KINDRED BRAVELY AIMS TO BREAK BARRIERS AROUND MATERNITY WEAR
By: Erica Commisso
Maternity brand Kindred Bravely is on a mission: The Oceanside, California-based brand is set out to prove that comfortable, functional clothing for mothers does not have to mean sacrificing style.
The brand was initially established in 2015 and, after over a decade in business, has expanded to offer clothing for every phase of motherhood, inclusive of pre and post-partum and everything in between. “Mothers are underserved. The postpartum and nursing period is one of the most physically demanding seasons of a woman's life, and the clothing industry treated it as an afterthought for too long,” says Courtney Klein, the brand’s director. “Kindred Bravely was built on the belief that what you wear during that season actually matters, and that mothers deserve better than what was out there.”
Source: Kindred Bravely
The company was founded by two mothers who were determined to make the fashion industry more inclusive for mothers and, while the two founders no longer own the company, their ethos has remained. And a lot of the creative process comes from creating a dialogue with real customers about solving everyday motherhood problems. “A lot of what ends up in the product comes directly from mothers telling us what isn't working, what they wish existed, or what they've been making do without,” the Kindred Bravely team says. “It starts with a problem worth solving. The team looks at what customers are asking for, what's missing, and what Kindred Bravely can do better. Then there's a long process of fit and fabric testing before anything ships. Every piece is designed by moms, for moms. Every detail has a reason. The support, the fabric, the way it opens for nursing, how it holds up at 3am and through a wash cycle. Nothing is there for its own sake.”
Source: Kindred Bravely
As a part of supporting mothers in every aspect, Kindred Bravely also gives to several charitable foundations and initiatives, including Baby2Baby, The Superhero Project, and the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. It also partners with an initiative called Chamber of Mothers, a non-partisan, grassroots coalition advocating for paid leave, affordable childcare, and maternal health, as the brand stands with its mission to create a community and amplify the voices of mothers in policy.
By creating a line of inclusive maternity wear, Kindred Bravely hopes to clear up the misconception that clothing cannot both serve a purpose in motherhood and be trendy and wearable. Often, the team says, there’s a compromise involved, and maternity wear is shapeless or forgettable. But Kindred Bravely, which even offers items that are eligible to be claimed with benefits, set to change that with a selection of activewear, functional sleepwear, sets and more. The brand’s best sellers include hands-free pumping and breastfeeding bras, bamboo loungewear sets, and labour and delivery gowns, demonstrating the brand’s growth from a nursing bra company into a full maternity and postpartum line covering the first through the fourth trimester in order to create a more inclusive–and comfortable and functional–fashion community.