Ganni (Q4104)
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Danish clothing company
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Ganni |
Danish clothing company |
Statements
photographer
It’s been a banner year for Ganni, which presented its spring 2025 collection in Paris. This wasn’t a simple matter of “hopping the pond;” reaching out to a wider audience led to introspection about what the brand is and what it stands for. Ditte Reffstrup was still mulling those questions over when designing this pre-fall collection in which Ganni-isms are revisited and revised. This season, for example, the label’s popular nipped waist jacket has a squared neckline and is cut from waxed denim, and a trench is cut to jacket-length and has a curved sleeve. “It really felt like we landed in a good place after Paris, we could really feel, ‘okay, this is who we are,’ and not be afraid of taking some of the really core values back; owning them and working with them,” the designer said on a call. “The Ganni girl has grown up—and I think that’s very natural because [she] is also an extension of me.”The Ganni girl might have matured, but on the evidence of the lookbook, (photographed at Copenhagen’sSMK Museum) her vibe is forever young. That is not to say that the collection lacks sophistication—a pair of roomy fil coupé jacquard pants (made from recycled wool and organic cotton) paired with a slouchy sweater look elevated and relaxed. Ditto for the organic cotton “summer tweed”-and-denim pieces. This collection will arrive in stores when the weather is warm; among the more easy-breezy looks are gingham polos and midi-length yoked denim skirts, one with eyelet details. There’s also a semi-sheer striped knit set, perfect for traveling, and a baroque foulard-print pajama set in yellow and black that conjures Miami in the ’80s and ’90s. Also available in a sunny hue (and many other colors) are Ganni’s new skate-style sneakers. Made using the brand’s Fabrics of the Future arm, they feature butterfly embroidery and a shoe charm.If there’s a bit of a grab-bag feeling to this offering—connecting the dots between a sweet pinafore dress, a chunky knit, and a sexy bubble skirt is a bit tenuous—there’s also a confidence and strength in refreshing the brand’s hits. Plus, it’s a different way of looking at sustainability. Changing for the sake of change is démodé; good design has longevity.
11 December 2024
Ganni’s Paris debut was 15 years in the making. In 2009 Ditte and Nicolaj Reffstrup took the reins of the Danish contemporary brand and, with a small local team, started building the company into the household name it is today. The Ganni Girl concept, which is centered on a colorful and fun-loving approach to fashion (rather than gender) captured the world’s imagination; as the business has expanded globally, the team has become increasingly international. Ganni now operates between Copenhagen and Paris, where its new CEO, Balenciaga alum Laura du Rusquec, is based. When Ganni, once the anchor of Fashion Week in Copenhagen, stepped back from shows two seasons ago, the rumor mill had it that this move was imminent, and so it was.Why Ganni in Paris is news is less to do with location than with market placement. The French capital is ground zero for luxury, it’s the birthplace of the great maisons (which for so long were resistant to ready-to-wear). Ganni is not a luxury brand: “we are not trying to be someone, we are not trying to play a luxury game,” Ditte Reffstrup stated on a walk through and the show proved she meant what she said. Danes are famously home-loving, and it felt as if the upbeat, welcoming Ganni spirit had been imported to France, especially when the models came out smiling and holding hands at the end of the show.The thing is, Reffstrup explained, brands evolve, just like people do. “It felt like we were ready to do something new, and because we’re expanding globally, it kind of made sense. Of course it’s a dream for everyone to come to Paris, it is like the mother of fashion, it is the big scene, and it’s obviously super scary,” she continued. “We are used to being one of the bigger fish and now we are just a tiny one; it’s a different energy, it’s almost going back to a startup energy.” Being a proven success, Ganni is in the place to help others become big fish. In the two seasons it stepped away from the runway, the company has supported local talent back home. Building on that, for spring, Ganni invited Nicklas Skovgaard, a Dane known for his ebullient bubble silhouettes, and Claire Sullivan, a New York-designer with a penchant for tulle an tutu-like volumes, based in New York, to participate in a creative consultancy. Their task was to design garments, using materials from Ganni’s Fabrics of the Future sustainability initiative, that will go into limited production. Skovgaard and Sullivan watched from the front row as their creations.
These included a mocha-colored party dress of OleatexTM, a material made using Biotex, which is derived from olive oil production waste in Turkey (his); and cleverly patterned pieces featuring sport jerseys of Cycora, a polyester material made directly from textile waste (hers). These designer consultancy looks were fully integrated into the collection, rather than set apart, eliminating any sense of virtue signaling.
24 September 2024
The ebb and flow of time, measured by the cycles of the sun and moon, and the seasons, were Ditte Reffstrup’s preoccupations for resort. Accordingly, she tapped Norwegian photographer Ola Rindal to shoot the look book, with varicolored roaming spots of light marking the pace. Fashion-wise, the collection remained within the brand’s comfort zone, with desirable iterations on Ganni tropes. Leopard print, for example, was cut into a delicious faux-fur coat with an asymmetrical closure; there was a coordinating bag that made the option all the more tempting. It was a look to dress up or down; and finding that middle ground was another focal point of this offering.“Dressing up for me can actually be a little bit difficult,” said Reffstrup, who was wearing overalls. “I think it is something that doesn’t come easy to the Scandinavian people because it’s so far from how we dress, but we are working a lot with hacking that, trying to do things that feel occasional, but still in a Ganni way.” The fanciest pieces in the collection were a sequined dress with a handkerchief hem and side slit and a yellow confectionery dress, light as meringue.Denim, however, remains the plot driver at Ganni. It’s not difficult to imagine the reptile-print jeans slithering into many a closet–particularly the flares worn with a matching jacket. A keeper of a maxi denim dress leaned into the western trend, but can also be styled in many other ways. The lineup’s most directional item was a pair of high-waisted flares that speak to the boho ’70s vibe fashion is rediscovering. They’d actually look smashing with one of the collection’s hand-knits, like the chunky man-in-the-moon number inspired by Mike Oldfield’s 1983 twangy, folk-pop song “Moonlight Shadow.”
