Pueblo East High graduate makes fashion sustainable and timeless with LAAW streetwear
Pueblo East High School alumnus Dalton Bidula is transforming the fashion industry as we know it with LAAW, an outerwear company placing special emphasis on sustainability.
Interchangeable velcro patches of various designs are applied to LAAW base garments like jackets and hats to minimize one’s wardrobe and minimize the carbon footprint it takes to produce additional garments. Bidula, the company’s creative director, launched LAAW Designs in December 2021 while a student at the University of Denver.
“Consumers now are really seeing, understanding what all this fast fashion’s quick consumption of garments is doing,” he said. “Creating these garments that are quality and stand the test of time is really what we are trying to do.”
Bidula started his first fashion company, Shape Streetwear, while in high school. In 2018, he was the youngest designer featured at Denver Fashion Week. After two years of sewing, printing and embroidering designs on blank garments, he decided it was time for something new.
“I really needed full control of all aspects of the garment,” he said. “When you are working with blanks, you don’t have control of the cut, the look and certainly the textile.”
Brainstorming ways to set himself apart from other designers, Bidula arrived at the idea of interchangeable patches able to be applied to cut-and-sew garments. He teamed up with a set of investors, including a designer with a decade of experience at Nike to develop blueprints for the garments.
“Getting that industry knowhow behind me and putting my fresh ideas in that really made the garments come to life,” Bidula said.
Base garments include a utilitarian puffer jacket and a 100% cotton adjustable dad hat. Starter patch sets are included with purchase of a base garment. Additional patches are sold separately. LAAW Designs is in the process of expanding its selection of base garments with light rain jackets coming this fall and hoodies in the works.
“Once you get into the LAAW ecosystem, you can use these patches and switch them from one garment to another garment,” Bidula said. “Depending on the season, you can have something that matches all seasons. To update the jacket, you just put on a new patch.”
In addition to being sustainable, LAAW garments are made to be long lasting. Most clothing utilizing velcro technology place the fuzzier, “loop” side of the velcro on the outside of the garment, but LAAW puts the rougher “hook” side on the garment, minimizing wear-and-tear done by reapplication of patches.
“Most things are temporary, but LAAW is forever,” Bidula said. “It’s this idea that garments can be picked up out of a bin 20 years later, understood and appreciated.”
Garments and patches currently available may be viewed and purchased on the LAAW website at https://www.laawdesigns.com. Updates on garments and accessories also are posted to the company’s Instagram page, @laaw.designs.
