Thoughtfulness, respect, inclusivity, and transparency—these are just a few of the values that define All We Remember, a “responsible clothing brand,” as cofounder Jacob Victorine describes it. So committed are they to their principles, they avoid using the buzzword “sustainable,” despite having every reason to claim it.
“Even though we work with organic materials and natural dyes, save the scraps from our production runs, try to limit waste during cutting, and manufacture locally in the U.S. (mainly in the midwest), we still ship items. The energy in our studio doesn’t come from renewable sources. So we acknowledge there’s some form of waste. We can’t visit every single factory we work with many times a year and there are other reasons we call ourselves responsible instead of sustainable,” Victorine says.
“We’re a tiny, self-funded brand with three main owners, two part-time employees, and an intern, so we don’t have the people power or financing to do every ethical thing we want.”
Having celebrated its fourth anniversary last year, All We Remember has charted an impressive trajectory since their first collection emerged in 2021. Run by Victorine, Rob Johnson, and Noah Zagor as a “responsibly made, gender-neutral clothing line with a focus on making garments and accessories in the United States using exclusively natural organic fibers and botanical dyes,” the brand has grown slowly but steadily, always valuing the materials they use and the people they work with.
The name All We Remember itself illustrates that ethos. As Victorine explains, “We wanted to honor all of the people whose expertise and labor goes into making our clothes. Oftentimes, a clothing brand will be known or named after the designer.” Victorine and Zagor both also teach at Columbia College Chicago, and Zagor once owned Meyvn, a menswear boutique in Logan Square.
“And we wanted to point to the fact that many, many people contribute to our clothing being made—from the people weaving the fabrics, to Green Matters [Natural Dye Company] dying them, to our assistant designers Morgen Brenn and Shelby Olson, to the people making the buttons, to the people harvesting the cotton, to the teams at Sew Valley [in Cincinnati] and Digit Patterns [in Chicago] who help us with production, and so on and so on,” he says. “Often that sort of process and those people are obscured in the fashion industry. And so we wanted to actually say, no—making clothing is collective,” Victorine continues.
“We also are very much rooted in traditional processes, which is an act of remembering—especially because many of these practices have been upheld by more traditional or Indigenous cultures for hundreds or thousands of years.”
All We Remember
Open by appointment or shop online, 2000 W. Carroll, allweremember.com
Chicago Collective menswear trade show
Open to industry professionals; apply to attend at the website
8/2–8/5: Sat noon–6 PM, Sun–Mon 8 AM–6 PM, Tue 8 AM–3 PM, the Mart, 222 Merchandise Mart Plaza, floors four and seven, chicagocollectivemens.com
Show & Tell trade show
Open to industry professionals; apply to attend at the website
8/4–8/5, Morgan Manufacturing, 401 N. Morgan, showandtellevent.com
The attention to detail is evident in every piece they make, including design features like hidden extra-large pockets and their “lichenized” drawstring, which allows waistbands to be easily—and stylishly—adjusted. Victorine says they draw on the concept of “simplexity,” meaning something that appears simple at first glance but reveals deep complexity the more you engage with it.
Their “Cove” styles, for example, are truly versatile and fit a wide range of bodies and genders. “People can often wear multiple sizes of our garments. I’ve seen husbands and wives sharing a jacket or a pair of pants,” Victorine says. All We Remember currently offers six sizes: 0 through 5, using a non-gendered, Japanese-inspired sizing scale. “0 is roughly an extra small, and 5 is roughly a double extra large,” Victorine notes.
Quality and durability are core tenets of the brand, which values high stitch counts and strong, flat-felled seams as much as natural fibers and botanical dyes. Their passion for garment longevity extends beyond design: They regularly host mending workshops, indigo dying sessions, and shibori classes at select shops across the country, including Rising Star Laundry in San Francisco and Heavy Market in Atlanta. Both shops also sell All We Remember’s designs.
“We have a couple of workshops coming up at a store called School of Thought in Brooklyn and another in partnership with our friends from [the] Literally Outside [brand] at [the boutique] Field Theory in Saint Louis. Those are really wonderful moments to connect and build community,” says Victorine.
Their recent collaboration with local artist Cody Hudson is another project All We Remember is especially proud of. The line includes T-shirts and bandanas screenprinted with natural indigo dye derived from indigofera tinctoria plants. The prints are bold and playful, with a lively spirit that evokes Marimekko’s iconic style. The pieces start at $105 for T-shirts and $65 for bandanas.
Operating out of a studio in the historic Kinzie Industrial Corridor—open to visitors by appointment—All We Remember currently sells their garments online. They’ll also be exhibiting their latest collection at Show and Tell, a trade show taking place August 4 and 5 at Morgan Manufacturing in the Fulton Market District. The event runs alongside the massive Chicago Collective menswear trade show at the Mart. Both shows are geared toward fashion industry buyers and require registration.
“We are interested in designing clothing that can be accessed when it’s first put on the body, but that can have meaning for someone over many, many years and wears,” Victorine says.
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