Meet Fleet London: Premium Sustainable Basics
Meet Richard, the founder of Fleet London. Fleet London is a menswear brand based near the path of the buried Fleet River, which flows into the Thames at Blackfriars. Fleet is focused on lightweight cotton shirts and slimline boxer shorts for men. Sustainably and responsibly made, these basics will be a great addition to your everyday wardrobe.
Fleet London came into being when the Founder Richard, for many years a finance guy, couldn’t source sensibly priced casual shirts made from quality lighter cotton and with pockets. Fleet is a synonym for quick, and the company is based in Soho W1, close to the now almost completely built over Fleet river, which flows from the ponds of Hampstead and Highgate under Fleet St and into the Thames at Blackfriars.
They have adopted the noble atlantic salmon for their logo, a fish that has started to re-appear in the Thames in the last few years for the first time since the 1830s, a clear signifier of the cleaning and rebirth of London’s river system. Read on to get a look behind the brand.
What's something that makes your brand unique?
We like to think that both our shirt and boxer short ranges have an element of uniqueness to them. Our boxer shorts, although cut in the traditional way, offer a much slimmer fit that many boxers on the market today, which seem to have become quite loose-fitting. Our shirts are a crossover between the formal and the more casual. While they have the relaxed elements of a button collar and a breast pocket, they are made of the finest, lightweight cotton poplin, as you would expect from a more traditional office shirt. The Fleet shirt is a combination of the two.
What is your bestselling style?
Our bestselling shirt is the Salmon Pink style from our first range of cotton shirts in pastel hues. The favourite boxer is the Deep Red, a bolder tone which we launched last summer.
For the office or for leisure, this shirt is everything that you're looking for in a shirt - practical, lightweight and reasonably priced. Perfect when worn with a tailored suit for a professional look or swim shorts for a light lunch at a beachside restaurant.
What are the ethical values your brand stands for?
Ethical standards are very important to Fleet. All of our raw cotton, which is grown in India, is BCI and Oeko-Tex compliant. These two standards regulate the fair treatment of labour, the minimisation of the use of fertilisers and chemicals, and the sustainable treatment of water in the manufacturing process. All of our products are made in Portugal, so the factories are regulated by EU standards for labour and materials. Fleet’s packaging is plastic-free, with much of the packaging itself not only recyclable but also made from recycled fibres.
What's one thing you're looking forward to in 2021?
As a fairly new brand, we had only begun to show our products in stores and marketplaces when the first Covid-19 lockdown happened. We’re really looking forward to a return of some kind of normality as soon as possible (vaccines-permitting), so that our customers can see our products and try them on in person.
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