Today on Fashionably Danu, I feature 1331 a brand that has always kept to great quality and perfecting their look.

The collection featured is super friendly, yet smart with fabrics that make you feel comfortable and trendy.
This is my first feature with them for 2018 and wanted to know what’s trending with the brand.

How often do you guys bring out a new collection, and how long does it remain in production?

We introduce a collection once in 3 months, we have 4 collections released each year. If a product is doing really well and we have requests to bring it back in stock, provided the availability of fabric we remake another batch. Product development and manufacturing is usually a continuous operation and a collection takes about 1-2 months for completion.

1331 introduced footwear into your line up, how is going and would you guys move into shoes soon? 

The feedback has been great and humbling. We are currently looking into shoes as well. Developing footwear takes a bit of time so we are looking to introduce shoes when we open our flagship store. As for now, we are based online and we believe in order to purchase the perfect pair of shoes that fit, the facility to fit it on is a must, so we are keeping this on hold! 

Tell me about the items you have featured on me today?

We have featured some of our best sellers on you today! These shirts show our style and uniqueness that sets us apart from other Menswear Brands. The Onyx Shirt which is the Black and white panelled shirt, is one of our new products that took a bit of time perfecting the finish, we are all about stripes and polka dots this year and we also introduced our linen collection, some of which you're wearing today like the Khaki Shirt. 

How do you guys work on the designs, and who makes the final call? 

We are both constantly on the lookout for fresh and new styles, we look at anything that inspires us and works on current trends together to create the final product.  

Who would you say is your biggest clientele, men or women? 

It’s a good balance of both but our menswear is more popular, because of the limited options available in Colombo. 

Can you also customize designs on request? 

Currently, we customize for women on request, we are yet to start custom made orders for men.

Choosing fabric is a big issue in this country, and how do you guys work around it? 

Yes, it is definitely the most challenging part of the job. We have very limited options for good fabric and most of the time we have to settle for what is available which is a bit frustrating. We hand pick each fabric we chose and we pretty much scan all the fabric shops and suppliers and we work with a few fabric importers but still, you’d have another brand using the same fabric which is unavoidable. 

What would you say is the next step for 1331?

We want THIRTEEN.THIRTYONE to be brand led, and manufacture all items under our brand name. We will be releasing our Basics Collection in the near future for both Men and Women. We are also thinking of expanding our Leatherwear line by next year.

What would be the men’s best seller with the new collection?

The best seller this time would be the Nautical Shirt, which we couldn’t feature on you today as it is almost sold out in less than a month! 

Where do you guys position your brand? And would there be a 1331 store soon? 

Yes, we are! Right now our main focus is to work towards opening our store, we initially wanted THIRTEEN.THIRTYONE to be only based online, but due to popular demand and to offer our customers a better shopping experience we are hoping to launch our flagship store soon while operating our online store.

Co-Founders & Designers – Inoma & Fazil

Photographer – You're My Favorite