Starting with a 90-year-old Henley discovered at a Berlin flea market, fashion designers Gitta and Peter Plotnicki immediately recognized the quality of this impeccably preserved workwear shirt from 1911. Tracing the Henley’s provenance took the pair to Germany’s Swabian Alps, once a vibrant textile manufacturing center. This journey led them to uncover an abandoned factory with rows of towering, authentic loopwheelers dating from 1889 to the 1960s. This original Henley, produced by this collection of Albstadt machines, contributed to the revival of Merz b. Schwanen from 1911 to 2005. Remaining true to the century-old company heritage, the Good Originals collection was unveiled to wide acclaim, designed, loopwheeled, and guided by principles of simplicity, quality, and the celebration of authentic workers’ clothing from the 1920s to the 1940s, refined for modern times. With the growing popularity of industrial-era fashion, slow and low-volume manufacturing was put to the test. Made in Portugal, the Good Basics collection was launched to allow the brand’s creativity to evolve alongside new organic materials, colorways, and designs produced with uncompromising quality by highly skilled craftspeople. Underpinning everything they do is a heartfelt commitment to good, original design and sustainable and ethical production, resulting in reliable, everyday pieces.