Almost a year after we first met its founder John, we are proud to share our collaboration with Amsterdam-based garment brand de dam foundation, for which we also invited our friend, and earlier collaborator, Lennard Kok. In the project, we examined the Dutch invention of the polder and translated it into garments, drawings and film. The most visible results are a trench coat and a cap. Both quiet. Both exact. Both built to stand in the wind without complaint.

John’s work is rooted in Dutch cultural heritage. It informs his references and his designs, which carry that influence into the third millennium and into a slowly evolving wardrobe. Understated, made to the highest standards, often produced in his country of birth South Korea, always shaped by a recognisable oversized unisex aesthetic. We wanted to add a perspective on "our own" The Netherlands that differed from his, both critical and curious, forcing ourselves to rediscover something in a country we thought we knew. It did not take long. We found what we were looking for in the artificial hydrological entity that were invented in The Netherlands: the polder. Land pulled from the water and kept alive by machines and patience. A space where survival and design share the same ground. [ Continue reading ]

As Joachim has shared a studio with friend, illustrator and artist Lennard Kok in Utrecht for a few years, we’ve been able to observe his working process up close. Lennard is a person of quiet concentration, making small decisions that accumulate into his signature style, along with his recurring experiments whenever he’s not occupied with larger assignments. We’ve known him for years, even before sharing a studio, and our first collaboration, “Fallen Bird,” dates back to 2017, when we turned one of his drawings into a porcelain sculpture. Since then, he has moved at his own pace. Never stepping into the limelight, just steady, careful steps that have carried his work into the world. [ Continue reading ]