I (Re)Designed the Hunza G Swimsuit
“This crinkle is better than the original crinkle.”
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When I meet with Hunza G co-founderGeorgiana Huddartover video, snapshots of one-pieces and two-pieces from the label cover the wall behind her. It’s not unlike a shrine to the suits — named theTiffany,Pamela,Celine,Brooke, andSadie— which kind of makes sense, as Huddart helped shape the brand that launched a thousand crinkle suits. Founded as Hunza in 1984 byPeter Meadows, who trademarked its Original Crinkle fabrication, the line became famous for its innovative material — and the women who wore it.Julia Roberts’s Vivian Ward strutted down Rodeo Drive in it, and Whitney Houston danced in it in“I Want to Dance With Somebody.” But thebusiness slowed in the ’90sand lay dormant until 2015, when Huddart relaunched the brand as a co-founder and creative director.
In the ten years since, Hunza G has become synonymous with the wordcrinkle, becoming “the biggest name in this swimwear bubble.” Even with competition from newer crinkle brandsYouswimandBond-Eye, founded in 2018 and 2011, respectively, Hunza G is still as much a fixture at the Rockaways as it is in the Hamptons. And while the suits don’t come cheap — prices range from $220 to $295 — the Hunza G customer is nothing if not loyal (something I learned while reporting ourswimsuitguide). “It doesn’t make me feel like I’m strapped in like my other [swimsuits],” an illustrator said about theNicole. My editor even called theGigiher most-worn swimsuit.
So in the tradition of our “I Designed the …” series (previous installments include interviews withRudy JudeandJill Guenzaof Levi’s), I asked Huddart all about Hunza G, from the difference between new Hunza and old Hunza to whether the company plans to change its sizing system.
This conversation has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
How did Peter Meadows come up with the crinkle-stretch fabric?
He found the fabric at a trade show in the 1980s. I think he had been influenced by Alaïa and wanted to use it for ready-to-wear. He realized it was more a body-sculpting material and, as it happened, perfect forswimsuits. It had lots of elastane, so it was incredibly stretchy. Many swim fabrics aren’t knitted, as the crinkle is. It’s essentially a sweater with a lot of yarns of nylon in it. I don’t think there was anything comparable on the market yet, and it’s not something that you see historically in swim. This was an interesting time for innovation in fabric; like Lycra became a huge thing. The world was very much moving in a technical direction. It’s when everyone clicked into that. It’s when the first Apple Macintosh was designed. Hunza had loads of success from 1984 to around 1998. Whitney Houston wore it in the “I Want to Dance With Somebody” video. There wasPretty Woman. But, truthfully, that came at the end of Peter doing Hunza the first time around. It became more about selling to wholesalers, less about building a brand. And, of course, the aesthetic changed going into the ’90s. It wasCorinne Day, Kate Moss, black and white. Hunza wasn’t that. It kept with the neons. Then Peter stopped doing Hunza completely.
You came in about 30 years later. What was important to get right with the relaunch?
It’s not like when I relaunched I had to undo 20 years of not-good things. There had been this history, then nothing, and then me. Very rarely does someone relaunch a brand that had huge success and just stopped, with nothing in the interim that had been brand devaluing. We had an incredible image, incredible heritage, incredible brand recognition, and still a lot to work with. I wanted to create something that spoke to all types of women. That’s body diversity, skin tone, age, everything. Nobody was really shooting on diverse and inclusive models before — they were women with a six-pack. The one-size wasn’t messaged out from an inclusivity point of view. It was more just a by-product of it being a tubular material. I knew what it did to your body, that it made you feel your very best and look your very best.
So what’s the difference between an original Hunza swimsuit and a Hunza G swimsuit?
I think the body is front of mind for us. How do we make all different types of women feel great in our swimsuits? They do cover your body in a better way than they did in the ’80s, but there’s still a massive nod to that heritage. I feel like there’s a good tension. I believe the original customers are probably moving more toward new Hunza than they are old Hunza anyway. Our most popular colors now are black, chocolate, cocoa, and bubblegum. It’s not the lime greens and the oranges like it used to be.
I read that you used to makeswimsuit sampleswhile studying at university. How did that influence the first designs under your creative direction?
I remember the fabric from when I was little. I found it again when I went to Berlin for a friend’s birthday at 18. I bought a whole rack of it — some tops, a skirt, dress, and bikini, all made in the crinkle fabric — for a hundred euros at a vintage shop. The first designs were pretty wacky. They were neon swimming costumes. I hadn’t quite gotten it yet. I’m not a designer, but I was trying to think about what looked good and what felt good. Then the next collection was a truer version of what we would become. It had mango, forest green, chocolate colors, and a beige we still call blush. That was very unusual for swim, those colors. The theme of it was called Northern Soul, and it felt really editorial. Hunza was not known for anything that was chic or neutral — it was bright pink and lime green. So that was a good step in the direction that we started to move into.
You mentioned the sizing of the swimsuits. A big thing the brand is known for is the one-size-fits-most (or around a U.S. size 2 to 12) sizing. Are there plans to expand the sizing range?
