Tender Co. Denim

[chicote]

Update on my 132s, they have been washed four times now i believe and worn close to four months. Got bitten by a german shepherd a couple days ago, fortunately not hurt badly but the dog did tear a good hole in the left thigh. You can see how little the indigo has faded compared to the fresh hem scrap i patched it with. In the mountains of Veracruz, super beautiful and not too hot this time of year!

 

Riding south this morning:

[rodeo bill]

Stunning photos! and jeans are looking beautiful. I got bitten by a big dog once (not sure what kind), hurt like hell and drew blood but just kind of mangled the fabric, didn't make as nice of a tear as yours. I hope you've recovered well.

 

It's been a long time since some in depth factory photos, here's some from a woollen spinning factory, in preparation for the yarn that went into AW24 Tacuinum Pullovers and Cardigans, and Paper Boat hats. These photos are of "woollen" spinning, as opposed to "worsted" spinning. Worsted spinning is a more refined process where the fibres are made to lie more smoothly, and is typically used for worsted suit fabrics, where as woollen spinning (two Ls!) gives a fluffier yarn more normally used for knitwear or coarser tweed woven fabrics. For these Shetland-type yarns a slightly uneven colour is preferable, so a blend of different coloured fibres are used. The wool fibre is dyed under pressure, which could also damage finished yarn, so it's better to do the dyeing right at the beginning. The yarn designer has a library of colours:

what was going through during my visit was a greenish tweed yarn with flecks of other colours. Even though the yarn will end up looking pretty classic, seeing the fibre mix is an eyeopener:

The yarn is all mixed together in a big barrow, so that the colours are randomly dispersed. They're then fed up into the long carding process:

the wool fluff is pulled through a succession of spiked rollers, in a stream, and as they go through the fibres start to lay inline with each other:

until eventually the stream of fibre has enough body to be pulled off the carding rollers into a sort of loose scarf called a sliver:

here's a closeup:

the sliver gets pulled around a corner and flattened out again, which continues to straighten the fibres through another length of the room, until it's ready to be separated, like this:

the stream of fibres is run through slightly tacky, static-charged rubber belts, which pull between sharply defined metal grooves, cutting the stream into ~1" wide sections. In the picture above, my guide has pulled out on of these sections- you can see that it's only barely holding together.

however:

Spinning itself will happen later. For now the narrow slivers are gently wound up onto cones, so that they can be put into the spinning process.

Here are a couple more pictures- at this stage what looks like yarn is still just sliver under very slight tension. The brown rollers are also slightly tacky, which helps everything move through, but these run quite slow and at very carefully controlled tension to avoid snapping.

At this point we'll switch over to a blend of natural undyed British wool, which is actually much closer to what I ended up using, but is less dramatic in the blending:

these wrapped slivers are moved over into the spinning room, where they are set up over vertical spinning cones, to put twist into the slivers, under a higher tension, and create usable yarn:

this is ringspun yarn, and that little loop in the wire over the pink cone top is the ring which the yarn is spun through, bouncing it around and giving it surface character.

Now I'd originally enquired about spinning a blended natural grey with a blended blue- these yarns with this result:

But while it's a beautiful thing it seemed a bit anticlimactic and subdued, so in the end I made a 2-ply yarn combined of a pure bright colour and a pure natural colour. Here are the results:

 

[willi]

Really interesting, thanks for sharing. Is the red color the same as you're wearing in the seasonal lookbook? What is the length and chest measurement on these?

[rodeo bill]

14 minutes ago, willi said:

Really interesting, thanks for sharing. Is the red color the same as you're wearing in the seasonal lookbook? What is the length and chest measurement on these?

Thank you! Yes indeed this is Levant Red in the foreground (bright red Shetland and a natural white yarn), and the background is Agate Blue (dark blue and natural black yarn):

For reference size 3 chest is 21" not including the gussets, and the full length is 27". Please just email me if you'd like full measurements.

[rodeo bill]

A couple of lovely outfits from an old friend of the brand, with an octave mandolin, in his 916 1-1/2 breasted Common Coat in Khaki dyed Herdwick Check Casement and 122 hadal brown Pleat Back Trousers in corresponding Herdwick Stripe Casement. Then below with a Weaver's Stock shirt home-dyed green and an 886 Stock in Barge Blue Flannel. I love how the herdwick yarn pulls the cotton casement in after dyeing, giving a quilted effect.

[julian-wolf]

A question for the Tender Co. historians: Was there ever a Type 781 Tube Neck Pullover? I have something that I’d thought was this, but after wearing it yesterday for the first time in a while I tried looking it up to get some more info and wasn’t able to find any reference to it ever existing…

[rodeo bill]

Yes! It's a lovely one, Deborah has one too. Here's the original linebook entry:

 

 

Type 781 Tube Neck Pullover

The Tube Neck Pullover has a deep, wide, plain knit tube neck which can be rolled down or worn loose around the neck and face.There is a large single hand-warmer pocket across the front, and the cuffs, neck, and hem are finished clean with no rib or change of tension.

