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LA brand Agolde rode the post-pandemic jeans resurgence, becoming synonymous with premium denim of all shapes and styles. Now, the brand wants to conquer the rest of the closet.
“Of course, we launched with denim,” says chief executive Amy Williams. “But at this point, we’ve evolved into more of a contemporary collection brand.”
Originally founded by “the godfather of Denim” designer Adriano Goldschmied and the retail pioneer Ron Herman in the early 1990s, the brand was later relaunched by Jérôme Dahan, a co-founder of Citizens of Humanity. The brand built its reputation on high-waisted, ’90s-inspired silhouettes and rigid fabrics — an approach that cemented its position in premium denim before its more recent expansion beyond it.
That shift is now material to the business. Today, roughly 40% of Agolde’s revenue comes from ready-to-wear, including knitwear, outerwear, shirting, and vegan leather. While the brand has long offered basics like T-shirts and non-denim jackets, it only formalized its ready-to-wear at the start of 2026, when it significantly expanded its assortment. The business now generates mid-eight figures on its own, scaling quickly from a supporting role to nearly half of the brand.
Several premium denim brands have attempted to build out ready-to-wear alongside their core categories. Rag & Bone has had some success doing so, while others, including Frame, remain more closely associated with denim despite selling other categories. The challenge is getting customers to come back for more than jeans — something Agolde appears to be doing at a faster clip.
“Denim is one of the most natural launchpads in apparel,” says Kristen Classi-Zummo, an apparel industry advisor at Circana. “It’s the foundation consumers build outfits around.” The brands that succeed in growing beyond it, she adds, are the ones that treat adjacent categories as an extension of that foundation, rather than a departure. “When the foundation stays intact, the expansion feels authentic to the consumer — and that’s what drives repeat purchasing across categories.”
Agolde’s world
For Williams, the expansion was, in part, about building out the brand world in a more complete way. “I think with any great brand, you close your eyes and see a very clear DNA for it,” she says.
Retail partners, including Selfridges, Net-a-Porter, and Bloomingdale’s, have quickly bought into this approach, carrying a broader mix of categories and merchandising Agolde accordingly — not just as a denim line, but as something closer to a full wardrobe.
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