It’s a question that we get asked a lot and given the regular negative headlines shaming fashion brands for working with sweatshop factories, it’s not all that surprising that people are curious and care about who and where their clothes are made; from left to right in the first photos, Vicky, Siobhan our daughter, Samuel our son and Alex.
As you may already know, Vicky and I took over the Grenouille label from her parents (Cindy and Greg) in 2021, following their decision to retire after 25 years at the helm; you can read more about our back story on the ‘about us’ page. Prior to starting Salamander Shirts in 2019, both Vicky and I spent nearly a decade working with Grenouille and even after starting our own brand, we continued to work with the same fabulous factories as before.
(A photo from one of the last business trips I undertook with both Cindy and Greg to Bangkok; from left to right: Siriporn, Alex, Cindy, Greg and Yui)
In the early days of Grenouille, as with many small fashion brands, its priority was finding factories and mills willing to produce their own designs and in quantities and a price that were desirable. This wasn’t an easy task then and it’s definitely not gotten any easier since. Although the brand has worked with a number of factories and mills for garments over the years, today it works with one factory for manufacturing and handful of fabric mills.
One of the biggest benefits of this is that we can really say “we know who makes our clothing!” The factory we work with is based in a south western district of Bangkok, Thailand and owned by a family friend, Siriporn Chatarsa. We’ve had the pleasure of working with Siriporn’s factory for nearly 15 years now and it’s testament to her as an owner, that so many of the staff that we met on our first visit, are still there today.
(Siriporn and her grand-daughter at the factory during my visit July 2022)
(from front to back in the photo, Yui, Nickki (our good friend and agent in Bangkok) and Alex)
Overseeing the day-to-day running of the factory is down to Yui, the factory manager. Yui is an incredibly talented designer and seamstress, even running her own factory for a while and her knowledge and skill has proved invaluable on many occasions whilst developing new products .
The factory is run across 4 floors, with the production process starting on the top floor, before making its way down through the building. Of all the production processes, I think the cutting of the fabric is my favourite thing to watch, but you’ll have to wait until the next part to meet the team and read about it.
