Why we make every piece to order

How it works

Reserve for free → The run fills (50 pieces) → Pay when we confirm the date → Delivered in about four weeks. Nothing is made until it is reserved, so nothing is wasted.

You reserve a piece for free. A reservation is not a purchase, and one click cancels it. When enough people have reserved the same piece, we confirm the date it will be made and shipped.

Only then do you pay, through your own pay link. We make the run, check it against the approved samples before anything ships, and send it with free tracked delivery. Most orders arrive about four weeks after you pay.

The problem with making on a guess

Most clothing is made months ahead, in quantities set by estimates of what will sell. When the estimate is too high, the extra has to go somewhere: into storage, into markdowns, or out of the system altogether.

Europe has put a figure on the worst of it. Citing the European Environment Agency, the European Commission says that an estimated 4 to 9 per cent of all textile products put on the market in Europe are destroyed before they are ever used, roughly 264,000 to 594,000 tonnes a year. Since 19 July 2026, large companies in the European Union may no longer destroy unsold clothing and shoes, and medium sized companies follow in 2030.

Production keeps rising all the same. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation reported in 2017 that clothing production had roughly doubled over the previous fifteen years. More clothing made on more guesses means more of it left over.

A ban stops the destruction, but not the overproduction behind it. The better answer is to make less on a guess in the first place, and that is what made to order does.

What made to order changes

When nothing is made until it is reserved, there is no guess to get wrong. We buy fabric for the pieces people have asked for, in the colours and sizes they chose, so we do not make stock for buyers who may never come.

Because each run is made for real orders, we can keep most pieces in a women’s and a men’s cut, in every size, without guessing how many of each to make.

It also lets us work carefully. We approve the samples, the fabric and the fit before a run is made, and check each run when it arrives. Our fabric goes to ARPANSA, Australia’s radiation protection agency, for testing to AS/NZS 4399 before the first run. The full report goes on the shirt test page.

What it changes for you

You wait longer than you would in a shop. Each piece ships from its own month, and we email the exact date before you pay. In return, you pay nothing up front, you can cancel a reservation with one click, and the piece you receive was made for an order, not taken from a pile.

Delivery is free and tracked to the 11 countries we deliver to, and every order comes with a UV card, so you can do the shirt test the day it arrives. Our delivery page lists the delivery time for each country.

The planet, honestly

Made to order does not fix everything the clothing industry does. It is one practical step we can take ourselves: make only what is wanted, send it in a paper box, and make it well enough to last for years. For the planet sets out the rest of what we do, and what we will publish for every piece.

A hotter world makes this more pressing, not less, as we explain in the planet is getting hotter. Every Daybreak piece is made this way, in Rezzella Riviera and Rezzella Adventure alike, from the Sun Tee to the Sun Hoodie.