about longevity of product as they do of their town’s heritage.
Jeans come with a “No Wash Club” encouraging you not to wash them for six months to better break them in (literally). If they ever wear through, they’ll repair them for free, for life. Image: Hiut denim “We want people to pass their jeans down when they’re done with them,” David explained, scrolling through pictures on his phone of customers who’d sent through pictures of their jeans years down the line.
The fades were as individual as fingerprints, the patches were worn beautifully. “They’re heirlooms.” It’s radical, making less but making it better. Most of us have been conditioned to expect clothing to wear holes in after a few wears. Clothes are so cheap now we don’t expect much of them. £15 jeans?
You get what you pay for. A £5 t-shirt probably isn’t made by a living wage. But what Hiut and others are gambling on is that people are sick of losing money on clothes.
Sick of throwing a coat away because it got battered in the rain once. Spending more money up front means you have less need to buy more. It’s a simple premise, and one that’s harder to convince people of when your rent is due.
Same goes for John Smedley. Making shirts and knitwear in Derbyshire since 1784. They were popping shirts for Queen Victoria when she came to the throne.
Clothes are still made in the UK, still use Sea Island cotton and New Zealand merino, and still focus on wardrobe staples that last for decades. I’ve got two of their merino wool jumpers; one navy, one grey. They’re boring as fuck, but also great.
Great at everything I own them for – I’ve had them for near-on a decade. Went through an entire packet of curry paste and came out the other side looking pristine thanks to skilled dry cleaners. Fast fashion jumpers I’ve owned autumn apart after one wear.
Start pilling. My Smedleys just get on with it. Live their lives quietly.
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Sort of like the brand itself. Sunspel, too. Underwear and tees in Nottingham since 1860.
Their design director told me when I interviewed him two years ago that not much had changed in their process since they started. “Except the materials have got better with time. But our attention to detail, why we make things, that’ll always stay the same.” Expect to pay around a tenner for a basic tee – which is extortion until you realise it’ll still look smarter than a cheap one five years down the line, and likely last longer too. Ask me.
Got one pushing seven now. <img class=”size-full wp-image-7037″ src=”http://joewears.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/im1979_Proper_British_Heritage_Brands_That_Still_Make_Things__ca45dee5-fd8f-461a-9b68-55ac79beb966.jpg” alt=”” width=”1168″ height=”826″ /> Why do these brands rub me so neatly? I’ve asked a lot of them. Interviewed founders and heads of production, pored over materials they source from, asked endless questions about how they view “quality.” To me they speak of pride.
There’s a matter-of-fact about quality clothing that these brands all exude. They don’t position themselves as luxury or premium. They know their clothes last longer than anyone else’s, and it irritates them when others don’t share the same viewpoint.
Talking to the owners, the ones who’ve been there for decades, they can’t understand what else you would make your clothes out of. “Why would you purposely make something to autumn apart?” as Jean from Private White said to me when I asked her why. Because to these brands it just doesn’t make sense. Smaller names, too.
Places like S.E.H Kelly on the Ace who work with all British producers and fabric mills to craft menswear that won’t autumn apart after a few wears. Blackhorse Lane Ateliers making jeans in Walthamstow on a not-for-profit model, offering lifetime repairs on everything they sell. Community Clothing making basic tees, jackets, socks in the bits of the year their UK factories would otherwise be resting to pay workers year-round.
You get the idea. What all these brands share isn’t an aesthetic – range from outdoor gear to minimalist basics – but an attitude. Buy less.
Buy better. Clothes that can be repaired, not replaced. Designed to last generations, rather than until you decide to downgrade.
Obviously, the big question with all these brands is money. Aren’t blind to it. Doesn’t matter how preachy I get about buying well, shit is expensive right now.
Telling people to just buy a £200 jacket instead of a £40 seems laughable. At this point buy-buyasting cheap clothing actually works out cheaper. You can buy and replace those cheaper jackets more than once before you’ve hit the price of something that’ll actually last.
Bit heartening to see some of these brands adapt their models in the last few years. Repair services. Buy-back schemes.
Pre-owned websites. Community Clothing go to great lengths to keep prices low while still paying workers properly. Others subsciption models like Hiut where you pay monthly and spread the cost.
Makes it more attainable. <img class=”size-full wp-image-7038″ src=”http://joewears.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/im1979_Proper_British_Heritage_Brands_That_Still_Make_Things__ca45dee5-fd8f-461a-9b68-55ac79beb966_1.jpg” alt=”” width=”1166″ height=”825″ /> Secondhand market for these sorts of garments also helps. Want a Barbour jacket? You can get one on Vestiare too for roughly the same price as High as will last you decades.
Have it rewaxed when you get home. My grandma’s old Sunspel shirts turn up on eBay all the time. Found a vintage Smedley jumper in a charity shop recently.
Quality will out. Means it can be enjoyed again. Not saying go build your whole wardrobe from these brands, either.
Trust me, I love buying new shit almost as much as the next denim obsessed writer. But having these kinds of reliable stalwarts in your wardrobe – stuff you know will stay faithful to you rather than autumn apart at the first sign of retail – feels more important now than ever. Not just for our wallets and our wardrobes, but for keeping skills alive in communities that have been doing them for generations.
Number one favourite piece of clothing I own? Black Abraham Moon wool overcoat bought from a tiny brand in Leeds who source all their wool from the mill down the road. Bought it years back at a trade show after chatting to the two brothers who ran the business for ages.
Quiet English types who’ve been making coats pretty much since they could walk. Were so utterly not fashion people I fell in love immediately.
Cost me an arm and a leg at the time, but I’d sold a bit of something previously and treated myself.
To this day still the best coat I own. Survived fashion weeks in four cities, endured five winters of British weather, wears better than most of the coats I’ve owned since. Had to get lining repaired last year after stuffing it through the wash.
Paid them nothing to fix it even though it was through no fault of their own. “It’s our job if we made it,” the older brother told me when I rang about repairing it. Like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Ended up getting my dads Barbour rewaxed.
Bought the stuff online and spent a miserable afternoon applying it as a thank you for helping me in the shed. Painted my arms and legs so much he begged me to stop halfway through. But when I gave it back to him as dry as new after that promised decade plus of waterproofing, he nodded sagely, like all English dads do when you achieve something vaguely outdoorsy.
And then eyed my pathetic rain jacket on the doorstep. “They make some decent waterproofs themselves, you know,” he said grinning. “Not just for old farts like me.” I am actually ordering their catalogue as we speak. Took me long enough.
