PASTDOWN ID: A STORY OF REFERENCE AND REFLECTION
In the last five years, the founders of online store PASTDOWN, have come a long way. On face value, PASTDOWN is a catalogue of designer and sportswear products. From well known brands to regional gems, the pair serve a nostalgic generation that, just like the founders themselves, “are looking to own things they couldn’t get when they were younger”. As we converse in the PASTDOWN stockroom, it’s clear the brand is an ode to everything that the boys love, giving them an excuse to spend time researching and sharing their ever-evolving yet ever-present love for fashion.
The co-founders, who prefer to remain anonymous, met in London in 2017 and “instantly, started talking about clothing”. Inspired by the likes of Wavey Garms, a Facebook group for buying and selling the kind of clothes the boys were into, and Dukes Cupboard, their favourite shop growing up, they were both separately selling clothes, just as a means to “pay to go to festivals, raves and stuff.”
Eventually, after realising the synergy they shared, they became business partners, and realised they might be able to run the store as their full time jobs. They decided to go all in on PASTDOWN, and used their student loans as an investment fund – the future no longer meant going into “normal jobs”. It meant paying for a studio that they “couldn’t really afford”, hitting car boot sales and buying from people from all walks of life, which has in turn impacted the types of brands they sell - as their purchases became a reflection of London’s fashion attitudes over the years.
As both of the founders have matured and changed their ambitions, so too has their personal taste. “Honestly, the stuff we sell is just the stuff we like,” one of the founders tells us.”We don’t try to sell what’s popping to make money. We came from wearing and selling big Evisu jeans, Ed Hardy, Moschino, really loud stuff. Sportswear allows us to still express ourselves, but in a more subtle way.” No surprise then that as I look around the PASTDOWN stockroom, there’s a an unmissable hint of red dotted around – the distinct tab of the Prada Sports line, a firm favourite of the boys: “We collect and sell a lot of Prada, we just love the details, the branding”.
Armed with an obsession of the technical details that sets certain brands apart, part of the role the pair have adopted is as advisors: their word certainly holds weight. So when they first came across the Japanese outdoor wear brand Montbell, and the puffer jackets the brand sells, the founders knew it was not something they could keep to themselves. Based on their observation, in Japan these are jackets that “aren’t popular, something your grandad would wear”. But the pair couldn’t ignore how well built they were, so they purchased a range of them, created a campaign around them, dropped them onto the store, and before they knew it, were overwhelmed with orders from all over Europe.
That same belief in their taste that led them to make the Montbell puffer a large part of their identity is the mindset fuelling the next stage of their growth, PASTDOWN INTEGRATED DESIGN, that sees the duo bring a product of their own to the market. “I mean, in the last few years, tens of thousands of items have passed through this spot,” says one of the founders as they look proudly around at the studio. “We talk about stuff all the time, like ‘ah yeah that toggle was sick, that zip placement on that jacket is nuts’ or whatever. We started selling some of the best Nike bottoms, but there aren’t many out there. So it’s almost out of necessity that we’ve created the perfect pair of tracksuit bottoms. For ourselves firstly, we just wanted to always be repping the perfect tracksuit.” And a year and a half later after initial discussions, the first drop from PASTDOWN INTEGRATED DESIGN is ready – an amalgamation of “referencing everything we like, putting it into one product.”
As well as taking inspiration from old Nike TN jackets, toggles from old Prada jackets and even a label made referencing the shiny Dior labels, there’s an injection of PASTDOWN that makes this feel like an extension of the boys, their interests and their values. “The ID in PASTDOWN ID has a double meaning. As well as standing for integrated design – integrating design knowledge into our products – it is also a comment on identity. As well as our brand being about a common identity that connects our community, it’s also about being immersed in London as an individual in this big city, so a lot of our visuals have gone towards being elusive and unfindable.” In true PASTDOWN fashion and shining a light on the creatives they not only work with, but consider friends, we see UK-based musician Sainté and Japan-based archivist, DJ and stylist Ozzy wear the collection for our shoot with the team, and it’s amazing to hear the excitement from those who get a first look at what has been a main priority on the PASTDOWN agenda. “We really took inspiration from the attitudes and aesthetics of loads of scenes we love, ones that resonate with our own experiences,” says one of the founders.
Favouring secrecy as they created the collection, the pair set to work on their first release in private, in an attempt to avoid any pressures to release in any timeframe and only on their own terms. “Even the boys we share the studio with had no clue until about six months ago what we were doing, but conversations we’ve had with them, and even with our housemates who couldn’t care less about clothes, have brought us to this point.”
Now this project is complete, and with the collection due to release on 10 September, the duo assure me it’s just the beginning stage in the “endless pursuit of perfection”. They’re in no rush however, but after the perfect tracksuit, must come a perfect everything else, right?
