RANRA SS26- RHUBARB: Clothes for the End of Darkness

There’s something unexpectedly poetic about naming a menswear collection after rhubarb. Not a gemstone. Not a rare bird. Not even an obscure French village no one can pronounce. Rhubarb.

In Iceland, it’s the humble plant that pokes its way through thawing soil to announce, Spring is here. For RANRA’s co-founders Arnar Már Jónsson and Luke Stevens, it’s also the perfect metaphor for clothing that grows on you: literally and emotionally.

The Name That Grows on You

Arnar says it best:

“Rhubarb has always marked the beginning of something for me… The end of darkness, the first sign that things are growing again.”

For a country that spends half the year under a blanket of shadow, rhubarb’s first appearance is practically a holiday. And in this collection, that moment—the slow unfurling of life after winter—is stitched into every hem.

Luke Stevens adds his own philosophy:

“There’s something really powerful in paying attention to what’s right in front of you—what’s seasonal, what’s real.”

That line might as well be RANRA’s unofficial mission statement: clothes that don’t shout, but last. Not designed to impress strangers at first glance, but to become a part of you: like that jacket you’ve had for years that remembers every trip, spill, and sudden downpour.

The Fabrics: Humble, But With Stories

No high-gloss synthetics here. Instead, silk-linen blends, sun-faded marina cotton, and raw canvas, fabrics that look better the more you live in them.It’s classic tailoring, yes, but RANRA’s version is looser, softer, inviting you to be at home in your surroundings rather than fight them. You don’t wear these clothes to dominate a room. You wear them because they’ve already adapted to you.

Somewhere in the audience, someone murmurs, “This is the kind of jacket that doesn’t mind a little mud,” and they’re right.

The Outerwear: Built for Weather (and for You)

Two standout leather jackets—deep rhubarb red and rich coffee brown—look like they’ve been waiting for the next Atlantic storm. They’re rain-repellent without screaming about it. The kind of pieces that, a decade from now, will still carry the shape of your shoulders and the faint ghost of every trip they’ve taken.

The Motion Pieces: Made for the Elements

Billowing cotton-linen and silk ripstop shorts are cut wide enough to catch the wind whether you’re on a cliff edge or walking home from the bakery.And that’s the thing about this collection: every garment feels like it was made with actual movement in mind. It’s not about posing—it’s about walking through a drizzle with your hands in your pockets, or kneeling to fix a bike chain without worrying about the knees.

The Wear Marks Are the Point

In RANRA’s world, bleached shoulders, rain-faded shoes, and worn elbows aren’t flaws—they’re proof of life. These clothes are meant to change with you. The sun, the rain, the salt in the air: they all leave their mark. And instead of fighting it, the brand celebrates it. You don’t just own these garments, you collaborate with them.

The Runway That Wasn’t

For their first in-person presentation, RANRA decided the traditional runway was too… traditional.Instead, they turned it into a collective ritual—a space where audience and performer dissolved into one experience. No sharp lines between “models” and “people watching the models.” Instead: gathering, sharing, existing in the same space.

The Broth Ritual

And then comes the twist: broth.Yes, broth. Not as an accessory, but as an act. Nutritional, medicinal, ancient. Humans have been making broth for as long as we’ve made fire, and RANRA takes that universality and turns it into a metaphor for clothing: you build it from what’s around you: plants, herbs, bones, berries and it carries the essence of place and time.

Guests are invited to sit, share, and drink.It’s fashion as nourishment, fashion as gathering. A collection not just to wear, but to inhabit.

Final Impression

RANRA SS26 is quiet, but like rhubarb, it grows stronger the longer you let it be. It doesn’t beg for your attention: it earns it over seasons, over years, over the lives you live in it.

Clothes for the end of darkness. Clothes for the first walk after winter. Clothes for when you realise that what lasts is what matters.