The Bite Magazine - Spring/Summer 2023 - Issue 33

Jada Brookes is enthralled by Swedish brand Didriksons’ story of hope, love, tragedy, triumph and legacy. bitefashion A t a time when placing a personal ad in a newspaper heralded the possibility of love and companionship, Julius Didrik- son, a single 30-year-old, was encour- aged to do so in Gothenburg’s trade and maritime journal by his mother, Amalia. He was born into a poor fisherman’s family of eight children and expected to fol- low in his father’s footsteps. However, his strength was more in his head than his hands, and he desired to go in a different direction. After attending school in Grundsund, Sweden, Julius moved to Gothenburg and worked as a manservant for Baron Max de Wendel, whose family owned a large textile mill. During his three years of service, he discov- ered how the industry worked from the inside. Sever- al years after leaving the household, Julius opened a grocery store in Grundsund, providing local fishermen, farmers and local canneries workers with daily neces- sities. He also made fishermen work clothing from dis- carded flour sacks. Julius married 18-year-old Hanna Andreasson from Grötö, whose family were also in the fishing industry and had answered his personal ad. She brought a dow- ry of 5,000 kronor which the newly-weds decided to in- vest into a business providing Grundsund fishermen with better apparel than the flour sack work clothes they were accustomed to. Julius approached his for- mer employer in 1913 to negotiate a deal for a supply of cloth from the de Wendel mill. Upon testing various types of linseed oil on cotton for the most water-repellant combination, Didriksons man- ufactured impregnated oilskin jackets. The garments underwent several impregnations and were hung up to dry for six months before they were ready for de- livery. Word spread throughout the fishing community of their quality oilskin jackets, shirts and sou’westers (rain hats) produced, tested and stitched at the house in Grundsund. At that time, waterproof clothes were cumbersome, so when Julius discovered rubber, a new elastic material, in the early 1930s, it opened new possibilities in the retail trade. One of Didriksons’ renowned pieces, approved by Kommerskollegium (the Royal Board of Trade) and launched in 1940, was the life-saving all-rubber Star Suit with a life jacket stuffed with kapok fibre on the inside. It allowed the shipwrecked person to swim and float and could be served as a float for others. The gloom of the Second World War saw the shipping and fishing industry hammered by German mines. Al-