20 May 2024
When Nicolaj and Ditte Reffstrup took over at Ganni in 2009, the team consisted of five locals working from a small apartment. Back then, said Ditte on a walk-through, “everything was so new; in a way you’re so naive and that makes you very brave because you don’t know how crazy a world this is.”Now an anchor of Copenhagen Fashion Week, the brand is stepping away from the madness this season. They’ve done a collection but skipped a show in favor of supporting up-and-coming Danish designers through an exhibition and dinner.(Read about it here.)Having taken that decision, Reffstrup experienced an emotion that became the title of the fall collection: Copenhagen nostalgia. In keeping with the theme, the look book was shot against red-and-white backgrounds, a reference to the colors of the Danish flag. Though she couldn’t have known it then, the release of these images roughly coincides with the succession of King Frederik X to the throne, and a swelling of national pride.Like the company itself, the Ganni Girl is maturing. This fall 2024 collection finds her at an in-between stage, drawn to pinafore dresses and miniskirts with ruffled hems, argyles and platform loafers—and tailoring. Though Reffstrup considers the brand’s fitted jacket with curved sleeves a classic by now, the focus on suiting and outerwear is a deliberate engagement with sartorialism. A trench coat has nice details like a double collar and a raised Ganni logo at center back. Suiting and outerwear feature squared cuffs and look like they mean business.No wallflower, the Ganni girl likes to party. Going-out options include sparkling looks and a fun beaded fringe skirt with the brand’s butterfly logo. Her Copenhagen cool comes through most clearly in denim. A shaped jacket is made in a wide ribbed material developed in-house, and creases are intriguingly preserved in a laminated set. There are miniskirts to wear over jeans and with any number of knits. Most hyggeligt of all is a fluffy black-and-white coat made using Biofluff, one of Ganni’s Fabrics of the Future.
30 January 2024
Oh, Europa! At Ganni, the combination of “revenge travel” and nostalgia resulted in a pre-fall line up that celebrates the beauty of the Old World while iterating on the brand’s codes, including leopard and rose motifs, shaped jackets, and cowboy boots. With an eye to patina, prints are deliberately faded, and the palette, while not sepia-toned, exudes a toned-down softness. Punkish touches like buckled ballerina flats, and interesting layering proposals—a lacy, open-work slip dress over a fluffy sweater, for example—keep things kicking.On a call from Copenhagen, Ganni’s observant creative director Ditte Reffstrup spoke of two tendencies she’s noted among her staff: a turn toward hard-to-find designs and post-pandemic rediscovery. “For so many years it has been so much about wanting all the new stuff, actually having the new collections before they are almost even developed, and I feel like there is a nostalgia upon us, in fashion, music, even in food,” she said, pointing out that the younger team members of her team are showing new interest in early Ganni pieces.As the world has reopened post-COVID, Reffstrup has been hitting the road. She recently spent time in Portugal with her family wandering the streets and absorbing history. The passing of time can soften the edges of things (memory is built to do this too) and that has a certain attractiveness in times of sharp divisiveness. This Ganni collection doesn’t stray as far from home as the people behind it, but the brand’s focus on serving up “comfort fashion” through the reframing of familiar pieces feels on point for the tenor of the times.
16 November 2023
“One more time, we’re gonna celebrate / Oh yeah, alright, don’t stop the dancing.” As Daft Punk’s lyrics blasted through the sound system the entire cast happily pranced down the runway and just like that Ganni once again shut down CPHFW in the best way possible.That track—indeed the whole playlist—had been generated by a proprietary A1, designed by the brand with the Danish artist Cecilie Waagner Falkenstrøm of ARTificial Mind. Ditte Reffstrup’s idea was to make a proprietary version of this technology, one that was “kinder and more thoughtful,” as the show notes put it, and would reflect the Ganni girl community; to do so it was programmed with brand data. AI is a virtual entity; Reffstrup chose to manifest it in something green. Forget Shel Silverstein’s Giving Tree, Ganni’s trees, all native to Denmark, were g-i-v-i-n-g attitude. “We come in peace,” they said in an opening monologue. The Ganni AI also spoke about sustainability, and gave Paloma Elsesser her cue to kick off the festivities, which she did in a dress of her own design that will be part of an upcoming collaborative capsule.The Ganni girl is still going strong, but not in the colorful printed dresses that gave name to the trend in the 2010s. More recently the focus has shifted to collaborations (there are two in this collection, with New Balance and Ace & Tate). As this collection was being created the team was “talking a lot about how we started with dresses and [how] it has developed into a full range, a full collection,” explained Reffstrup at a preview. “But we really wanted to try to create a new iconic dress [for spring].” It’s a button-front white organza jacquard with a warped red rose motif. In the studio it had some a simple ’40s retro charm; on the runway it was worn open to reveal a pair of black briefs.Despite the plentitude of frocks, this didn’t really read as a dress collection. Part of that is due to the styling, with for example, a diamante skirt layered over a beaded number. The same technique was applied to tailoring, most effectively with a gray T-shirt over a beige pant suit, an unexpectedly chill surprise among Ganni-isms like embellished jeans, animal prints, and shine.The tailored pieces were the stars of the show, as suiting speaks most convincingly to the evolution of the Ganni girl. As the company has grown up, so has she. The sophistication of the tailoring is a good counterpart to more glam items, sort of like the trees are to AI.
