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Caring for a wax jacket
Care guides|October 2025
A timeless outerwear staple, Barbour’s classic waxed cotton jackets are known to last for decades with proper care.
Notes|August 2025
On translating colour
How do you capture the feeling of a place in a single brushstroke – or distil the essence of a flower into colour alone? This season, a quiet, hands-on process of exploration led our team to new ways of thinking about function, beauty and the expressive potential of print.
With a summer collection inspired by sculpture gardens – specifically, artist Barbara Hepworth’s garden at her studio and home in St Ives, Cornwall, in the southwest of England – our new seasonal print designs took root in research on opposites and contrasts: light and dark, round and edgy, natural and man-made.
A bright-pink print, custom-made for a silk dress, was hand-painted by our designer Elsa Esser, who wanted to evoke the garden without being too literal. ‘I ended up distilling the idea of a flower to its essential colour – fuchsia – and then started thinking about how the colour meets the underlying texture of the fabric. I was painting on watercolour paper, rice paper, and then on silk, and the silk had the most interesting interaction with the ink,’ Elsa recalls.
‘We didn’t want the design to sit on top of the product, but rather to work within the shape of the dress – so we’ve kept the brush strokes in the print to preserve a painterly quality in the garment.’
She worked with sumi ink and large brushes – the kind typically used to prepare a canvas – experimenting with wetting the material first to let the colour bleed in controlled ways. By diluting the ink or adjusting the moisture of the surface, she could gradually build up layers, adjusting intensity and creating a more nuanced effect.
The process leading up to the final print also sparked wider conversations within the team around the meaning of functionality and its connection to timelessness and longevity. Comfort, wearability and durability are essential – but what about the function of beauty, or the function of craft?
For Elsa Esser, working by hand is not just a way of making but a way of thinking. The physical process invites trial and error, offering a transparency that digital methods often lack. It also deepens the connection between idea and outcome.
‘Many times, individuality is what make us keep a garment in our wardrobe for years. Essentialism and pure functionality represent a very strict narrative – and I think the idea of beauty as function adds something important to the wider conversation on sustainability.’
Care guides
Suede
Care guides|August 2025
Suede is crafted from the underside of leather hides, offering a soft, fuzzy finish. Due to its delicate nature, it is important to properly care for your suede products to extend their lifespan.
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Linen
Care guides|August 2025
Linen is a strong natural fibre that gets softer with use and time. It’s breathable and has a soft texture. Caring for linen properly helps maintain its natural characteristics.
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Down
Care guides|August 2025
Down is ideal for lightweight insulating outerwear because it creates a warm thermal barrier next to the body. Treat your down products with special care to maintain their level of performance.
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More editorial
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Pattern with purpose
Design|December 2025
This winter, we present a new collaboration with Stockholm-based artist Evelina Kroon, created in support of UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. A limited-edition plaid blanket in blue, white and red that continues our shared conversation on colour, textiles and everyday objects – now with a wider purpose.
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Polkapojkarna
Suppliers|November 2025
Rooted in Sweden’s sweet-making tradition, Polkapojkarna is a small confectionery based in the town of Gränna – the birthplace of the red-and-white peppermint stick known in Sweden as polkagris.
Caring for a wax jacket
Care guides|October 2025
A timeless outerwear staple, Barbour’s classic waxed cotton jackets are known to last for decades with proper care.
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On living in a small world
Notes|October 2025
For our new design collaboration with British outdoor specialists Barbour, we spent a few days on the island of Gotland earlier this year, capturing the distinctive landscape of sea, stone, and open skies, and the lives of people who live and work there.