Mia and I founded Pelikamo in 2011 — by way of a detour. We're both business graduates and had been working at large companies before, in marketing and consulting. On the side, we'd always been drawn to beautiful things: design, architecture, fashion.

So in 2009, we opened "Townhouse", a small concept store in Zurich's old town. Just the two of us, doing everything ourselves. Two things became clear: what we enjoyed most was developing products ourselves rather than simply buying them in. And the few pieces of clothing in our range were by far our best sellers.

When the opportunity came up to take over the shop at Pelikanstrasse 11 (today our flagship store, though half its current size), we faced a question: what should we do with it?

The answer came on a drive into the Swiss mountains. Mia's suggestion: menswear. But done differently — everything made in Europe, without swapping out every style and colour each season.

I was against it; the market seemed difficult and saturated to me. Luckily, Mia prevailed. And so Pelikamo was born.