The Tamesis
Welcome to The Scoop: a weekly email series in which I ask fashion insiders about the week’s stories. This will be a way for the Vogue business community to synthesize and reflect on the latest headlines every Friday and get a little inside scoop.
This week’s scoop is sweet, just in time for a relaxing weekend after the Met Gala and the European May Bank Holiday. Kristoffer Juhl is the co-founder and managing director of Danish homewares brand Tekla, which you’ll know if you follow low-key luxury influencers on Instagram.
Kristoffer is in London this week for a board meeting and the launch of her latest collection of Tekla twill pajamas. I know very little about home furnishings (really a growing category) so I thought this would be a good opportunity to educate myself through a chat.
Hi Chris, any scoop?
I’m currently in London celebrating the launch of our twill collection. We’ve just hosted a fantastic event in-store with the community where we traced the history of homewear and the role it played in people’s wardrobes.
Are community-driven events part of your daily routine?
It’s a successful event when people feel like they learned something. However, the London store has only been open since December, so we tried to test different formats to engage with the audience here.
Why twill?
Poplin has always been our hero quality – it makes for sturdier pajamas. A few years ago we also introduced satin which was a very nice deal but also quite heavy. So we’re looking for some lighter products perfect for the warmer months. I think twill is by far the most comfortable of the three qualities in our pajama range.
How do you know when the time is right to expand a category?
We are not a trend-driven business. Most of our products are for the interior of the home, so expanding into a category isn’t a leap where you drop everything and rush to the next thing. Often, products have been in development for many years, or at least a long time ago. The twill we launched this morning has been in development for a while. We put a lot of effort into quality and detail, so when we launch something, it sticks.
How often do you bring new products or categories to market?