Reffstrup is well versed in this kind of pairing; she describes her union with her husband Nicolaj as a coming together of opposites. It is one that works; to paraphrase the Daft Punk robots, they’ve never stopped the dancing.
10 August 2023
Not all dance-inspired collections fall into the balletcore category. Case in point: Ganni’s resort collection, which builds on Ditte Reffstrup’s memories of going to dance camp as a child and her sister’s career as a ballerina. These recollections were the designer’s way into an exploration of femininity; and its most obvious expression was the use of bows. But these weren’t just floppy bands of ribbon that recalled childhood; they had functional uses. Long ties at the front of a suit jacket work as a closure; others at the back allow the wearer to have some control over the fit. There are a few instances when the bow theme gets a bit Bahnsen-ish; but that’s certainly not the case when it comes to a mushroom-colored crushed velvet dress with an asymmetrically drawstring-pull festooned with line of butterfly-like bows that are coquettish rather than cute.Reffstrup said her fall collection had a more grown-up mood, and that has carried over to resort as well in the form of some strong tailored pieces, like a midi skirt suit with a must-have double-breasted jacket. Pinstripe is used for a wear-to-work pantsuit as well as a miniskirt paired with an oversized bomber.
25 May 2023
Ganni earned its wings a long time ago, but for fall 2023 the company is adding four more, in the form of an abstract butterfly logo. At a preview of the collection, Ditte Reffstrup talked about the company growing from two people in 2009 to the global concern it is today. This season, she took time to survey all that’s been accomplished—sort of like a butterfly who alights for a while before once again soaring up and away. This stocktaking comes in the wake of the pandemic and other global crises. “It felt like everyone had gone into this transformation, like everyone looked back and just changed their life, a little bit,” the designer said. In this collection, she continued, “you will see me growing up.”Also dressing up. Like many others at the moment, Reffstrup has a feeling for the structure of tailoring. The show opened with a charcoal pantsuit and closed with a blue skirt suit; both had curved sleeves and emphasized the waist. Balancing the sartorial elements was a large offering of dresses, from sequins to knits with many variations in between. One of the most charming was a buttercream yellow slip with a carwash hem that had delicate black ruffles that were placed like tendrils down the front. Similar ruffles edged a bra top and embellished a suit.Denim was also an important part of the collection, and has been, Reffstrup said, since the brand phased out leather. Jeans are little-d democratic and the brand’s ethos is fun fashion for everyone. It’s not for nothing that Reffstrup has been described as “a modern hippie.”As such, it’s easy to see how she might be attracted to the colorful world and work of Esben Weile Kjær, a recent Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts graduate with a background in music. The two first hit it off on the dance floor, and they continue to keep in step.By happenstance or fate, Kjær was asked to curate pieces from the collection of Arken, a museum of contemporary art, and create an environment in which they could live. The exhibition is called “Butterfly!” Its mascot is one of those winged creatures, and according to the museum’s copy, it wears death metal makeup. I asked Kjær if his beastie was smiling a happy smile or secretly plotting to take a bite out of someone, and he replied, “Both, it’s scary and cute.” Reffstrup drew a parallel between Kjær’s butterfly and Ganni’s new logo, but there’s a deeper meaning as well.
This is a brand that delivers color, novelty, and enjoyment (cuteness) that helps people deal with the turmoil in the world.If Ganni is a “friendly” brand, it’s not just because of its aesthetics and price-point, but also because of Reffstrup’s penchant for collaborations. This season the brand teamed up with Veneda Carter, who made jewelry, and once again worked with the Icelandic outerwear brand 66°North on some smart-looking and sporty pieces, creating continuity with last season’s collection. Ganni’s spring outing was “piecey”; this one had more of a through-line, proof that not only Reffstrup, but the brand, is growing up and in new directions.
2 February 2023
Ganni’s Joy Ride collection, presented outdoors on a pier covered in pastel chalk drawings just before the sun set, was a love letter to Copenhagen.The idea was the fruit of a collective brainstorm. “The design team right now is very international, and they have experienced when Copenhagen is best, and that’s for sure summer,” explained Ditte Reffstrup at a preview. “We really wanted to celebrate that feeling you have when you walk around the city…it feels so free.”Copenhagen really is a wonderful capital and Ganni offers a way for people to tap into a certain brand of Scandi style, one that’s colorful, playful, and cool. Reffstrup has a knack for translating insider trends for a wider audience. Noting that many models were showing up to the office in vintage cowboy boots, the team developed their own boot and shoes versions for spring.Kickstarting the show was champion BMX rider Malene Kejlstrup Sørensen who cycled onto the pier and executed some tricks. What followed was a collaboration-rich collection, featuring Barbour x Ganni jackets. Reffstrup took her bow in a Levi’s x Ganni skirt with a double button-front, one functional, the other just for show. And that BMX energy was best captured by a color-blocked nylon jacket and coordinating pants that was part of the 66° North x Ganni partnership. It’s not only people, but brands that want to tap into the Copenhagen scene evidently.As Reffstrup doesn’t have a driver’s license, she bikes for necessity, by custom, and occasionally also to escape or meditate. Sometimes when she’s taken a ride the designer will feel her heart pumping; this idea was first translated into the heart monitor squiggle, which was then worked into hems via the use of curved and custom-designer hardwear closures.If this collection were given an EKG, the lines would be spiked and spread wide; there was more variety than cohesion. The show experience, however, was off the charts. For the finale, models came out rolling or pedaling bikes, mimicking how the looks would be seen “in the wild.” Only someone without a heart wouldn’t want to follow their lead and ride happily off into the sunset.
