Carhartt Went Abroad and Got Cool

As a former SEARS employee, I sold a few pairs of Carhartt overalls in my day. As a former Barneys New York employee, I sold a few pairs of A.P.C. jeans too. It did not occur to me that there was overlap in the clientele for those products until I heard that the American workwear makers at Carhartt and the French fashion designers at A.P.C. were collaborating on a collection. The collection is nice (see the t-shirts above) and you should check it out here.

In my view, the more interesting story is how Carhartt is branding itself overseas and selling a product outside the U.S. that is way cooler than what it sells domestically. Compare Carhartt's U.S. website to the site for Carhartt's distributor in Europe, Australia, and parts of Asia. The latter features a music blog showcasing artists from genres including krautrock, afro, house, minimal, disco, hip hop, and dubstep, while Carhartt's overseas collection includes some seriously cool flannel and chambray shirts made from Japanese cotton.

Unfortunately, not much of Carhartt's overseas product is available to U.S consumers. One would think that Carhartt might want a piece of the current workwear trend that has hipsters and trendy sub-hipsters wearing Redwing boots and flannel shirts like they're going out of style (again). Perhaps Carhartt does too well in the U.S. workwear market to bother with re-branding here, or maybe they foresee a risk of alienating current Carhartt customers by getting too fancy. My hope is that they are testing the product overseas with plans to bring it stateside soon.

Either way, some of you will want to get your hands on this stuff now, and some pieces are available through a handful of domestic merchants and foreign merchants with U.S. delivery. Samples of what's available from U.S. merchants are below. Search for foreign sellers of Carhartt's overseas product here.






Carhartt chambray Clink Shirt ($118). Available @ Union.












Carhartt selvedge canvas Roper Pant ($140). Available @ Unionmade.