Acne Studios

The founding hundred jeans — red-stitched raw denim given to friends and Stockholm tastemakers — remain the house origin myth, and denim is still its commercial spine. Around it, Johansson built a design identity that treats Swedish pragmatism as something to be gently sabotaged: boxy tailoring in odd pastels, oversized scarves, distressed knits, and the pale-pink shopping bag that became an accessory in its own right.

The “collective” framing never faded — Acne began with fingers in film, advertising, and a magazine, and the fashion house still collaborates constantly with artists, photographers, and furniture makers. Thirty years in, it occupies a rare position: a genuinely independent-minded Stockholm brand with a Paris runway slot and global scale, still run creatively by the man who bought that first bolt of denim.