Melt Scarves
ACCESSORY DESIGNERS
France
Friends since they were 10 years old, Emma Garcin and Jeanne Biehn Sall are the designer team behind Melt.
With solid credentials in fashion – Emma worked at Hermès and Jeanne spent six years at Yohji Yamamoto – it was their shared passion for textiles that led to the birth of the brand. Their colourful, fringed scarves in natural fabrics (camel, yak, cashmere, silk, cotton and linen) are, they say, more than just scarves: “They make you feel powerful,” says Emma. Each one is also a tribute to the workers in Nepal who weave the fabric, notes Jeanne: “The Nepali people are amazing. They give us a lot of energy.”
“Jeanne’s family lives in Morocco, and my son is half Nepali, so family is at the heart of what we do,” explains Emma.
The designers divide their time between their homes in Avignon, France, and factories in Nepal and Morocco (where some designs are trimmed with leather).
Each scarf takes three days to be made. Setting up the loom requires eight metres of yarn, and the team is careful not to waste any material.
Once it is woven, it is finished by hand: bad threads are painstakingly removed with tweezers. Then the scarf is washed, ironed, dyed and ironed again. “All the fringes are combed and cut by hand,” says Emma. “It’s just like when you go to the hairdresser!”
“Our scarves are not industrial – each one is completely unique, and they’re beautiful because they’re not perfect”Melt Scarves