12 August 2022
Music is Ditte Reffstrup’s constant muse, and her new resort collection delivers all the rock-and-roll attitude Ganni girls expect but with a difference. The designer stepped a bit out of her comfort zone with the concept for this offering. Called I’ll Be Your Mirror, it is the result of Reffstrup’s exploration of selfie culture. “I’m from this generation where photographing yourself is not something [you] do, and I feel like people have a second persona [online], and I wanted to explore that,” she said on a Zoom call. “Also coming out of the pandemic, I think a lot of people have literally used the time to get to know themselves a little bit better.”Reffstrup teamed up with the Norwegian photographer Jacqueline Landvik for the look book, which featured mirrors. The most selfie-worthy look in the collection is an angular denim suit in the form of a fitted jacket and roomy cargo pants. An asymmetrical wrap miniskirt kept the geometry story going, as did a smart khaki coat that could be styled different ways.The designer says that her collections reflect Copenhagen’s street style. The Danes love a suit, and this season Ganni’s have a bit of ’80s flair, something that’s cropping up with increasing frequency across the board.Safety-orange workwear felt like a bit of an outlier here; in contrast, a lone floral dress with coordinating fabric shoes felt like a more grown-up, less boho take on the Ganni girl look that put the brand on the map.
23 May 2022
Inspiration is an intangible spark that designers try to translate on mood boards and in press releases. Often it’s necessary to read between the lines; such is the case at Ganni for fall. Though the season’s guiding angels are P.J. Harvey and Bjork in the 1990s, their influence is general rather than specific. You won’t find line-for-line copies of items these artists wore, instead you’ll get a peek at what drives Ditte Reffstrup.“The thing is that at Ganni everything starts with music and everything stops with music. For me that is forever inspiration. I have tried to seek other kinds of inspiration, but it doesn’t work for me,” the designer said in her showroom. “For me, it always comes back to music and I think it’s because when I grew up it was this window to the outside.” Today young people connect through social media or the internet. For the MTV generation, of which Reffstrup is a part, communities formed around bands, talents, and genres.Ganni’s fall collection was presented in the form of a video/performance featuring the Danish musician Jada (Emilie Molsted Nørgaard). It was filmed at The Vega, a music venue in Copenhagen that Reffstrup knows well. You can catch a glimpse of her dancing like mad in a smiley face T-shirt in the film. The lineup might be described as a mixtape: There are striped overalls with shaped legs, gilded denim, and more traditional pieces in khaki. The season’s requisites—snakeskin and sequins—are represented. Cowboy boots are key. The pieces that form the “chorus” of this collection, are those with drawstrings or ties that allow the wearer to customize their look. Of the video, Reffstrup said, “it’s just about having fun.” The clothes, too, seem made to facilitate good times.
3 February 2022
Ganni’s creative director, Ditte Reffstrup, described the feelings of nostalgia she experienced when flipping through old family photo albums recently—their imperfect, faded images seemed to capture a simpler and freer time. So little was documented in the past, compared to our extreme online habits now, that what did get photographed is often all the more precious for it.Reffstrup wanted to distill a similar feeling for pre-fall, so she colored the collection in sun-bleached pastels with retro details: A chiffon yellow seersucker dress had a sweet lace collar, while a handful of wrap dresses came in a dusty blue damask, a bit like your granny’s curtains. Sweater-vests and lapel-less blazers had a touch of ’60s charm; ditto the Fair Isle knits. As for the pops of neon and up-to-there hemlines, Reffstrup name-checked Slim Aarons and his iconic Palm Springs photographs. As much as she was craving the simplicity and calm of a bygone era, freedom in the Ganni universe also means putting yourself out there and living boldly. Pre-fall’s clashing neons and odd combinations—a feathered top over a swimsuit, a hoodie under a knit dress—will appeal to the #GanniGirl with more experimental tastes.
7 December 2021
Ganni staged its first show in 17 months roughly 278 feet above ground level. Guests made their way up, up, up to the peak of CopenHill, a new artificial ski slope atop Copenhagen’s largest green power plant. As models walked the tree-lined runway, the factory below was turning non-recyclable waste into renewable energy for around 100,000 local homes.The setting was a gesture to Nicolaj and Ditte Reffstrup’s sustainability goals for Ganni—recycled materials and waste reduction are high on their list—as well as the spring 2022 collection’s title, “Higher Love.” Ditte explained how inspired she felt by the creativity she witnessed in Ganni customers and her fellow Danes last year. With nowhere to go and no one to see, people were truly dressing for themselves and for their own enjoyment—mixing items they’d never put together, experimenting with color, paying no mind to what anyone else might think. It was personal style at its most personal; Ditte saw it as “self love.”As a result, the collection looked a lot more like outfits you’d see young people wearing on the street than over-styled, prescriptive “runway looks:” boxy blazers with bra tops, crafty cardigans with fishnet skirts, citrus-hued jean jackets over swimsuits. On a Zoom preview, Ditte pointed out her favorite new details: the puffy elasticized straps, waistbands, and ruching down the center of dresses, apparently inspired by the scrunchies women wear on their wrists at the office. It was a clever way to add a touch of flexibility and comfort without veering into athleisure and lent some clever interest to otherwise-simple items—the Ganni sweet spot.As for the brand’s best-selling dresses, they came in newly sexy, curve-hugging silhouettes, suggesting the “summer of skin” is far from over. (Per the Ganni way, they were styled with chunky loafers or clogs, not heels.) Body-con dressing is its own kind of self-love, and the casting included a happily diverse range of sizes and body types. Ditte was excited to announce that later this year, more women than ever will be able to shop with Ganni: Their sizing is expanding from EU 46, or US 14, up to EU 52, or US 20.
