170 years making the same thing.
Better each time.
One address. Avenida Pamplona 10, Tolosa. Three generations. 1,800 berets a day. Six steps unchanged since 1858, and one room where 2022 Shima Seiki machines share the floor with wooden molds from the 1950s.
We don’t make berets in series. We make the same beret many times. The difference is in what you can’t see: the yarn tension, the fulling time, the right mold, the hand that checks at the end.
Six steps
- 01
Raw wool
Merino fleece arrives at the factory in 80 kg bales. It comes from Australia, already washed at origin and OEKO-TEX certified. Each bale feeds several days of production.
- 02
Spinning
The wool is opened, aligned and twisted. Each strand passes through machines that have been turning for decades. Tension matters more than speed: a beret can hold more than a hundred metres of yarn, all the same gauge.
- 03
Knitting
Shima Seiki. Six Japanese machines on the floor, next to old looms still in use. Each beret is born flat, seamless, with the top knot above.
- 04
Fulling
Warm water, constant movement, patience. For hours the wool shrinks, felts, hardens. What enters the fulling mill as soft cloth leaves as a dense, almost waterproof piece. No shortcuts.
- 05
Shaping
On wooden molds we’ve kept since 1950. One mold per diameter, one every half inch. The beret rests until it takes its shape. This is where diameters 10 to 16 come from.
- 06
Finishing
Trimming, lining if any, leather sweatband for 1858, Super Lujo or Txapeldun. Hand-checked: every beret passes through someone’s hands before leaving the atelier.
"A beret is still a beret. Here, we still make them this way."Atelier · Tolosa