We didn’t know if it would work, or if anyone would care. Athens and Greece in general was in the middle of a financial and societal crisis. A new upcycling brand appeared that was the last of what was needed. All we knew was that there was an immense amount of balcony awning fabrics being thrown away, and that felt wrong. We wanted to do something creative, locally focused and disruptive.
11 years later we’re still here. A lot of things have changed, we now work with ferry life raft fabrics, and we’re still learning. But we’ve already learned a lot.
Recycling breaks materials down, shreds them to tiny pieces and recasts them. Upcycling doesn’t, you have to work with what you have.
Life rafts for example are tough. They need disassembly, there are ropes, ladders, zips, equipment, anchors, and so many other stuff. They fight back. The fabrics themselves are diverse, full of glue and already assembled into a raft. They don’t want to become a bag. But we’ve learned to work with them slowly.
We never had a big marketing budget and to be honest we still don’t. What we have is a good product that lasts and organic reach. People notice that and word of mouth has been our best advertising.
We’ve always been honest about what we do. We don’t claim to save the world, we’re addressing an important local waste problem creatively. We just try to do our small part and the community and customers appreciate that.
We’ve been doing this for eleven years already. We’ve worked with balcony awnings, event banners and ferry life rafts. We developed special projects and collaborations. But we’re not finished. There’s always more to learn, better ways to work and better ways to source.
We’re a small brand. We started as a tiny shop, that became double and now we have a larger production site on top. Everything is in Athens with a handful of people doing their best. But every bag we make is one less life raft in a landfill and that matters.
You care about quality, honesty, and about where things come from. You don’t want cheap things that fall apart. You want good things, made by hand, that have a purpose and a story and above all, things that last.
We can do this. We can make a living doing something that matters. It’s not always easy, but it’s always worth it. Plus, there’s a whole world out there, looking for a creative and sustainable future.
We don’t know exactly what the future holds. But we know one thing: we’ll keep doing what we’ve always done. Rescuing urban synthetic textile waste; it was awnings and now life rafts. We’ll keep making beautiful bags and always repairing them when they break. And we’ll keep trying new things.
That’s our story. And we’re looking forward to the future.