12 August 2021
Ditte Reffstrup has always been a daydreamer, sometimes to a fault—at least that’s what her childhood teachers said. But as the creative director of Ganni, it’s one of the many secrets behind the label’s success. The Ganni look is a magpie mix of things happily thrown together as if the wearer got distracted: a utility boot with a sweet Peter Pan shirt, an argyle vest with a sequined mini, a feathered frock over a graphic tee. Nothing is ever too perfect or too planned.Still, even Reffstrup found it difficult to daydream in the gloomy days of winter, when this collection was coming together. Several months and many lockdowns into the pandemic, she felt sapped for inspiration. But rather than dwell on the dismal present, she and her team looked boldly forward, imagining clothes they’d wear on a wild night out—ideally IRL. Reffstrup recalled letting go of what she felt they needed to design or what was guaranteed to sell and instead went for it with audacious, experimental new ideas.The opening dress is a break from Ganni’s usual silhouettes, pieced together with asymmetrical panels outlined in gold ruffles. Its faux Baroque print appears elsewhere in the collection—on jeans, mesh turtlenecks, and nylon leggings—and mirrors the fancy-kitschy bars where the look book was shot. Jet-beaded dresses and minis come with slashed skirts, loosely inspired by the concept of a door or window opening into a new, post-pandemic world. They’ll be no-brainers for holiday parties and New Year’s Eve bashes (this collection will drop in November); ditto the smocked crop tops trimmed with jangly fringe. Reffstrup said you can’t help but dance when you’re wearing one—a little mood lift in a garment.
9 June 2021
Growing up in a small town in Denmark, Ganni’s creative director, Ditte Reffstrup, says MTV was her only source for pop culture and style. “There were no magazines, but there was MTV,” she saidback in 2019. “My window to the U.S. was Madonna.” Reffstrup has been deeply passionate about music ever since, seeing it not just as a medium that shaped her identity, but one that represents connectivity and community too. Throughout lockdown, it’s where she turned for inspiration and to boost her mood, often with the ’90s hits she remembers from her youth. Of course, attending a concert would’ve been ideal—so for fall 2021, she and her husband Nicolaj, Ganni’s founder, staged one of their own.The digital experience, “Love Forever,” isn’t another video of models dancing awkwardly to a canned playlist. It includes real performances by Zsela, Deb Never, and Coco O., and will stream today on YouTube and Ganni’s Instagram. After a year of virtual shows, it’s surprising how few designers have done something similar; a virtual concert is more likely to engage young shoppers like Ganni’s than a prerecorded show or a moody fashion film. They’ll be excited to discover new music in addition to the new collection.On that note, Reffstrup said she was thinking about what artists wear onstage—clothes that have an immediate impact and read well on a screen. On a Zoom call, she pointed out a jacket in a hi-def emerald green (she joked it was the exact shade of Kermit the Frog) and a few moments of flash, like a metallic-coated denim vest and matching jeans with curvy legs. Elsewhere, Ganni-isms like lean dresses, boxy suits, and statement collars were simply tweaked with new, voluminous proportions or odd textures. The once ruffly collars shrank a bit with newly sharp edges, and a Gen Z–friendly skirt set came in puffy quilted brown leather.Much of it will feel familiar to the #GanniGirl, which was intentional; Reffstrup isn’t looking to challenge her with new trends or unrealistic shapes right now. Like Reffstrup’s favorite ’80s and ’90s albums, these clothes are meant to be moments of uplift and small reminders that better days (and IRL concerts!) are coming. “It’s this feeling that we aren’t alone in the world,” she said. “It’s a collection full of optimism.”
4 February 2021
Ditte Reffstrup doesn’t like to admit that she has a favorite Ganni show, but she does. It was the fall 2018 collection, which was dedicated to her hometown of Copenhagen. That season, she commissioned artist Ana Kraš to wander around the city and capture snapshots of surprising faces and places, many of which Reffstrup said she’d never even noticed. The photos covered the runway and the show was soundtracked entirely with sounds by local Danish musicians. The clothes were designed to highlight Ganni’s signatures: the exaggerated pilgrim collar, subtle embellishments, floral prints, and effortless silhouettes. With the COVID lockdowns, Reffstrup has been in Copenhagen for the last six months straight and she’s been reminiscing about that collection a lot lately. Unable to travel for an inspiration trip, she decided to create a nostalgic ode to fall 2018 for her new pre-fall collection, updating some of those recognizable Ganni codes.Cleverly, Reffstrup photographed her new wares inside of a well-known bike shop on the outskirts of Copenhagen. Pretty, well-dressed girls on bicycles may have been some of the original muses for the Ganni brand, but Reffstrup has brought that Scandi-cool aesthetic to a whole new level over the last couple of years. This season, that elevated but effortless look came by way of a striped-tent dress with fitted sleeves and a pilgrim collar. Tie-dye prints and sharp knits also stood out, as did the scallop edge cutouts on the hemlines of skirts, tunics, and dresses. According to Reffstrup, that detail was meant to mimic waves, which served as a quiet nod to Copenhagen’s waterfront. The designer and her team are doing their city proud, and even amid new lockdowns they’re continuing to build bridges around the world.
