Shortly before the beginning of this year, Evan Kinori took over a small gallery in London to show his Fall/Winter collection alongside the work of a select few designers. When I visited the space, I was particularly drawn to two checked shirts by Oliver Church, a New Zealand-born designer who now lives and works in Paris, using vintage Japanese fabrics and specializing in “singular garments.” I’ve followed Church’s work for a while; he began making clothes under his own name six years ago, using vintage cloth to make and hand-finish shirts and overshirts — each one completely unique. On those two shirts, the detail that struck me most was the hand-embroidered button holes.
For Church, everything begins with fabric. When he moved to Paris in early 2018, he found himself surrounded by vintage linens and cottons, preserved and passed down over decades. Church studied fashion design in New Zealand and worked in design and production in London, but these fabrics offered a new way of working. “I’d spent time researching and developing textiles to give them a sense of age or wear,” he says. “It struck me that I didn’t need to reverse engineer this process. I could go directly to the source.”
The fabrics that Church now uses dictate the nature of the garments he creates, which vary from workwear-style chore jackets and coats to soft, unlined shirts and comfortable blazers. For starters, almost everything he uses is either vintage (which Church defines as more than 50 years old) or antique (more than 100). At first, he would visit flea markets around Paris, or trawl the French countryside to find his materials. But over time, he has built relationships with dealers and brocanteurs who help with sourcing. “I now buy mostly from a couple of market stalls who know what I like,” he says.
Because the fabrics are so old, it’s rare that Church can ever find a full bolt. Instead, he buys his vintage French linens or cottons in small sections. These limited quantities mean it’s impossible to make multiples of any garment, as more traditional brands might. “Although some fabrics might have similar qualities, they are distinctive because they are made by different mills at different times in different areas,” he says. Church embraces this unpredictability, cutting, sewing, and dyeing each piece by hand. The result is clothes that aren’t simply unique, but that have an authentic wear-feel — a reminder of the handiwork, literally, behind their production.
“All the processes that make clothes are ultimately very human,” Church says. For him, this is a contrast to what much of the wider industry is doing. “I have noticed an increasing flatness in the industry at large; things all feel and look the same,” he says. “Of course there are brands that do better and have developed their own language, but for many if you brush your hand along a rail, it would be hard to tell one from another.”
Once the materials are sourced, the real work begins: Church steam-washes everything before cutting a week’s worth of fabric by hand. The garments begin to take shape through machine-sewing, which is followed by a couple of days of hand-stitching. “Before industrial production, each garment was idiosyncratic, with little signatures from the hand that sewed it,” Church says. “Now the differences between garments are seen as a fault.” In Church’s hands, these differences feel significant again. “Hand-sewing is forgiving in a way that machines are not,” he says. “So adding these hand-sewn details in all my pieces adds softness.”
Once each item has been constructed, Church dyes it two or three times to build up a level of color he’s happy with. After a couple more washes, he adds labels and tags. Each stage of the process — from sourcing and cutting to sewing and dyeing — is done by Church himself in a small atelier on the outskirts of Paris.
Of course, working in this way has limitations. Church estimates that he produces somewhere between 150 and 200 pieces of clothing each year, which could practically be a rounding error for a bigger brand. “The work takes the time it takes,” he says. His methods mean that he doesn’t have to work to strict deadlines, manage a team, or work alongside busy factories. It also has an impact on the price of Church’s garments, with shirts generally costing around $1,000. “Ultimately my prices are a reflection of my working hours and what I have decided will let me have a decent life in France,” he says. “Since COVID I have seen a huge rise in prices of many labels across the designer and luxury sector, an increase that hasn't been explained by an increased quality of fabrics, finishing, or on-shoring. I am putting less of a markup on the end product.”
After production, Church’s clothes are distributed through his personal relationships, either directly to private clients or through a select network of retailers across the world who buy into Church’s ideas. “You can put a person behind the work and care,” says Saager Dilawri, founder of Vancouver store Neighbour and a longtime Oliver Church supporter. “In an industry where that is rare, I feel like this sticks out.”
Dilawri originally connected with Church over Instagram, intrigued by the designer’s process. Neighbour soon came on board and began stocking Church’s garments, with Dilawri and Church becoming good friends along the way. “I have two pieces from Oliver, a classic shirt and a big jacket that he made for Neighbour,” Dilawri says. “The shirt I wear regularly; it has aged nicely and become a go-to piece in my wardrobe. The big jacket is something I wear less often, though I know I will have it for years to come, and I look forward to how the dye will age and break in.”
The way that clothes change over time is an important part of how Church works. While the brand’s resulting styles are timeless and uncomplicated, it’s through the fabrics and finishes that they come to life. “What has always interested me about clothes, and what draws me to clothing to this day, is age,” he says. “I think clothes should last and are nicest when they do, so I spend time constructing in a way that allows for longevity. Clothes become much more personal the longer they are worn.”
While Church’s process might be different from the wider industry, the time he spent working for brands including Garbstore and Casey Casey showed him what was possible. “I was aware that the market existed and that I just needed an opening to make a connection with clients,” he says. Working closely with retailers like Neighbour has allowed Church to reach this audience. “It would be impossible for me to sit down with every single buyer of my work and tell them how and why I work the way that I do,” he says. “I’m lucky to have such great representation.”
In an industry where rarity has become its own form of currency, Church’s garments stand out for reasons more legitimate than any “limited-edition” run of otherwise identical copies. Anonymous and forgettable they are not. Instead, these are clothes that come from a specific place and time and will continue to change with the wearer’s unique story.
