David Gandy’s Wellwear: ‘We’ve designed the one T-shirt you’ll ever want’
David Gandy, arguably the world's strongest male supermodel, and I are about to go for a bowl of pasta at Boca di Lupo, the wildly oversubscribed Italian restaurant subsequent door to his studio. However earlier than I'm allowed to tuck right into a plate of butter-clogged tagliatelle ai finferli, I’m to be given a run-through of his newest enterprise, David Gandy Wellwear.
A muted assemblage of ultra-easy-wearing jersey items designed with low-key dwelling in thoughts, there are stretchy T-shirts, which, Gandy claims, possess the “good” match (and are a snip at below £30 apiece), there are wide-legged trackpant-cum-cargo-style trousers in loopback cotton, and there's even a jersey dressing robe, resplendent in deep navy and piped in white. “Everybody loves this piece,” he tells me. “We simply thought, ‘Why not make a robe out of tracksuit jersey?’”
There's much less of amusing than I hoped once I counsel that it appears to be like like the best garment by which to slob round the home once you really feel a bit below the climate, however that's in all probability as a result of, with this new 20-piece assortment, Gandy is squaring his goal straight on the burgeoning wellness market, providing style-savvy health fanatics simple items to put on to, from and on the health club, a spot the place, one can readily assume, Gandy spends a lot of his time.
This isn't Gandy's first time on the jersey rodeo, after all. In late 2014 the mannequin and entrepreneur, who has featured in world campaigns for the likes of Dolce & Gabbana and Hugo Boss, launched a loungewear assortment with excessive road megalith Marks & Spencer, which shortly grew to become the third hottest like in its class, and will need to have offered fairly the rag commerce studying curve.
“I by no means wished to try this factor the place I used my identify to begin a model. I wished to begin on the backside and be taught concerning the trade and that got here from working with M&S,” Gandy explains, levelling his steel-blue, barely vulpine eyes in my route. “I discovered all the pieces from the factories to the design course of to the advertising. I did that for 5 years as a way to be taught the method. Creatively I’ve at all times been fairly concerned and I simply put that package deal of studying collectively and thought it was a good time to launch.”
Certainly Gandy, who previous to the pandemic spent a lot of his time jetting between the world's vogue capitals selling different individuals's merchandise, noticed the lockdown as a chief alternative to begin his personal enterprise. A banana bread baking enterprise, nonetheless, it was to not be.
“The pandemic gave us the time,” says Gandy, who’s sporting a gray tweed baker boy hat regardless of the late summer season warmth. “It was one of many constructive issues that got here out of the entire thing. My good friend Charlie, who owns his personal branding company, mentioned, ‘I feel it’s type of now or by no means, David. You’ll get again into not having time, however you’ve got this timeframe now, so let’s get it collectively.’ And that’s what we did. That's when it began.”
Gandy, who has lengthy been a supporter of London's ever-burgeoning menswear trade, isn’t one to comply with developments. Certainly, with one flick by his Instagram feed you'll see that his private type takes give attention to expertly tailor-made items that may be worn again and again, yr in yr out.
“I’m by no means that stylish,” he agrees. “I’ve by no means received the newest issues off the runway. I purchase items and I preserve them and I take care of them. That’s what we’re attempting to do with Wellwear. The perfect objects which you could purchase for that amount of cash, which you’ll preserve for years.” He pauses, pre-empting my subsequent query, because the metal blues swerve again in my route. “The sustainability component comes from individuals retaining these objects for years.” Certainly, every bit within the assortment, I’m advised, comes imbued with anti-odour and antibacterial remedies, lowering the necessity to wash garments after each put on and rising the longevity of the garment.
In relation to selecting the strongest items within the assortment, which is crafted from materials together with pima cotton, lyocell and modal, Gandy appears to seek out the duty a contact traumatic. “Selecting my favorite piece is like selecting a favorite little one!” He laughs. “The ecru heritage pant I really like. The shawl-collar sweater. Everybody at all times asks about my scoop-neck T-shirts." He pauses. “American Attire used to do one of the best after which they stopped. It took ages to get that neckline proper, time and again. Even on the shoot day I used to be sporting it and mentioned to the group, ‘, that is nonetheless a centimetre too excessive.’ They got here and measured it and so they had been like, ‘Spot on.’ And I used to be like, ‘Knew it. Get again to the manufacturing unit!’”
With regards to how creatively concerned he’s, Gandy is effusive. “Everybody in our small group has a say. It’s all very open-ended,” he explains. “Everybody’s received their experience, however on the finish of the day, all of it comes again to me to make the ultimate determination on all the pieces.” I can solely hope that he doesn’t really feel the identical about ordering pasta for hungry journalists.
David Gandy Wellwear is out from October at davidgandywellwear.com
Now learn
Every part that you must learn about London Vogue Week September 2021
Again to high school? Saul Nash has designed the best uniform going
The perfect-dressed stars on the 2021 Emmy Awards