16 November 2020
Taking a risk is a difficult proposition in fashion at the moment. The industry is facing a recession and many unknowns. By and large designers are choosing to play it safe and give their customers exactly what they know they want. Knitwear, denim, and loungewear were major categories at the resort collections. Unless you have the consumer base or the cash flow, creating bold, wildly impractical clothing isn’t really part of the sartorial vernacular right now.But Ditte Reffstrup managed to balance her desire for daring fashion with wearable, sellable garments. Ganni’s spring 2021 collection is a fine example of a brand carefully toeing the line between too much and too little, between fashion with a capitalFand easy, attainable style. In many ways, this is what Reffstrup has always done at Ganni, and as a result she has created an aesthetic that appeals to the sort of fashion-loving girl who takes trends and remixes them into her own singular wardrobe.This season, Reffstrup gave the #GanniGirl some drama with a volumized, metallic-sparked version of the label’s popular smock dress. She added quirk and cool to the lineup with the introduction of new draped suit dress silhouettes. But the core DNA was visible too, especially with the quilted pilgrim collar jacket, the knotted lace dress, and the bright knits. The smocked green candy-stripe dress qualified for both the bold and everyday categories. Also worth noting is that according to the designer, 70% of the collection is made sustainably. As Reffstrup explained over the phone from Copenhagen, “We decided to take chances with some of the designs because no one really knows where everything is going in the industry.” She also pointed out that “there are so many brands out there today and maybe even too many clothes. If you want a voice, you need to be a little bit more daring.”
26 August 2020
Do you remember the last thing you did before quarantine? After months of social distancing and staying home, many of us are painfully nostalgic for the last time we went to a restaurant, bar, concert, or event of any kind with more than five people. Before the coronavirus hit Denmark, Ganni’s Ditte and Nicolaj Reffstrup threw a rager. They are famous for their Copenhagen Fashion Week after-parties.In late January, to celebrate their fall 2020 collection and a collaborative artist project called 202020 that aimed to predict the future of the next decade, the Reffstrups invited everyone over for drinks and food and dancing into the early hours of the morning. Riding on that high, the Reffstrups began working on their resort 2021 collection, but soon thereafter, everything was stopped by the coronavirus and the Reffstrups began self-isolating like so many of us.Ditte Reffstrup took up residence in their kitchen, using the counter space as a makeshift standup desk. She had to adjust, like we all have, to a new way of being creative and collaborative in the digital sphere. In the beginning it was challenging to find a way forward, but Ganni, the brand and the people behind it, are nothing if not optimistic. Reffstrup built their resort collection on a foundation of the brand’s classics. Oversized pilgrim collars, bubble sleeve mini dresses in playful prints and black leather, and striped polo print shirts were in the mix, all cut a bit more streamlined than in seasons past. That was the point; Reffstrup has been focused on editing down the collections and really choosing her “darlings.” This time around that’s the party dresses. She said she’s “longing for that feeling of being on the dance floor.”Copenhagen has now reopened and the Reffstrups are back in their headquarters drumming up new digital ways to present their collections, grow their sustainability efforts, and connect their community of Ganni girls all over the world. They’re ready for what’s next.
15 June 2020
What will the 2020s bring us? At the start of a new decade, the world is unsure. In fact, people are freaked out. There’s the impending doom of climate change, political upheaval in the U.S. and abroad, and a new and extremely scary virus spreading across the world, just to start. But Ganni is looking on the bright side. And why not? Ditte and Nicolaj Reffstrup hold the keys to the most globally successful brand out of Copenhagen right now, opening stores across America and attracting attention from VIPs. Selena Gomez wore a dress from their spring 2020 collection and it sold out almost instantly.Business aside, the Reffstrups are happy by nature. They’re hopeful, but not in a naive way. As the pair works toward creating a fully sustainable brand, they’re honest and real about how much it actually takes to achieve, and it’s their realness that makes them, and their clothes, so appealing.This season was about pushing the needle forward while respecting the realness and DNA of the brand. They partnered with 20 female artists across various mediums, who upcycled Ganni materials and created exclusive products for a pop-up shop in their New York and Copenhagen flagship stores. The pieces are meant to represent their own predictions for what’s to come during the next decade.Creative director Ditte Reffstrup pointed to favorite details that have carried over from previous collections to fall 2020, like blown-up white pilgrim collars, bejeweled buttons on knitwear and dresses, and Copenhagen-native floral prints. But those familiar touches aside, the collection had a new swagger. A simple rib knit black dress and straightforward suiting separates qualified as pared-down, while remaining impactful and versatile. Reffstrup has said that she likes seeing how different women (and men) style her designs. It brings her joy, world problems aside.
30 January 2020
Ditte and Nicolaj Reffstrup are riding a wave of success. They’ve just opened Ganni stores in New York and Los Angeles, and today they’re celebrating a new outpost in Miami. More are following soon in other parts of the States. Back in early August, the Reffstrups celebrated 10 years of their Copenhagen-based label with a blowout Spring 2020 show, and as the label’s creative director Ditte said over the phone, they’re “still feeling the high energy from that moment.” High energy is exactly what fuels the fast-paced momentum of this brand, and Reffstrup assures that they aren’t planning to slow their roll anytime soon.After many dark, cold, and rainy months during Copenhagen’s winter, spring and summertime are ushered in with such enthusiasm and excitement that residents of this small city take to the streets to eat, drink, and be merry with one another, perhaps more so than in other European cities. Reffstrup used this shift as a starting point for a Ganni offering that’s bright and bubbly, focused on candy colors, polka dots, and micro-florals, yet not at all naive. Wide, oversized collars, and big, inflated silhouettes looked fit for a futuristic Scandi retelling ofAlice in Wonderland, but elsewhere a dreamy deep olive green feather and jacquard dress for evening signaled that Reffstrup is focused on maturing the Ganni girl. There are more denim options, as well as classic-ish knits, jackets, and vests.Reffstrup also expanded the accessories offering, introducing a lineup of rain boots made with recycled rubber. There’s more swimwear and a new lingerie category, too. But what this well-conceived, covetable collection really showcases is how Ganni keeps constantly proving naysayers wrong. To those who thought this was just another Instagram-first, influencer-backed brand pushing the Scandi style agenda, think again.