The size range is definitely something we’re always talking about. Honestly, Hunza fits a larger range than we say it does on the website. I’ve seen women who are bigger than the size on the website wearing skimpier Hunza and looking unbelievably good in it. I can’t tell a size-8 woman or a size-18 woman what I think would look best on them because it’s about what they want to show off. We really try to offer as much of a range as possible, and I really feel like there’s not much that wouldn’t work on most women.
What does it take to make a new swimsuit?
So the process opens up with mood boards that might have ice-cream colors, shells on the beach, etc. There are different stages of mood board. Then we’ll start drawing up sketches, and we get designs sampled — maybe a third, or even half, more than what actually makes it through. There might be this version and that version. They seem really similar, but one’s going to be better in the crinkle. It can be a hard fabric. Sometimes what you think will look good doesn’t. The material is thick, so you can’t do tiny details with it because they can look very bulky. The complicated bit on our side is making sure that the fit is democratic. We fit everything on me, a model, and the girls at the office will also try. We’re trying for bust options, size options, skin-tone options. There are normally about 15 new options in each collection. There can be new colorways within that as well.
What’s the hardest part of the process?
The hardest part is getting enough newness to a customer. You have women who are on their 12th Hunza that you’re trying to keep providing for while creating newness. We haven’t always got that down. I don’t think anybody external would know it, but we’ve had wholesalers say, “You should really do more skimpy styles. We’re selling them really well from another brand.” And we’ll try a skimpy style and it won’t sell because it’s not what customers are coming to us for.
We aren’t a very trend-led brand. It really is that women tend to find their shape on our website, and they rebuy that style. So the thing that’s really the hardest is trying to block out all the noise from external requests except for customers’. Our head of customer services, Lily, sends us an email every week with the comments, and those sometimes go into the design process.Could you make this strap in the X, Y, and Z? Or could you put more support around this part of the body?And when we do tweaks, it’s detail, it’s color, it’s shape.
Every swimsuit has a name, likePhoebe,Bonnie,Ruby,Camille. Do the names come before or after?
They come after. It’s like when people give birth and they have a list of names, and then they see what fits their baby best. Honestly, it’s so gut led. My merchandiser, Kristie, and I will often say something like,She’s obviously a Phoebe.It might mean nothing to somebody else, but to us, it makes total sense.
What would you say makes your crinkle swimsuit different from othercrinkle swimsuits? Someone on our team tried Youswim and Hunza G for comparison.
There’s the literal and the emotional. Peter was the first to use this fabric. He really did do something special, and so we were the first there. Also, our fabrics are different — our fabric is different from Youswim’s. If you had theirs and ours, they’re not the same. I actually don’t want to say anything negative about another brand. But for ours to perform the element that we say it does, which is to expand and recover, that’s taken redevelopment. Twice we’ve redeveloped the crinkle. This crinkle is better than the original crinkle. We’ve worked really hard on innovating in terms of stretch and technical performance. We’re constantly innovating and trying to get it to its absolute best. There’s so many more things we want to do with crinkle, too. Everybody else’s don’t offer the same level of design and detail, and if they do, it’s probably because they’ve copied ours.
Could you say more about the care of a Hunza G? Do you have any tips for making sure customers get many summers out of the swimsuit?
Customers expect general wear and tear from a product that’s athleisure-y in a way. You are exposing it to sun, sun cream, sea salt, chlorine. No one’s hand-washing swimsuits anymore. We do recommend you put the suit in the washing machine quickly. This is important after you’ve been in chlorine, because it can fade the color otherwise. I put mine on a 20- to 30-minute wash, depending on the color. Neons across any brand are more likely to fade over time. Those I do on a 20-minute wash — and anything else, 30 minutes. Then I leave it to dry on a radiator. I don’t tumble dry them, even though you can. You should have your Hunza for life. That’s how we think about it. I’ll sometimes get DMs from people wearing a color I know we’ve never done, and they say, “This is my piece from the ’80s that I still wear.” And that’s obviously thrilling.
Some of Georgiana Huddart’s favorite Hunza Gs
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Hunza G Domino
Rosie Huntington-Whiteley wore the Domino and posted it on her Instagram, saying, “This is the best swimsuit ever.” This was when we were still quite small, and we got 700 swimsuit orders in four hours, and we didn’t have 700 swimsuits! Our website crashed for two days. It was one of those brilliant start-up-company moments when everyone’s freaking out. It feels terrible but so exciting.
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Hunza G Pamela
I guess bubblegum pink is still my favorite color out of all the colors. I only wear black and white as a general rule. I’m like black, white, gray, very boring. But I live in the bubblegum-pink Pamela, which is this thin-strapped swimming costume. It’s an OG Hunza G style.
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New! You can now save this product for later.
New! You can now save this product for later.
A gingham collection was something I was trying to do for two years. It felt very new and came from me being obsessed with print and being desperate to do something that had a print and that felt true to Hunza. We’re not really a flowery company. The fabric itself is UV-protective and seersucker-y, and you can swim in before it dries on your body.
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