-Made in Scotland
-Fully fashioned, hand framed, and hand finished
-Plain stitch
-The pictured sample is in black cold felted lambswool

 

[julian-wolf]

Yes! Reading that now, I do remember the blurb about the cold felted lambs’ wool from when these came out. Thanks so much for digging that up!

Anyway, here are some action shots for the archive:

[julian-wolf]

Photo dumps incoming!

First, sweaters. Shown are the Type 799 Mirror pPanel Double Pullover, in blackberry stitch lambswool; the Type 781 Tube Neck Pullover, in cold felted lambswool; the Type 751 Wide Rib Barnacle Neck Pullover, in Shetland wool blind fair isle knit wool. The Mirror Panel Pullover, in particular, is a long time favorite. (Not shown are both the cardigan and the turtleneck version of the Pop Punch Rap Promoter sweater, the latter of which was a gift from my partner.)

[julian-wolf]

Next, shirts. Before I tried anything else from Tender Co., I was a big fan of their wool & mohair socks. I thought that the rest of the clothes were a little too out there for me (go figure). At some point in maybe 2017 or 2018, I was in Standard & Strange and they asked if I wanted to try out one of the shirts. It wasn’t for sale—I think they’d stopped even stocking Tender Co., by that point, besides maybe belts and socks—but I guess another regular had dropped it off as a pay-it-forward sort of deal, just in hopes that it would find a happy home. It was some or other version of (I think) the Type 423 Wallaby shirt, and at that point in grad school I wasn’t going to say no to a free fancy shirt. I started trying to work it into my style, and before too long a switch flipped and I “got it”. I’m still really thankful to whomever dropped the shirt at S&S, and to the staff who was working that day and saw fit to pass it on to me (sadly, I’ve long forgotten who that would’ve been). Through them, a long-term appreciation & obsession were born.

The shirt in question was eventually joined by 2x Type 492 Bench Shirts, in indigo chambray tote cloth + in henna handkerchief check; the Type 452 Bridge Pocket Square Tail Shirt, in Hadal green Herdwick stripe casement; the Type 445 Short Sleeved Boomerang Shirt, in Prussian blue carding cloth. (Not shown is a Type 420 Long Sleeve Tail Shirt, in walnut cotton tote, which I almost like quite a bit, but rarely end up wearing in practice, I think because of the bright red buttons. I’ve also sadly had to pass a couple others on due to inconsistent sizing.)

[julian-wolf]

I haven’t taken photos of pants, because I’m currently wearing 1/2 of them. I also haven’t taken photos of tees (2x), a whole big slew of socks, nor a variety of smaller things (shades, watch, mugs, gloves, kerchief, ???).

With those exceptions out of the way, finally: jackets & coats. Shown first are the Type 961 Baste Pocket Jacket, in red ochre cotton velvet; the Type WS922 Welsh Flannel Curve Front Jacket (Thanks Austin!); the Type 425 Double Cuff Flat Jacket, in some sort of very soft (felted?) wool. Last but not least are the Tenth Anniversary Edition Type 900 and the standard Type 902.

[ATWM]

@julian-wolf love it.
We have a few overlaps (or close) - in particular the 799 double panel pullover and the type 751 short turtleneck - although you definitely out do me!
I’m not a button down shirts guy but maybe I’ll take stock of my jackets, pullovers and jeans soon. 

[willi]

Great collection @julian-wolf, thanks for sharing. Tender's knitwear is my favorite but I've been slowly integrating in a few shirts as well.

[exaptavist]

Great posts Julian.

For Bill, re a new project, penknives - this wouldn't happen to be an Ashley Harrison (of A Wright & son) custom would it? 
The Bureau have them in, and it's rather keenly priced to be either a Steven Cocker or Stuart Mitchell.  

Edited December 3, 2024 by exaptavist

[winteracr]

Late to the Tender party - learned about this brand a few weeks ago. Got a pair of saddened wattle dyed 136 jeans from neighbour. Bill was super responsive to some of my questions on ig 😌 Rare to see this level of customer engagement.

Some wears and washes later, the color’s setting in really nicely and the lovely marbling is starting to show. 

Edited December 7, 2024 by winteracr

[clawbytes]

A few days ago as I was getting rid of my bed, I squatted down and heard my jeans gave out. I took it as a sign of the ending of the year, a chapter in my life and to lay off second breakfasts for a while...

[chicote]

Quick update on my 132D, which are still pretty filthy after their first machine wash in a few months … it’s interesting how different the colour is coming out compared to my previous Tender jeans, all of which were washed biweekly at least throughout their life cycle. These have probably five months of wear now.

[rodeo bill]

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, things are very busy personally and with Tender- it feels like forever, but we've still only been in the US five months!

Thank you so much @julian-wolf @chicote and @clawbytes for fantastic photos.

More things coming, but in case it's of interest to anyone, I'm doing a project with students at University of Wisconsin-Madison, and will be doing a public talk on Tuesday Feb 4th at 3.30 Central Time. It'll be livestreamed and there's a signup here: 

https://cdmc.wisc.edu/event/understandable-design-and-perfect-imperfections-with-william-kroll-of-tender-co/

I'm putting together a bunch of Tender garments and my own things, which I'll show and discuss. Hopefully it'll be interesting!

