Our Social Initiative

When founder, Nika Diamond-Krendel, first discovered how East London was once home to a booming manufacturing and textile industry, she wondered what had happened to all these workshops and jobs and why the international recognition the area continues to receive for its designers and creatives wasn't trickling down to its once proud manufacturing base of makers.

She learned that over only thirty years, just a handful of leather workshops were left, due to British brands outsourcing their manufacturing abroad. This decline had led to local jobs disappearing, skills honed over generations being lost and, ultimately, the death of craftsmanship. Nika felt it a tragedy that an area with such a strong history was powerless in the eradication of its identity.

Fuelled by this, she set out to create a brand to do just that; champion & cherish London’s heritage & talent. Paradise Row started working with a local team to help preserve the ailing craft of the London leather trade alongside partnering exclusively with local creatives to promote the area’s talent; all of whom live within just a few miles.

Through every thread, cut and design, you can see the inspiration from the surrounding area down through the generations.  

It is true craftsmanship.