The Story Behind the Piece
The Moth Cardigan Series was designed by our designer, Asia, known for a number of our other popular pieces including the Garden Overalls and Moon Phase Bomber Jacket. When she first submitted these designs to myself, Rae (the owner, hi! :D), I didn't really think much of them. While I genuinely love everything my co-designers come up with, I didn't expect these designs to do well on socials and didn't see them gaining much traction. Because of this, I held off on posting the designs for quite some time - which in hindsight was a huge mistake!
As it stands now, the entire moth and butterfly cardigan collection are our best performing products, with the Death's Head Cardigan standing at the top of all of them as the king of Moth Cardigans.
Here's a bit of what went into making this piece…
July 26th, 2024
On July 26th, 2024 the Death's Head Moth design was submitted to me for review. The original design looked like this:
Autumn, 2024 - PSPO launch
We launched a Pre-Sample Pre-Order for this product in the Autumn/Winter months of 2024. For those who don't know, long story short: PSPOs are the product of my craziness where I accept pre-orders with a no-questions cancelation policy based off of the design alone. We don't do this very much anymore, but at the time it was the major way our shop was able to grow and gain traction. As the first week orders opened was overwhelmingly successful, we began working on samples immediately.
The main hurdle for these cardigans was to select a method and fabric that would be suitable to the wing shape, and not be too heavy for the wearer. Pure cotton was too heavy, but many of the synthetic yarns out there are poor quality. It took quite a few rounds of testing, and we continue to update the fabric to a nicer one whenever we are able to, although, for what it's worth, I personally think the current fabric we are using is incredibly pleasant.
January 2025 - Product Delivery
The factory designer's job is to look at our sketches and do their best to recreate them in jacquard knit, programming each stitch to a corresponding pixel in a computer. This is an incredibly time intensive process that often requires multiple rounds of sampling. Death's Head was, fortunately, one of the easier cardigans to create, as, if I recall correctly, it only needed one, maximum two samples before it was approvable.
As this particular Moth Cardigan, the King, as I said earlier, did so well in the PSPO stage, we had over 3,000pcs to order when it was time for bulk production. This added to the delivery time considerably, but we were still able to hit very close to our originally projected timeline and get the cardigans to their new, loving homes.
2025 and onwards
It is now January of 2026 as I am writing this, and since the creation of this product we have grown so much as a company. I have hired so many much-needed hands and brains to help me run this operation, and, as a result, I have been able to put a lot of my time towards product upgrades. I remember when Asia and myself were on my apartment floor selecting colors out of a swatch book for each moth cardigan. How time flies…
Originally, all the moth cardigans only had one layer of ribbing. It has since been upgraded to two. The yarn's content used to have a higher % of synthetic fabrics and yarns, which do serve a purpose but can tend to make them a bit scratchy, and we have since switched to a much more plush and soft yarn to prevent any sensory issues. We have made a few tiny adjustments in many moth cardigan patterns to ensure accuracy to the original moth that inspired them, but also to keep them looking good as a cardigan. The Death's Head Moth Cardigan, however, has never needed any pattern changes. The only difference that might be physically noticeable is a very slight color shift, as we have had to change the yarn here and there.
Thank you so much to everyone who has supported this project, whether you are new here or one of the first people who ordered. Mochipan is not possible without you.
