This Amsterdam-Raised Denim Brand Redefines ‘Heritage’: Olaf Hussein

Amsterdam is not only a place you visit for coffee shops, canal tours, and Anne Frank.

The city offers a flourishing variety of shopping venues for great denim. Amsterdam is also the home of several prominent brands within the denim business. One that aspires to become such is Olaf Hussein; a denim label raised in Amsterdam.

Showcasing their capsule collection and a redesigned website at the shop FOUR, Denimhunters’ Michael van Hal was on the spot.

Okay, so what’s the hassle?

Well, Olaf Hussein is a young and passionate Amsterdam-based designer with a strong orientation towards denim and a clear goal: to combine classic styles with contemporary silhouettes using top quality denim.

Subtle luxury and understated items set the tone for the brand.

‘Clean’ and ‘simple’ are key elements of the brand; design, quality, and fit are closely connected. With this clear concept in mind, the aim of the young designer is to convey the classic look with a modern attitude.

So where are all the flannels, beanies and beards?

Forget about that.

Olaf Hussein is not a ‘heritage’ brand. But the brand has something in common with all the heritage brands – something that separates Olaf Hussein from similar brands that gravitate towards fashion: his focus on quality over quantity.

Still, listening to Olaf Hussein explaining how he works makes you realise that he highly aware of the denim heritage.

And the brand offers a great variety of colours, materials, and fits that would suit most of us when taking a break from the lumberjack costume.

His latest capsule collection for 2013/2014 consists of 4 different denim fits and colours :

• “THE RAW DENIM” – Olaf Hussein’s signature denim
• “THE HEAVY WEIGHT SELVEDGE” – a modern 5-pocket denim
• “THE BLACK SELVEDGE” – an 11oz. black denim
• “THE GREY SELVEDGE” – a great grey-coloured denim

It’s all in the details. And Olaf Hussein clearly pays attention to the details when it comes to choosing components and fabrics.

All of the fabrics are sourced from the Kuroki Denim Mill in Okayama, Japan. The deep, indigo colour is achieved by rope dying with natural indigo, where the yarns are dipped up to 8 times, giving the deep denim tones Olaf Hussein is looking for.

Three different kinds of rivets are used to match the colour of the denim. In the end, they will to the job of keeping the points of strain together.

Throughout the jean, varying thread thicknesses and colours give a nod to the way jeans used to be constructed.

The zipper old-school is made with a 100% cotton tape that will fade along with the denim. As an added bonus, the zipper tape has a selvedge running down both sides.

The green vegetable tanned leather patch is handmade by Guild of Holland. The details are hand stitched and the logo is hand embossed.

The Italian hand brushed gold button is specially made for Olaf Hussein. The designer spend quite an amount of time searching for a button that would match the selvedge zipper.

Unfortunately, the collection is not available online at the moment. It is however on display in several shops throughout Europe including EEN, FOUR, and Tenue de Nîmes in Amsterdam, COÏNCIDENCE in Paris, and 14oz in Berlin.

For more info about the brand check out the new website.

Photography : Michael van Hal