1. RigRaiser
The brand was founded by Anna Lekontseva, a graduate of the Skolkovo Startup Academy, in 2019. It combines fashion, contemporary art and environmental friendliness. She buys clothes from second-hand stores and transforms them into works of art. Each of the brand’s items is a collaboration with contemporary artists.
At first, Anna found artists with the help of the Gallery of Contemporary Art, but now they come to her themselves to become part of her project.
“We release items under the RigRaiser brand, but the artist’s name is listed on all the labels. We tell everyone who exactly made these clothes. Each of our items, like a painting, has a concept, a message, a history,” Anna explains. This background info is accessible via a QR code tagged on each item.
2. Dog Rose
Moscow-based brand Dog Rose creates new items by hand from scraps of other clothes. Its signature technique is derived from the fashion for layered clothing: the brand’s items are made up of assorted sweaters, shirts, T-shirts and sweatshirts sewn together.
On the brand’s Instagram account, users can choose a ready-made sweatshirt or hoodie, or they can bring their own old clothes to give them a new life.
The brand’s products are executed in the best traditions of early Vetements, but at prices under 6,000 rubles ($80).
3. 2.0
This Yekaterinburg-based team of eco-friendly designers dubbed ‘2.0’ creates unique items riffing off post-apocalyptic themes.
They presented their first collection in the former mining village of Karabash in Chelyabinsk Region. Despite its location in the middle of the Ural Mountains and the magnificent taiga forest, the village is one of the most polluted places on the planet.
Based in an environmentally troubled region, the team behind the brand focused on recycling and design. Their experiments with paints and colors resulted in cutting-edge streetwear referencing the global fashion industry.
4. SOEURS
The Nizhny Novgorod-based project SOEURS makes shirts, dresses and skirts from vintage textiles. The driving force behind it, designer Irina Shubintseva, creates her items not only from cuts of old fabrics, but also from curtains, bedspreads, tablecloths, furniture upholstery and even mattress sheathing.
Among her designs is, for example, a shirt made of fabric that was produced for the 1980 Olympics or a scarf made out of a Scottish flag.
She finds her materials at flea markets or buys them from people who still store their grandparents’ and great-grandparents’ things in their closets. And she doesn't mind if her vintage fabrics have stains or worn-off patches: “It is part of the life and history of the fabric,” she says.
5. Stenosis
This is another brand built around contemporary art. Stenosis was founded in 2017 by friends from Kirov. They decided to consider each item of clothing not as a material object, but as an exhibit, except that it would be “exhibited” on people who wore it.
All of the brand’s items are one of a kind - from jeans made out of different pieces of denim to a hoodie with a shirt sleeve to cyberpunk jackets.
6. Forgetmenot.archive
This brand offers hats made of shirts, bags made of climbing carabiners and an impressive collection of knitted balaclavas.
However, the main distinctive feature of Forgetmenot.archive is presentation - from the brand’s advertising campaign and philosophy to delivery. Have you ever received a package from a clothing store in a fruit crate or an egg box?
7. Masstak
This is a bold brand that is not afraid of experimenting with materials. A bottle opener baseball cap, a skirt made of soccer scarves or laser-etched Calvin Klein jeans - Masstak creates items at a cross between art and street fashion and is not afraid of playing with the logos of the global fashion giants. Take, for example, its jeans with a piece of a Louis Vuitton scarf and patch.