Four figures in sculptural sailcloth garments stand far apart on an empty tidal mudflat.

Tarpaulin

Collection one. Clothes for standing in weather.

Made by people who expected the wind.

Sailcloth is the most honest textile in the world. It has been cut, for centuries, to hold a shape against force, and every seam and eyelet is there for a reason. Tarpaulin takes that vocabulary off the boat and puts it on the body.

The clothes are stiff, and they do not apologise. A collar stands up because it has been told to. A hem lifts in the wind as one panel. You do not so much wear them as stand inside them.

A collection by Pencil of Nature.

A tall Black woman in a floor-length raw sailcloth coat with a stiff standing collar.Look 1. The Luff coat, raw natural sailcloth
An older East Asian man in a boxy rust-red canvas cape-jacket and wide trousers.Look 2. The Batten jacket, tanned rust canvas
A South Asian woman in a dark green waxed tarpaulin smock dress laced with rope.Look 3. The Reef smock, waxed tarpaulin
A young androgynous model in a patchwork two-piece of old sail panels.Look 4. The Mainsail two-piece, patchworked old sails

Four cloths

Raw10 oz Dacron sailcloth, unbleached, reinforced at every seam.
RustCanvas tanned with cutch and red ochre, the way working sails were.
TarpCotton duck waxed by hand, stiff enough to hold a folded edge.
PatchRetired racing sails, cut around their old numbers and repairs.
A brass eyelet and rope lacing through rust canvas.