Aries produces 90% of its products in Italy; a country with a long and rich manufacturing history. Within the process of making, there are layers of understanding a design and elevating it; this is an ability that only comes with experience, skill and an ability to problem solve that is learned over years, or handed down through generations.
It be easy to doodle on the back of a napkin and send it off into the ether to be printed in some mythical factory you’ve never seen, half way around the world. But rather than do that, we take a more invested approach.
Most of the manufacturers we work with have been working with us for so long that there’s basically a personal relationship between each garment sold and the person who made it; everything has a special quality to it. From the raw material it’s been made from that has been lovingly grown, to the person who presses it before it gets sent off, it’s all done with care and quality.
So hopefully our clothes have a life past sitting on the shop floor, we want them to be worn for twenty years into the future and more. They’re designed to last, age and to look good when worn over and over again, to live beyond a season and a hanger in a shop.
We’ve grown with our factories, and as we grow we continue to support each other, as our quantities grow we won't move on looking for cheaper options. They push our boundaries by helping us elevate our products through the skills they have – skills that might otherwise be lost. We use factories who invest in old machines to keep them alive, and in their local communities. It’s a codependent relationship filled with beautifully made solutions.
Let’s bring nature back in here, and remind ourselves that everything we make takes from nature in a way. We make garments to order, in smaller quantities, from raw materials that are the best that can be sourced, in a factory where people feel a responsibility and a connection to the item that they are making, which means that not only is the outcome the best possible product, but it’s less wasteful, less harmful.
Do you remember the horse meat scandal? You can draw something and send it off and it gets made but the reality is you don’t know the real cost of that product. Who’s made it, what it’s made of. That’s how you get horse meat in your lasagne.
We have a duty to support manufacturing, even if it comes with less fast gains, we have a duty to know that people aren’t being exploited and how things are being made and dyed. There’s a certain pride in Italy in manufacturing processes. Working with the right factory makes you push boundaries, it makes you a better designer. You break new ground. Aries doesn’t make lasagne laden with horse meat. It’s redesigning the finest salami.
