We Could Have Kept Going. We Chose Not To.
At the end of January this year, we closed a shop we had run for 22 years.
We had a large store, 330 square metres in a beautiful old town hall building in a small coastal town. For two decades Chille had been the centre of everything. Our income, our identity, our daily rhythm. We knew most customers by name. We knew what they were looking for before they asked.
And yet.
The business had grown into something that was pulling me away from what I actually wanted to build. The shop was full, but full of things that no longer excited me. Brands that had nothing to do with each other, or with us. A message so broad it said nothing at all.
The shop kept us tethered. To a building, to a roster, to opening hours that owned our days. We were busy every day and yet the things we actually wanted to focus on like our own label, creating content around our values, living more of a life with slow mornings and beach walks, kept getting pushed to later.
We had watched enough of life to know that later is not guaranteed, the unexpected can happen. We were empty nesters. Our parents were still well. We were still well. Our window was open. It felt like the moment to take the risk and follow the dream while we still had the energy and the courage to do it properly.
I have been a gardener for 26 years. Its a way of life. I love that I know where the food has come from, the convenience of picking a carrot then eating it.
In the garden, I know exactly what I want. Soil that is alive. Plants grown without chemicals. Food that has travelled zero kilometres from ground to table. Flowers for the bees and the joy of cutting them and putting them on the kitchen bench. Nothing that doesn't earn its place.
I had never applied that same thinking to what I wore or how we filled the shop.
I was buying clothes the way most women do, whatever was available, whatever fit reasonably well, we were working hard in Chille to find pieces that sat well for us, classic, good cuts that would fit a wide range of shapes. As we started to concentrate on the composition of fibres, we were noticing we were compromising often. The average piece of synthetic clothing takes 400 years to biodegrade. I did not want to keep adding to that.
When we closed the shop, that clarity arrived properly for the first time. If I was going to build something new, it would be built the same way I build the garden. From the ground up. With materials that matter. Slowly, deliberately, for the long term.
Chille is what we are building now.
A small clothing label with a focus on natural fibres, linen, wool, cotton. Designed to be pieces you want to wear for years rather than seasons. Simple shapes. Flexible fits. Pieces for women who have stopped chasing trends and started choosing well.
We are based in Wynyard, on the northwest coast of Tasmania. Its a small coastal town with ocean on one side and rolling hills with farm land and wild spaces on the other. Our environment is connected with nature. It suits the clothes we are making.
The Sofia Linen Pinafore is where we started. It is made from 100% European linen, preshrunk and stonewashed so it arrives soft and ready to wear. Dark chocolate. A shape that works over a shirt, over a skinny knit, on its own in summer. A classic piece you can reach for again and again without thinking about it.
That is what we are making. Not more. Not faster. Just better.
Shop the Sofia Linen Pinafore →
We are documenting the garden and the label as they take shape at @chillelifestyle on Instagram. It is all part of the same slow, deliberate thing.*