Home (all) Welcome to DENHAM the Jeanmaker´s website. Each card reveals a story which represents one facet of Denham´s vision. Categorised by the collection, garment library, studio & stores, to press reports & the birth of the Cutter´s Council. Designed in time with no beginning nor end, through resourceful innovation and fearless experimentation. It´s a decorated blog. A tailor-made homepage. We hope to fascinate but are equally prepared to frustrate.
The AW10 Sea Commission trench coat picks up where the SS10 Commission left off. When we say "Denham Design, Denim Integrity" we're partly saying that we believe in incremental design. Inspired by the steady step-by-step improvements made by early jean-tailors (who upgraded the cloth of their workpants to denim, then added rivets to the pockets, then increasing the pocket-count from two to five) our aim is to identify ways to improve our own designs each season.
In the case of our new trench coat we selected premium macintosh fabric from British Millerain. The British Millerain mill is famous for wax-stuffed fabrics but we contracted them to produce a traditional macintosh with a twist. Macintosh fabric is characterized by two layers of gaberdine flanking an inner layer of rubber. A rubber sandwich. For our new trench coat we had the two layers woven in contrasting colors producing an unlined waterproof coat that's black on the outside and khaki on the inside.
The most dramatic reengineering took place throughout the shoulder construction. Where a single gusset along each shoulder is a classic way to increase the arm mobility in military field coats and motorcycle jacket, it occurred to us we could double that mobility (gussets A and B above) by doubling the gussets. So a classic bi-swing action back would become an unconventional new tri-swing system.
The inspiration came from those jackets in the Denham Garment Library that feature bi-swing shoulders, but it also came from non-garment sources. -Like the curved sections of architectural conduit, the tail of a lobster or the entire back of an armadillo. We're calling it a tri-swing double-action back, but you could call it an armadillo construction.
Armadillo Construction
Besides devising the relationship between both right and left sets of double gussets, we went a step further and tethered each of the four to the central spine of the back panel. Each gusset is secured independently with a wide comfortable elastic strap so that the shoulders stretch easily when you reach forward and return as you relax your arms.
To increase the sleeve comfort even more and increase airflow we added full pit-vents but covered them with self fabric gutters (shown as C above).
Talon Zipper Secured Document Pockets Left Hand and Center Breast
