Making a garment
The key to our success is retaining the original quality of a hand-crafted garment. There are multiple procedures involved in the manufacturing process, and most are carried out by hand. Harley’s reputation of manufacturing the highest quality knitwear in the world is earned by conducting quality checks at each stage in the production cycle.

Knitting
A traditional knit garment is made up of several individual panels. Each individual knitted panel is checked by hand to ensure that it meets with our standards. We are one of the few private knitwear manufacturers to offer traditional fully fashioned and ‘seamless’ knitwear. Using the revolutionary ‘seamless’ production technique, each garment is knitted in a single unit, eliminating the need for joining of components, and producing a sleeker, and often better fitting garment.

Milling
The yarn in the knitted panels is still ‘greasy’ at this stage, and these panels are linked together to create the basic body ‘shape’. Washing garments in Scotland’s soft water is absolutely vital in achieving the unique soft and luxurious ‘handle’ of a Harley garment. The traditional skill of milling garments is passed from generation to generation.

Clean make-up
The washed garment passes through this area where a number of highly skilled processes are carried out. Perfecting the time-honored skills in garment make-up can take up to 18 months. Among these are the ‘Mathbirk’ process, which is a combined linking and over locking process to bind garment panels together, resulting in a strong tensile seamed garment.

Pressing and finishing
Each garment is pressed with the greatest of care, ironed, labelled, ticketed and packed ready for delivery to our customers. It is absolutely vital that these completed garments are perfect, and that is achieved by employing an experienced, competent and dedicated workforce.