5 December 2019
It’s been a pretty epic decade for Ditte and Nicolaj Reffstrup. Ten years ago, they joined the struggling Danish label Ganni and, after strategizing a new formula and a new look, created a brand that is now largely credited with putting Copenhagen fashion on the map. Today, the Reffstrups are preparing to open their first retail locations in the U.S., after receiving a major investment from L Catterton, a private equity firm that counts LVMH and Group Arnault as shareholders.To celebrate, Ditte went back in time a bit and referenced a few of the Ganni girl’s longtime favorites, including pretty floral dresses, tops, and skirts in a light lavender shade. Bib dresses styled over T-shirts looked cool, as did the leopard print on a crop top, a balloon-sleeved frock, and a long-sleeved turtleneck shirt styled with belted dad jeans. Still, this wasn’t a greatest-hits collection. Ganni 2.0 is about better fabrics, better construction, and tailoring. See: the sophisticated suiting in silk and pleather, as well as beautiful draping techniques on a few of the dressier numbers.Just as the last model circled the outdoor playing field where the show was staged, the same venue where the first Ganni collection was presented 10 years ago, it started to storm. Rain came pouring down on the guests standing in the balconies. Luckily, there was tent for the show’s performer: Copenhagen’s coolest pop star and Justin Bieber collaborator MØ. As she began to sing her raver hit “Lean On,” the cast came stampeding back out, dancing and swinging their arms in the air. Then the crowd joined in, creating a wet, wild mosh pit. It was a major moment this week. As we cheered and bounced along to the music, one thought came to mind: It’s the Ganni family that should really be jumping for joy.
9 August 2019
America is currently experiencing an invasion of the #Gannigirls. The Copenhagen-based fashion company is prepping for expansion in the U.S. market with two new stores set to open in New York and Los Angeles by the end of this year. At Coachella in April, the label found a new celebrity fan base in Emily Ratajkowski and Gigi Hadid. Ganni’s clothes are cool and they’re affordable, at a price point somewhere between contemporary and advanced contemporary. That counts for a lot in a marketplace oversaturated with Instagram-first, direct-to-consumer start-up labels that are often too pricey or poorly executed.Ditte Reffstrup, who is the creative head of the company, while her husband Nikolaj serves as founder, is hoping to refocus her customers’ ideas about what Scandi style looks like. That means repurposing old tropes promulgated by mass influencers on social media. You won’t be seeing many of the pretty but ubiquitous pastel floral Ganni frocks that have been everywhere for the last couple of years in this Resort collection.According to Reffstrup, the design elements in this offering were borrowed from her own tomboy nature. “I always find it very fashionable to use both your feminine and masculine sides when dressing up,” she said over the phone from Copenhagen. “I like the idea of borrowing your dad’s clothes.” There were plenty of dad-ish touches, including Reffstrup’s reimagining of a classic argyle sweater vest and a quilted patchwork jacket worn with matching trousers. The boyish cuts of trousers and trenches felt directional. Overall, the Ganni invasion is off to a running start.
3 June 2019
Minutes after the Fall 2019 Ganni show wrapped, Ditte Reffstrup was backstage in happy, jittery tears. Her husband, Nicolaj Reffstrup, handed her a well-deserved Long Island iced tea to calm her nerves. She was anxious about whether or not she did justice to the pictures of photojournalist Ami Vitale, which in part inspired the collection and were showcased on giant screens that lined the venue. There were images of the desert, wild animals, children playing in fields, and cityscapes, all across the world.Reffstrup and her husband, who up until a few months ago was CEO of the brand, have transformed this once unknown-to-the-rest-of-the-world Danish label into a multimillion-dollar global business. With every Fashion Week that comes and goes, Ganni becomes more visible outside of Copenhagen. Even with its mass market appeal and its perfectly positioned price point, Reffstrup has managed to maintain that sense of a personal, thoughtful touch in her designs.For the last few seasons, the Reffstrups have been moving away from what they call the “Copenhagen girls on bikes wearing floral dresses” look, which is what everyone on the outside tends to assume Ganni is about. Reffstrup wants to change that notion and make her cult following and the world at large understand that the Ganni girl is every girl. How fitting then, that the show’s theme was about “Life on Earth.” (The official title for the show was taken from the famous David Attenborough wildlife show on the BBC.)The clothes definitely played into the idea of a nomadic wanderer, but one with a cool, chic sensibility. The prints were more abstract this season, and the outerwear, especially a long striped puffer and sharp trenchcoat, more sophisticated. This season was less playful (in a good way) and more buttoned-up, like a wardrobe for a Ganni woman instead of a Ganni girl.Reffstrup and her team currently have more than 25 sustainable practices and projects in the works. They’ve been mapping their carbon footprint since 2016 and are offsetting their CO2 emissions with carbon credits. For the Fall collection, they’ve partnered with Swedish Stockings to make all of their tights, leggings, and socks from recycled materials. In the end, Ganni has a lot of love to share and it really is representative of Copenhagen, but its creative and entrepreneurial team has enough heart and chutzpah to span the globe.
