Inside our supply chain: Visiting our makers in India

This month, we travelled to Tirupur, India - the heart of where our garments at NICO come to life.

Over three busy and inspiring days, we visited more than a dozen factories involved in every step of making our organic cotton pieces. From yarn being knitted and heated to bond the materials, to fabric being plant-dyed, bra cups being moulded, patterns being cut, and final garments being sewn. It was a deep and humbling dive into the incredible craft behind our collections.

NICO Underwear owner, Kimberley Caines, visiting the sewing factory in Tirupur, India.

So much goes into every NICO garment - and this trip to the knitwear capital of India was a powerful reminder of the many hands, skills and steps behind each piece.

Visiting our makers in person is an essential part of our commitment to ethical and transparent production. It allows us to build stronger relationships with the people behind our garments, better understand their processes, and collaborate face-to-face to continuously improve our products - for our customers and for the planet.

Our production manager, Rajesh, welcomed us to his factory with warmth and pride. In fact, when we arrived, we were greeted with a hand-crafted mural drawn on the footpath by staff to welcome us - a gesture that truly moved us.

Throughout the visit, we had the chance to sit down with the factory’s technician, Sandhu, to discuss how we can improve our products - including changes inspired by your feedback. One of the updates in the works is changing our bra straps to make them more functional and supportive. We also explored a few exciting new product idea... but we'll keep those under wraps for now (watch this space).

We visited Suresh, who runs a screen printing factory that will be producing a limited-edition range for us. Stay tuned - we can’t wait to share more soon.

We also took a two-hour drive out of the city to visit the plant-dyeing facility where our organic cotton fabric is naturally dyed using bark, seeds, and flowers. Our natural dyer, Sivaraj, and dye technician, Thiru Murugun, gave us a tour of their beautiful operation and showed us how each piece of fabric is carefully coloured using traditional, chemical-free methods.

The natural dyeing process is slow, intricate, and entirely worth it. It begins with soaking the fabric for 8 hours to remove oils, wax, and starch, followed by drying. The fabric is then placed into dyeing machines for 4 hours, where natural dyes are bonded with heat and water.

After a round of washing and drying, the process is repeated again - making the full natural dyeing cycle around 18 hours, compared to just 8 hours for chemical dyeing.

For some pieces, hand-dyeing is also used, requiring a full day of drying outside. We also learned it takes 10 litres of water to dye just 1kg of fabric - a process that’s as efficient as it is environmentally considered.

Natural dye technician, Thiru Murugun, tasting the dye to show it's all natural ingredients.