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SM x Original Madras Trading Company

We don't do a lot of collaborations, but this one is special. Original Madras Trading Company is a third-generation family business that’s been handweaving since the 1970s on traditional hand looms in — where else? — Madras, India. That's the birthplace of traditional Madras cloth (pronounced mud-ROSS,) defined as a plainweave fabric made from 100% Indian cotton and woven by hand with a minimum of two colors... but usually more. We love it for its breeziness and its light weight, but most of all for the unique, not-totally-perfect character of the hand weave. The irregularity is exactly what makes it so cool. While it takes a single weaver 4–6 hours to do what a machine loom could knock out in under 10 minutes... we think the end result is worth...

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Polyester

We often hear a little trepidation in the shops around polyester, but let us set the record straight: not all synthetics are created equal. Fast-fashion polyester does not go through the same careful refinement process as the fibers used here — this charmeuse is woven in Italy and requires a finer micropoly yarn with an even smaller diameter than natural silk yarns. This gives the finished product a soft, graceful drape and a lustrous finish. And polyester has a few unique advantages: for starters, it’s machine-washable and super quick to dry. It has excellent color retention, so it takes dye beautifully and won’t fade with washing, wear, or sun exposure. It’s naturally resilient and abrasion-resistant (read: keeps its shape and...

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Escorial Wool

Escorial wool, a cut-above alternative to cashmere, comes from a super-rare type of sheep originally kept by Spanish royalty. Soft and supple, with springy coiled fibers that naturally resist wrinkling, Escorial is remarkable for its longevity —  in other words, it looks really great for a really long time. It’s currently produced by a single mill, and sourced from the only direct descendants of the original Escorial flock, which are now bred in small pockets of Australia and New Zealand. Talk about special.

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Tana Lawn® Liberty Fabric

Liberty Fabrics has been producing some of our favorite prints since 1875. Their signature Tana Lawn® quality is fine, cool, and especially soft. While it's woven from ultra-fine, long-staple Egyptian cotton, it almost behaves like silk, with a lightweight drape and beautiful color vibrancy. In their own words, it's “a fabric built by obsession, perfected into a modern masterpiece of production through a bespoke process that has evolved over a century.” Each print is hand-drawn or painted by their London-based design team, then applied to fabric at Liberty's own printing mill in Northern Italy.

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Piccadilly Liberty

Liberty Fabrics has been producing some of our favorite prints since 1875. The Piccadilly poplin quality is heavier and more opaque than their signature Tana Lawn® quality — though still quite soft — and especially suited to the kinds of pieces that benefit from more structure. Each print is hand-drawn or painted by their London-based design team, then applied to fabric at Liberty's own printing mill in Northern Italy.

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