Meet Bare, the Canadian Knitwear Brand Redefining Luxury on Slow Craft
Well thread.
As teens in North Vancouver, Kelsey Adair and her friends would crochet hats and trade them before going snowboarding on Grouse Mountain. “I loved all of the nuances of the craft,” she says. “The beauty of the process, everything you could do with the finishings—that was all really interesting to me.”
The after-school hobby eventually inspired Adair’s homegrown label, Bare Knitwear. She started the brand in 2014, focusing on handmade pieces woven from natural fibres like alpaca wool, merino wool, and pima cotton. “Our brand ethos is about removing the excess from our lives and focusing on high-quality essentials. For knitwear, that manifests in our considered, over constant, approach.” That philosophy is reflected in her choice to produce annual collections, handmade by artisans in Ayacucho, Peru, since the brand began. “Looking back, I knew in my gut that this was the way forward,” she says, recalling her first trip to show them her samples. “I could see the impact that we could make” on the local job market.
While her work remains connected to Peru, Adair is also building her own community of entrepreneurs and retailers who share her passion. Bare Knitwear pieces are “objects that inspire a slower, more thoughtful way of life.”
Photos by Britney Gill.
