STORY mfg. Says Stay Positive!
Brand: STORY mfg.
Season: Fall/Winter 2022
Release Date: Summer 2022
Buy: Highsnobiety Shop, STORY mfg.'s website
Editor's Notes: STORY mfg. makes it look easy but its intricately-dyed, hand-knit, and generously oversized apparel is truly an international effort and, like the brand itself, is very much a labor of love.
Co-founders Saeed and Katy Al-Rubeyi have made much (deserving) noise about the craft that informs STORY, going to great lengths to explain the effort they put into each collection with utter transparency. One day the rest of the industry will hopefully catch up.
"We make stuff from scratch," Saeed explained in a recent STORY mfg. blog post.
"We go slow because if we want something (a fabric, a trim, packaging) we generally have to make it ourselves. It takes a long time, often we have to make a tool, to make a tool, to make a tool, to make the thing we want."
We toss around terms like slow fashion so often that they tend to lose meaning but STORY's patient production humbly epitomizes the concept.
Fall/Winter 2022, "Try Try Try" sees STORY again tinkering with natural dyes (including hues derived from soil, plants, and berries) and demonstrating the breadth of its artisan craftspeople's painstaking craft with a lush spread of time-consuming creations.
The messaging here is one of pure positivity: don't give up and don't be hard on yourself (or the planet)
Militaria silhouettes originally designed for combat are repurposed with post-hippy ease: field jackets are transformed by corduroy, patchwork and plenty of pockets while cargo pants are dyed and occasionally accented by block-printed symbols of benevolence provided by artist Shana Sadeghi-Ray.
The perfect accompaniment to its recent District Vision collaboration, STORY's signature crocheted scarves and pullover jackets return with peppy patterns aplenty. It all complemen ts the down-on-the-prairie aesthetic provided by loose-gauge knitwear and stitched skirts.
Shop STORY mfg.
