The Sashiko Gals may be on the cusp of hitting the big time but they're never too famous to check their Instagram messages. "The Sashiko Gals’ DMs are a place where special things seem to happen almost daily," says Arata Fujiwara, founder of menswear label KUON and Sashiko Gals organizer. Every message of support makes "us smile," he says. Ain't that nice?

But the Sashiko Gals' DMs is also where work gets done. That's how The North Face Japan's design team got in touch with an offer of a collaboration, says Fujiwara, which "quickly became something very real."

The Sashiko Gals are a collective of 40-to-80-year-old Japanese women recruited by Fujiwara in the wake of a natural disaster as a means to support artisans who'd created sashiko and boro items for KUON. They've been at it for over a decade but have really been cooking these past few years — quite literally, as of late. I'm referring to a public cosign from Apple CEO Tim Cook but there were also official New Balance and C.P. Company partnerships following Sashiko Gals' habit of customizing existing product. However, the Sashiko Gals' take on The North Face's signature Nuptse jacket is arguably a career peak, partially because it's also The North Face at its best.

"In many ways, technical gear sits at the opposite end of the spectrum from sashiko. By bringing sashiko into that space, we felt the potential [of said gear] could expand even further," says Fujiwara. "In that sense, the timing with The North Face felt absolutely right, and we’re deeply grateful to the TNF team for being so involved, even joining us on-site throughout the process."

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Releasing only in Japan (due to The North Face licensing quirks) on December 27 as the initial drop of The North Face Japan's multi-part "Japan Collection," which also includes technical textiles dyed with onion skins, the Sashiko Gals' hand-stitched Nuptse is not the Nuptse as you know it. The famous puffer jacket has been stripped down to a front-tied hanten, a traditional collarless Japanese winter jacket, albeit one cleverly reimagined as a puffed-up mid-layer both classic and contemporary — its shell was produced using lab-developed material from biotech company Spiber. And that one-era-meeting-another motif is made most tangible by the Sashiko Gals' mind-meltingly precise hand-stitching.

"Because The North Face is, first and foremost, a gear company, it was crucial that the sashiko work did not compromise functionality," Fujiwara says. "Rather than stitching directly into the core body of the down jacket, the yoke area was constructed as a double layer. This required careful design thinking and collaboration."

Fujiwara also notes that the Sashiko Gals "developed a different thread specifically for this project" as their usual materials weren't appropriate for the needs of high-performance garments.

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Now, don't get too excited. Though the Sashiko Gals' TNF Nuptse and matching boots are made to be worn, they're also more collector's pieces than daily drivers as reflected by their prices — ¥550,000 and ¥242,000, respectively (about $3,500 and $1,500, respectively).

Similarly, though they're glad to get admiring DMs, they don't do custom work unless, perhaps, you visit their workshop in Tohoku. This kind of endeavor is all about the bigger picture, rather than the product alone.

"The values we’ve cultivated over many years — craftsmanship, respect for Japanese tradition, and an understanding of making things responsibly — played a significant role in shaping this collaboration," says Fujiwara. "One of our core missions with Sashiko Gals is to expand the possibilities of sashiko. We believe that for this traditional Japanese technique to survive for hundreds of years to come, it must also evolve."

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