Everything goes back to my early 20s, when I was mostly traveling through Spain — Valencia, Barcelona, Alicante, Sevilla. Beautiful destinations. At the time, I didn't even own a linen shirt. Heck, I probably didn't even know it was a thing. My go-to summer outfit was always tank tops.
One summer, while I was walking along the beautiful beach of Valencia, I stumbled upon a gorgeous blonde young woman, sunbathing on the sand. I stopped to say hi, and ended up lying on the sand next to her for three hours, talking, enjoying the sun.
Now. I have dark skin. Until that point in time, I never experienced a sunburn.So you can imagine my shock when I woke up the next day completely roasted. My skin was hypersensitive, I couldn't stand being in the sun at all. After plenty of laughter, my friends suggested I simply wear something with long sleeves, to cover from the sun. As if I would bring anything with long sleeves to a summer holiday in the South of Spain. I mean, it was July. So, one of my friends lent me a linen shirt: simple, white.
Upon wearing it and checking myself in the mirror, I thought "wow, I actually look great in this". Then I went out to test it against the sun: it was working!
That was not all. The next thing I noticed then, as we were strolling in the old town looking for a restaurant, was that I was getting more looks from the ladies. In retrospect, it might have been my red skin - yeah, black red skin is a thing - but I totally attributed the credit to the linen shirt. So I thought “I will start to wear this stuff all the time”.
And so it started.
Tank tops were officially demoted to gym duty only. Buying more and more linen shirts, I started to learn about different cuts, blends, fabrics, designs. I began to like the ones with a pocket on the chest. Useful to store some cash, without carrying a whole bulky wallet. However, I quickly realized I couldn’t rely much on those pockets. The contents would easily fall out if I get a little wild at a beach party or hit a bump on a scooter. So, I started hunting for those with a button to close the pocket. But it wasn’t really good enough. And honestly, with pockets, some linen shirts started to look very anti-aesthetic.
Well, I was not on holidays all the time. In fact, I was an engineering student, electronics and physics - not fashion - and one day, the time for my graduation arrived. For the occasion, I bought a fantastic Italian suit. The reason why I paid a monstrous amount for the top piece - the blazer - was because of these hidden internal pockets with super tiny zips. You see, you don't see them. They fit cash, cards, keys, and yet remained completely hidden. I was fascinated by those pockets.
I can't recall if it was immediate or over time, but the idea to have those pockets on my beloved linen shirts started to take form in my head.
Three years later, I asked my mom to sew three pockets on a linen shirt.
That was my first prototype.
The rest, is Joarel.