1 February 2019
When Ditte Reffstrup was growing up in the Danish countryside, she and her friends would listen to Nirvana and smoke inside the barracks dotting a nearby beach. In the summertime there was drinking, dancing, and swimming after dark. For Ganni’s Spring 2019 collection the designer culled from those freewheeling days of living outdoors. Reffstrup was so moved by nostalgia backstage, she admitted to sobbing while watching her youthful pieces charge down the runway to “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Though naïveté was the theoretical idea behind the clothes, the designs were actually rather grown-up. Ganni first became known for girly floral-print dresses but it’s clear that Reffstrup wants to move away from that stereotype and she did so today.Yes, there were delicate slip dresses and touches of pouf sleeves and eyelet, but for the most part, this collection was about moving the brand forward and making it accessible and appealing to those living outside of Copenhagen. There weren’t a lot of embellishments, frills, or fuss, save for the rainbow and blue-and-white tie-dye on jeans, jackets, and shorts (these pieces are likely to sell well). Reffstrup also took a familiar balloon-sleeved button-down dress and did it in a chic hunter green leather. Shimmer and shine came from retro Lurex knits, and the loudest print was the leopard on a long slip dress and a collared blouse. Although the outdoorsy-chick references were a bit too literal, the anoraks and hiking boots made in collaboration with the Icelandic sportswear label 66 North worked well with the more urban-minded pieces.It took Reffstrup a bit of time to look inwards and bring more of herself to the brand, but no doubt about it this collection benefitted from its unique and heartfelt point of view.
9 August 2018
Ganni continues its swift upward climb (the brand recently received an investment from LVMH partner L Catterton), but the label’s designer, Ditte Reffstrup, is paring back. Last night’s show was just as packed and just as Instagrammed as any other Ganni runway outing; nonetheless, it felt lighter. Reffstrup did this on purpose. She minimized the floral-print dresses—typically a given each season—and toned down the embellishments. Backstage, she talked about how terrible the state of the world is right now and how no one should fret and fuss over their clothes. She wanted the models to look and feel “like angels” and encouraged them to look up. “We walk around our own cities all the time and we forget to look up at the sky, to take our eyes off of our phones and our heads out of business and be present.”The show was in part a love letter to Copenhagen. Reffstrup commissioned Ana Kras to wander the city and photograph whatever caught her eye. Those photos dotted the venue, and the music, all by Danish artists, was curated by Dev Hynes. Reffstrup thinks that the rest of the world thinks they know what Copenhagen style is, but really, she says, they don’t get it. The designer wanted to prop up the city’s organic look—something that isn’t so contrived or try-hard, or spotted in a street style snapshot. Effortless is the word, but non-bohemian. She did this with a cropped pleated bomber jacket, white jeans, and a printed tee. She did it with a brown polka-dot dress layered over a sheer zebra-print turtleneck, and she did it with a hot-pink boiler suit that slouched off the body. There were trend-driven, profit-inducing items too: chunky hiking boots, raver pants, a motocross one-piece, and logo tees.Overall Reffstrup did a great job turning down the volume, but the best example of Ganni’s new direction came by way of a sharp gray suit. From a distance it looked plain, but up close a gleam hit the eye from the thin line of crystals embroidered to the seams of the trouser legs. It was cool, easy, a little surprising, and totally Ganni—born and raised.
2 February 2018
While chatting with Ganni creative director Ditte Reffstrup at lunch on the first day of Copenhagen Fashion Week, the subject of American politics came up. She said, “I was in New York shortly after the election and I was feeling very depressed. It was a sad time even for me who is not from there—I wanted to make my Fall collection all about love.”And there it was in her show, not only in the pink neon signs that decorated the runway and read “Love Society,” but also in the playfully cool clothes. Reffstrup opened with a plaid prairie dress layered over a striped knit and accessorized with red platform sneakers, setting up a collection that touched on several different but cohesive references, from ’90s grunge to American pastoral. Small touches added to each look made them that much more enjoyable, like the bows tied onto the straps of dark denim overalls, ruffles midway up a pin-striped sleeve, and hearts embroidered onto a cozy knit and an embellished minidress. As they say, love is in the details, and at Ganni there was a lot to go around.
2 February 2017
Creative spark set alight by a California road trip,Gannicreative director Ditte Reffstrup paid tribute with the brand’s Spring lineup, dubbed Space Cowboy. There were traces of a sunbleached desert palette in tones of pale peach and washed-looking neutrals; the show also opened with an itty-bitty python-print hot pant. Pansy-print fringed yoked Western dresses were as sweet as bric-a-brac-trimmed, button-front skirts, and a cognac suede dress. If a ’70s beat seemed to course through the collection, it wasn’t a costumey one. Trend-driven and youthful, Spring’s styles will be right at home on It girls (and recent Ganni fans) fromAlexa ChungtoKendall Jenner.
15 August 2016
Ganni, one of Copenhagen Fashion Week’s most accessible brands, has opened more than 15 stores since launching in 2008.Fall found the label embracing what seemed to be an inspiration of ’90s grunge (slip dresses, et al.), at time disjointedly married with hints of streetwear and Parisian insouciance. Chalk some of it up to the styling, but not even the playfulness of the venue, a drink-filled, in-the-round nightclub affair, could fully distract from the unfocused feeling of the clothes themselves. The best look of the bunch was a silvery shantung suit with a Western yoke in bugle-beaded fringe.
5 February 2016
Founder: Frans Truelsen; headed up by husband and wife Nicolaj and Ditte Reffstrup, CEO and creative director, respectivelyYear established: 2000Known for: Parisian chic through a Scandinavian lens, translating to a crisp and wearable take on feminine, contemporary coolWorn by: Alexa Chung, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kate BosworthStocked at: Shopbop, Liberty (London), Isetan (Japan)Spring '16 inspired by: Optimism, youthful energy, relaxed West Coast style, Baz Luhrmann'sRomeo + Juliet
6 August 2015
Founder: Frans Truelsen; since 2008, husband and wife Nicolaj and Ditte Reffstrup have headed up the brand as CEO and creative director, respectivelyYear established: 2000Known for: Parisian chic through a Scandinavian lens, translating to a crisp and wearable take on girly coolStocked at: Shopbop
29 January 2015