Toronto’s Literary Sport Refines the Athletic Look
The running brand debuted its spring 2026 collection at Paris Fashion Week.
Even at a quick glance, it’s easy to discern that Literary Sport is not your typical running brand. These are clothes made for movement but also designed for everyday wear.
There are Japanese cotton tanks, merino wool long-sleeve tops, and running tights made with a French-milled fabric—all in decidedly streamlined silhouettes and a mostly neutral palette. Both the running and lifestyle ranges offer sporty basics stylish enough to be worn with labels like Lemaire and The Row.
Founded by M. Bechara and Deirdre Matthews—who have backgrounds in manufacturing and wholesale distribution, respectively—Toronto-based Literary Sport debuted in September 2024.
Bechara, an avid runner, had studied literature and writing. The starting point for the label was as “a throughline between sport and literature,” says Jackie McKeown, who is design and co-creative director alongside Fran Miller. The pair was brought on by the founders early on to help launch the brand.
McKeown, who has styled and consulted for brands like Kotn, Roots, and Canada Goose, is an enthusiastic runner. For her, Literary Sport was an opportunity to marry working in the fashion industry with her passion for sports and running.
The question was “How do we approach the world of sport from a less performance-based agenda? How do we make it something that is not for the person who’s necessarily trying to be the best, the fastest?” McKeown says. “There’s a lot of people that are getting into running, and it’s not always about the end result.”
Instead, the goal was to make running clothes that feel good in movement but that are also connected to fashion “in a way that maybe wasn’t quite represented already and felt true to how we wanted to dress,” McKeown explains.
Designed in Toronto, the collection features premium fabrics sourced from mills around the world. “We are quite subtly technical in the fabrics that we source,” McKeown says. “We don’t really try to go too hard as a lot of brands do in terms of ‘this is the sleekest, the fastest, the thinnest,’ but the quality of what we’re working with is quite high.”
Most cottons and merino wools in the collection come from a mill in Japan, spandex fabrics from France, and some nylon and performance fabrics are sourced in Italy. “For us, it’s really important to build these relationships with these mills and to build a story over time where we are just season after season introducing new ones from people that we already trust,” McKeown says.
Literary Sport pieces are also cut and tailored to incorporate into contemporary wardrobes. “There are really nice darts and tailored details that I don’t really see in other sportswear,” says McKeown says. “That’s kind of the goal, is things that just fill a wardrobe in and out of activity.”
It’s an approach that has been resonating with shoppers and retailers. The brand will likely soon be available wholesale—the team has already presented the spring 2026 collection to buyers during the menswear portion of Paris Fashion Week earlier this summer, catching the attention of fashion and running enthusiasts alike.