Edited January 24 by rodeo bill

[oomslokop]

at one of the oldest chinese restos in jaktown for our 16th anni dindin in my khaki wallaby shirt

Edited February 1 by oomslokop

[rodeo bill]

Congratulations Ooms! Shirt looks lovely, I hope you had a good meal. Great PopSwatch too.

Here's a lovely photo from a great customer and friend of the brand. Pocket use par excellence

[jeash90]

On 1/24/2025 at 2:32 PM, rodeo bill said:

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, things are very busy personally and with Tender- it feels like forever, but we've still only been in the US five months!

Thank you so much @julian-wolf @chicote and @clawbytes for fantastic photos.

More things coming, but in case it's of interest to anyone, I'm doing a project with students at University of Wisconsin-Madison, and will be doing a public talk on Tuesday Feb 4th at 3.30 Central Time. It'll be livestreamed and there's a signup here: 

https://cdmc.wisc.edu/event/understandable-design-and-perfect-imperfections-with-william-kroll-of-tender-co/

I'm putting together a bunch of Tender garments and my own things, which I'll show and discuss. Hopefully it'll be interesting!

Saw just over half of the presentation the other week, Bill, cool stuff and a lot of neat pieces shown! Hope you had a good time in Madison, it's a really cool city.

[rodeo bill]

thanks @jeash90! Yes it was a great trip. I was mostly just on the University campus, so I'm sure there's more to see in the city, but the college was fantastic and it's always a pleasure meeting students. I'm hoping to get a video back of the talk, in which case it'll go out as a newsletter asap.

[rodeo bill]

As promised, here's a video of my talk. Just gone out to mailing list subscribers, but for people that aren't on that, here it is:

https://mediaspace.wisc.edu/media/Understandable+Design+and+Perfect+Imperfections+with+William+Kroll+of+Tender+Co./1_8yi6cv0u/171463141

A bit in there about superfuture and how great our community is in general, and some examples of member's Tender clothes, although I could have sited many more. I checked with the only person who's visible themselves (thank you!), I hope other members won't mind their things being shown- I only used images already posted publicly. 

[Georg]

@rodeo bill that was a very interesting talk but too late vor me so I missed the second half- many thanks for the link!!

Hello tender friends, this is a weavers stock shirt made of wool. It has a stain that cannot be removed in the wool wash. I am thinking about dyeing it. Does anyone have experience with this? Any product recommendations?

Best Georg

[julian-wolf]

^ Dyeing it’s a great idea, and the wool will take dye plenty well—especially if you’ve already been wearing it and washing it for a while—but be warned that the stained spots will probably not end up the same color as the rest of the garment. They might blend better, or the shirt might end up a color that you’re more happy to wear it with stains on it, but an okay rule of thumb is that if you can’t wash them out you probably can’t dye over them. (If you wear an antiperspirant that contains aluminum, you’ll also want to be very thorough in scouring around the armpits, or they’ll end up a different color.)

[ATWM]

Anyone have some weathered and worn Achilles Heel (indigo garment dyed) denim at this point? I wouldn’t expect much in the way of defined fades but still curious how it all washes out over time. I’ve got a pretty worn Woad pair that reveals a nice lighter, almost dusty blue,, but I’d love to see how much darker (or not) the indigo stays over time. 

[rodeo bill]

On 2/16/2025 at 5:21 AM, Georg said:

@rodeo bill that was a very interesting talk but too late vor me so I missed the second half- many thanks for the link!!

Hello tender friends, this is a weavers stock shirt made of wool. It has a stain that cannot be removed in the wool wash. I am thinking about dyeing it. Does anyone have experience with this? Any product recommendations

Best Georg

Thanks Georg! I'm really pleased you enjoyed the talk 🙂

I'd add a couple of points to @julian-wolf's excellent advice- firstly I think these spots actually look kind of great, and especially as they're quite low on the garment I don't think I'd worry about them too much. But if they're an issue for you, the first thing I'd check is if you've tried a stain remover as well as a wool wash? These can be a problem with dyed garments, but as this is just undyed wool it's worth having a go with a natural stain bar (I like the clay-based type sold as 'savon de marseille terre de sommière'), or even just a regular supermarket one- Oxiclean stain stick gel does a pretty amazing job, although it's potentially harsher.

If you do decide to dye your shirt, please bear in mind that the thread on these Weaver's Stock shirts is synthetic, so it may show up as a contrast white to whatever colour you dye with. This depends a bit on the dye and the method you use, and will be less noticeable on a relatively light dye colour.

I hope this make sense and helps! the texture on your shirt is really special, so it should look good whatever you decide- please let us know.

[Georg]

Thanks for the tips on my stain @rodeo bill @julian-wolf

I will post all attempts  

Had this one sharpened. Now it looks so good that I almost don't want to use it any more.