DUARTEHAJIME

Wear the streets you walk, the trips you take, the sports you love.
Illustrating the streets since 2017.
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​Hajime (はじめ) is the Japanese word meaning "beginning" (初め, 始め). In the Japanese traditional martial arts such as judo, it is a verbal command to "begin".
Inspired by the streets, trips and sports, the brand means to give a colourful energy to everyday life. DuarteHajime pieces are perfect for someone with an active lifestyle that values garments with design and an urban appeal, while contributing for a better world.
It focuses on mixing and creating different textures essentially through the use of unique prints, natural and technological fabrics, and knitwear.
The pieces are all about the details, quality finishes, good materials and are made in Portugal, with a conscious mind.
In 2023, the brand started a new chapter and rebranded into DuarteHajime. Previously known as DUARTE, this new chapter marks a statement, whilst keeping the same vision of telling stories.

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Ana Duarte was born in Lisbon, Portugal in 1991.
She has been inspired by people and nature since she can remember. A lot of the memories are related to clothes, and when traveling with her parents, who are architects, she had always been drawn to people and how they look, while her parents looked at the surrounding buildings. As she also practiced judo since she was four years old, the movement of the body and sports have always been on her mind.

She studied Fashion Design at the Faculty of Architecture in Lisbon and took a Master of Arts in Menswear Design and Technology at the London College of Fashion, where she finished with Distinction in 2015.
After this, she created the eponymous label DUARTE .

She was selected by the British Council to exhibit at the International Fashion Showcase during London Fashion Week 2013. She also integrated the exhibitions “22 Years of Design at the Faculty of Architecture” at MUDE, in Lisbon, in 2014; “LCF MA15” at Victoria House, in London, in February 2015; and "2 em 1: Jovens e Criadores" at Museu Nacional do Traje, in Lisbon, in 2017.

Ana Duarte presented the first DUARTE collection at Sangue Novo at Lisboa Fashion Week in March 2015. In October 2016, she presented, for the second time, at Sangue Novo, the “SS17 Knock Out” Collection and received an Honourable Mention Award, starting to be part of the official calendar, in the LAB platform.

In 2018 she was invited to present her SS19 Monaco GP Collection at Riga FashionWeek, where she also integrated the United Fashion showroom. She participated in the United Fashion Showroom, through Lisboa Fashion Week, once again in 2021.

Ana Duarte is the winner of the C.L.A.S.S. Icon 2021 Award: the annual competition for visionary creatives who combines design, responsible innovation and communication, capable of raising contemporary consumer awareness of the new values of sustainable fashion.

With a passion for drawing and illustration, Ana Duarte is a professional illustrator with 5 published books. Also, all the brand’s prints are exclusive, made by the designer, adapting to the concept of each collection.