introducing named patterns

As we mentioned last week, we’ve begun adding a number of exciting, new digital pattern brands to the Oliver + S shop. Today, we’re happy to welcome Laura and Saara from Named patterns who are joining us to introduce you to their stylish new line.

Hello everyone, and greetings from Helsinki, Finland! We are Saara and Laura Huhta, the sisters and designers behind the pattern label Named. We are very excited to write this guest post, and even more excited to have part of our pattern collection now available in the Oliver + S web shop! With this blog post, we are hoping to give you a little glimpse of what happens here behind the scenes of Named.

The story of Named started about a year and a half ago, as the two of us sat on the bus 72. We had just finished a circus workout class and were headed to our parents’ place for a Sunday lunch. Somehow we got to talking about our future, and what to do with it. We are both passionate about sewing and crafts. Saara has a degree in fashion design and pattern making, and Laura has graduated as a footwear designer. We have been sewing since we were just little girls, and Named is not the first design project we have started together. Neither is it the only thing we have in common; having the same family, same hobbies and same habits, we do pretty much anything together anyways!

As corny as it might sound, that bus trip changed the course of our lives completely! We started to discuss work, and what kind of work we would actually love to do (it was obvious that it would be too late for us to make it as a dancer or a circus artist), but we could turn our love for sewing into a career! So, as we got to our parents’ house, we grabbed a pen and a piece of paper and started to write down our business idea. It was as simple as that, and now that we look back on this life-changing moment, the idea of having our own pattern label seems so obvious that it’s almost weird that we hadn’t thought of it earlier. About a year later, in August 2013, we were ready to launch our business, our web shop, and our first pattern collection, “First Named.”

Since then, a second collection “All Things Nice” has been released, and the third one “Ritual” is on its way. As designers we value simple and easy-to-wear clothes. Our collections are clean-lined and simplistic, with interesting details and nice cut. We do follow trends, but we want to create collections that can be worn for as long as they last (and they should last long!), from season to season. We also support ethical and ecological clothing, and think that a self-made garment can be a serious opponent to fast fashion. We want to encourage everyone to sew and build a smart wardrobe that truly resembles their personal style. Altering a pattern is not at all forbidden. Vice versa! The most rewarding part of our job is seeing an item from our collection made by someone. Our customers, like so many people in the crafts movement, are extremely creative, positive and just never fail to amaze us!

Having our own indie pattern brand is really an ideal job for the both of us and we couldn’t imagine doing anything else. And honestly, we don’t think we’ve ever learned so much in such a short period of time! We still do most of the work by ourselves, which means that we handle a large variety of tasks from creative stuff like design, pattern making, sewing, graphic design and marketing, to basic every-day tasks like sales, customer service, shipping orders and what not!

We really hope that you enjoy our styles and patterns as much as we love making them. We are eager to constantly develop and improve our products and services, and we are definitely not bothered by customer feedback.

Thanks and all the best!

Saara & Laura