HOW WE STARTED
Club Eildon was not conceived in a boardroom. It began in two separate moments of
quiet reckoning — two women, each searching for an explanation her body would
not give her, who arrived, independently, at the same modest revelation: that what
we place against our skin is not a trivial matter. It is a daily act, repeated thousands
of times over a life, and it deserves the same scrutiny we bring to what we eat and
what we breathe.
Thi's search began with a diagnosis and a silence. When she was told her AMH levels
were low, she asked the obvious question — why — and found, in return, very little.
Where clinical explanation fell short, she began her own inquiry, turning first to the
substances and habits of daily life she had never thought to question: the products
on her shelf, the food on her table, and, in time, the clothing on her back. Synthetic
fibres, finished with chemical treatments and worn against the skin for most of every
day, had gone entirely unexamined in her life, as they do in most. Replacing them
with natural, thoughtfully sourced fabric became, for Thi, not a trend but a discipline
— one small, deliberate correction in a life otherwise spent searching for answers
she could not fully find elsewhere.
Shiona's story began on her skin, plainly and persistently. Years of flare-ups, eczema,
and irritation that resisted explanation left her cycling through creams, treatments,
and eliminations, searching for a trigger no single doctor could isolate. It was a slow
process of elimination, conducted at home, that led her somewhere unexpected: to
the fabric itself. Natural fibres — cotton, linen, wool worn as they were meant to be,
without synthetic finish or blend — made a difference she could feel. It was not a
cure; Shiona is candid that eczema does not resolve so simply. But it was relief, real
and repeatable, and it was enough to convince her that the composition of what we
wear matters a great deal more than most of us have ever considered.
When their searches converged, Club Eildon followed naturally: a house of naturalfibre clothing, chosen with the same scrutiny either of them would have wanted for
herself.
THE CHALLENGE OF MAKING ONSHORE
Building Club Eildon within New Zealand has not been the easier path, and we have
never pretended otherwise. Manufacturers working in natural fibre, at small scale,
are few. The raw materials we insist upon — organic cotton, undyed wool, linen
woven without shortcut — are often harder to secure, and considerably more
expensive, than an equivalent sourced overseas. There have been months spent
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tracking down a single mill willing to work in the modest runs a young house
requires. There have been fabrics we wanted badly that simply were not available
onshore, and had to be sourced piece by piece until we found a supplier whose
standards matched our own. It would, without question, have been simpler, cheaper,
and faster to manufacture elsewhere. We chose not to.
WHY WE STAY ONSHORE
When production is sent overseas, it is, in large part, sent out of sight. A label can
tell you what a garment is made of; it rarely tells you how it was made, under what
conditions, or with what chemical shortcuts and finishing agents were used to meet
a deadline or a price point. That is not a risk we are willing to ask our customers to
take on faith.
Manufacturing onshore means we can walk the floor of the mills we work with, ask
directly what has gone into a fabric, and know — rather than assume — that what
reaches you is precisely what we said it would be. It costs more. It takes longer. We
consider both a fair price for certainty, and we would rather build Club Eildon slowly
and honestly than quickly and in the dark.
LOOKING AHEAD
Our collection today reflects what we have, so far, been able to source and make
onshore to a standard we are willing to stand behind. It is, by design, a beginning
rather than an end point. We hope, in time, to extend the House into a fuller range
of certified organic cotton, and into New Zealand merino — a fibre we are fortunate
to have on our doorstep, and one we intend to bring into the collection the same way
we have built everything else: carefully, onshore, and without shortcuts.
OUR PROMISE
We are not physicians, and we make no claim to cure what ails you. What we offer
is simpler: a considered alternative for those who have begun, as we did, to ask
questions about what they wear, how it was made, and by whom. Every piece within
Club Eildon is chosen for what it is made of and where it came from, not merely how
it looks — a small standard, perhaps, set against the scale of the industry, but the
one we each wished existed when we needed it most, and the one we now extend to
you.