Amsterdam is home to a lot of fashion brands, but it isn’t a fashion capital — or maybe it refuses to be one. It doesn’t have the designer legacy of Antwerp or Tokyo. It doesn’t have a prestigious fashion school like London or New York. And its fashion week isn’t Paris or Milan. If anything, Amsterdam is still more readily associated with weed, canals and rain than any particular brand or trend.
That outsider status is exactly what makes Amsterdam such an exciting fashion city. Without the pressure to play by the industry’s usual rules, there’s more room to think differently about what fashion could be. It gives the scene a punkish, DIY feel: you don’t need formal training, the right connections, or even a conventional brand to matter in fashion.
Few cities produce labels so unusually grounded in the everyday (and night) life of the people and communities around them. Rather than runways or trends, Dutch clothing brands look to subcultures like football, skateboarding, hip-hop and political activism, or just elderly folks on the street. Not because they’re cherry-picking references, but because they belong to these worlds themselves — and so do their clothes.
With Amsterdam Fashion Week kicking off this week, now’s the perfect time to take a closer look at what the city has to offer. Here’s a list of 12 Amsterdam brands we love and think you will too.