Linen in summer: learning to love the crease

In August the air in Algiers is humid; in Ghardaïa it is dry and burning. In both, linen does the same thing: it draws moisture from the skin, gives it back to the air faster than cotton, and does not cling. It is a hollow, long fibre, rough at first, that softens with every wash. A linen shirt always looks a little better in its second year than in its first.

Why we wash it before we cut it

Linen that has never been washed shrinks three to four per cent in its first machine wash. A dress cut as a 38 becomes a 36 in length, and that is most often the reason for a return. So we wash our linens by the bolt, at the Baba Ali workshop, before the pattern goes down. The dress you try in the boutique is the dress you will wear after ten washes.

That wash is also what gives its soft hand to the shirt dress that opens the season: Kettani shirt dress. And the fall of the wide trousers it is photographed with: Kettani wide-leg trousers.

The crease is not a flaw

Linen creases because its fibre does not spring back. You can fight it with an iron every morning, or accept that worn linen looks lived in. We took the second road, and our cuts are designed for a crease to fall well: soft shoulders, generous lengths, few darts. The washed-linen safari jacket, for instance, has no interfacing — so it has nothing to distort: Baie safari jacket.

For men, the heavy linen overshirt is worn open like a light jacket on May evenings and buttoned like a shirt in July: Oversized heavy linen overshirt. The Cuban-collar short-sleeved shirt in slub linen is our answer to August: Camp-collar textured linen shirt. With drawstring trousers it covers a whole day: Linen drawstring trousers.

Covered linen

Linen is also the best cloth for dressing covered without suffering. An abaya cut in one piece like a kimono, open over wide trousers, lets the air in under the arms and along the legs: Linen kimono abaya. The long shirt and trousers set in washed linen is the one our customers pack for travelling, because it fears neither the suitcase nor the train: Linen shirt and trouser set.

Care

Wash at thirty degrees, spin gently, dry in the shade on a hanger rather than flat. If you iron, iron while the linen is still damp: it smooths in two passes. And never put linen in a tumble dryer, which breaks the fibre and shortens the garment.