We just want to escape this grown-up world with its grown-up problems, like paying the rent, the necessity to work for money, impossibility to just lay down and do nothing for a long time, and so on. So we create these garments which bring us joy to deal with everything like that. Our creations help us feel like we are still children, and all we have to do is play, and there are no shitty obligations in life at all.

It’s very intuitive and we don’t have any pre-existing plans. Igor just knits something, then once we have a collection we analyse it and define the common themes. So everything starts as irrational and becomes cerebral in the end. We have sources of inspiration, though. We love vintage magazines with knitting patterns, draw from our childhood memories of life in rural Russia, and develop our pantheon of characters (1,2,3,4,5) which travel from garment to garment (1,2) and from collection to collection.

Yes, the brand is named in honour of the small town in the Moscow region where Igor’s mother worked at a garment factory, which made the first jeans in the USSR and where Igor himself grew up.

Yes, and we also use our designs to attract attention — it seems to be a childish approach as well.

We were raised in rural Russia, and it’s a very special place with its own aesthetics. And we do love Russian culture, and draw a lot from it. Our inspirations are Russian knitting traditions, fairytales and the culture of 90s and 00s rural Russia. For example, knitted shoes and rubber boots which appeared in the fw21 lookbook were the popular footwear for the mid-2000s in provincial Russia. And lace tablecloths and doilies which we sometimes use for making dresses are still one of the elements of home decor in Russian villages.
We also are inspired by pagan festivals that are still celebrated in Russia. For example, during Shrovetide at the beginning of spring people make a scarecrow in the form of a woman which symbolises winter, burn it, and eat pancakes, which symbolise the sun. Another lovely holiday is the day of Ivan Kupala. This takes place at the beginning of summer, and historically it was intended to search for brides and grooms. A couple of centuries ago, everyone ran almost naked through the forests and fields on this day — that was the tradition. In short, we like the remnants of paganism, and a Russian culture that existed before the Europeanisation of Russia in the 18th century.
Knitting is still very popular in Russia. But in the USSR it really flourished, maybe because people were really poor and there weren’t lots of garment options in the shops. So if in the USSR you wanted to wear something, you would have made it by yourself. So lots of women knit. This is also a tradition that remains.

We think yes, the fashion industry encourages artistic freedom. You have to have a bold statement to attract attention. As for the problems — we really didn’t have any big troubles. Maybe we just have that kind of attitude. It also really helps that we used to work in fashion before Vereja (Igor was a stylist and an editor-in-chief of Numero Russia, and Masha used to be a fashion journalist and Editor of Numero Russia — it’s where we met) and know how everything is supposed to work.

Some of our items, like this dress, are made from vintage napkins and tablecloths. We think, Soviet people had some kind of obsession with tablecloths and napkins. All houses, especially in rural Russia, were decorated with these textiles. Napkins were everywhere: on TVs, tables, sofas. It was also everywhere in Igor's childhood home. We used them a lot during the production of the first collections, but now we use them only for samples. But now we have developed our project into a knit installation too. For a couple of years now we have collected unwanted knitwear from our friends and followers and transformed it into an art piece. Here you can see the development. Everything started from the dress, that then was transformed into one installation, then a bigger one, and then a bigger one. On October 1st we opened the 25-meter high knit installation in Tsvetnoy department store in Moscow.

We don’t want to be an example. We just do what we want and what we find natural to do. There are lots of things around, why not use them?

They went great with every look and the collection in general. Also croc-like rubber shoes are very popular in Russian villages. Everybody uses them on a daily basis. So it also made sense.

When we started to work in fashion (Igor was a stylist and Masha was a journalist) we just opened Vogue Runway and went through all the shows of the season from A to Z, without missing anything. We also are and always were big fans of printed magazines, so we knew great photographers from it, like Tim Walker, whom Igor admires. Speaking of childhood — our favourite movies were Harry Potter and The Chronicles of Narnia. OK, we still love them. We watched The Chronicles of Narnia again a couple of weeks ago, as for Harry Potter — we revisit it no less than 4 times a year. We also love all the Marvel superhero movies. And Pokémon of course - although that's not western.

Nobody knows. But now Andre, that's the name of the dog, is the face of our collaboration with Moscow department store Tsvetnoy. And he also became one of the creatures in the Vereja’s universe.

Actually, we are such people. We are sexually active but a bit like children in our souls. We are also a bit infantile in terms of romantic relationships. We don’t know how to deal with it. So all we have is our sexuality and a desire to play. Sometimes we think that our puberty is not over yet.

Yes, we think it’s important. Knitting is a great area for creativity. You can use knits of all colours, and your mood and personality affect the way you knit. For example, you can tighten the threads more or less — so there could never be absolutely identical hand knitted pieces.

We hope to launch a Vereja Home someday: rugs, tableware, home textiles and so on. We also dream of doing a collaboration with Dover Street Market, and to extend our knitted installation so it covers the Mausoleum on Red Square in Moscow. It would be a great symbol of a new time and values in Russia.