Free parking
From manufacturing the famous local woollen shirts to the genuine sailor sweaters that were so tightly knit they were regarded as a ‘second skin’, SAINT JAMES has been the nautical sweater specialist for over 130 years. It takes at least 23 kilometers of thread and 18 manufacturing steps to make a SAINT JAMES sailor sweater. In total, over 18 seamstresses will have been involved in cutting, making, quality controlling and ironing the final item. This is the level of care taken by SAINT JAMES in making top-quality clothing.
Saint James: discover clothing from the latest collection at Jourdain
Around 1850, Saint James, a commune in Lower Normandy, located 20 kilometers from Mont Saint-Michel experienced a real industrial adventure. The Legallais family started to spin and dye locally produced wool.
They created the real woollen shirts which gave birth to the fisherman’s sweater. Léon Legallais, Mayor of Saint James, transformed a workshop into a real industry.
SAINT JAMES has been drawing inspiration from this sea-facing, windswept land of sailors sandwiched between Normandy and Brittany and a stone’s throw from Mont Saint-Michel for well over a century.
Hopping on the bandwagon of a thousand-year-old textile tradition SAINT JAMES began knitting the famous sailor ‘sweater’ in the XIXth century. This sweater made from wool from the land was so tightly knit that it was considered to be waterproof and perfect for sailors bashed by intemperate weather conditions when fishing in the freezing cold seas of the North Atlantic.
As the years have passed by, fishermen, sailors and pleasure boaters have turned this authentic sailor sweater into an iconic item of clothing and by doing so helped to raise the profile of SAINT JAMES to that of a great French brand with a unique savoir-faire.
for purchases of Saint James items in the United States, shop on the site: saint-james.com/us
