House of Blanks’ sartorial success is rooted in its made-in-Canada ethos | Canada Voices

“We’re a cold country, so we should know how to make this stuff, right?” That’s how Amit Thakkar sums up his mission: making world-class fleece and other knits in a country where a lot of the textile industry disappeared decades ago. His brand, House of Blanks, has become a cult favourite among people who care about well-made basics like dense hoodies, great-fitting tees and cozy sweats.

A House of Blanks piece has no labels, no graphics, no identifying marks at all. The secret isn’t branding. It’s a place: Roopa Knitting Mills in Brampton, Ont. The family-owned textile factory was founded in 1991 by Amit’s father, Nat, and knits cotton fleece and jersey for some of the biggest names in fashion (Stüssy, Supreme, J.Crew, Roots).

But increasingly, its textiles go into its own collection. House of Blanks was born out of a mistake in 2008 when the younger Thakkar found himself sitting on a large amount of fabric produced at the wrong weight for a client. When he couldn’t find a buyer, he decided to cut it into sweatshirts and offered them directly to customers. Word spread, especially during the pandemic, and the line has since expanded to more than a dozen styles in 19 colours.

Roopa’s vertical integration is what sets it and House of Blanks apart. It knits raw cotton (mostly from the U.S.) into fleece, French terry and jersey on modern circular machines at its 72,000-square-foot facility, then dyes and pre-shrinks the fabric in its own 91,000-square-foot dye house across the street. From there, the fabric is cut and sewn in the company’s Scarborough facility. Every step happens in the GTA.

Thakkar says they’re simply perfecting the basics. “Outside of making a three-arm T-shirt, you’re not reinventing the wheel,” he says. Most blank brands (manufacturers that create apparel that a label can customize later) don’t knit their own fabric, let alone dye and sew it themselves. “Anyone can import; it’s harder to make things here,” Thakkar says.

Doing all of this in Canada requires a commitment to domestic production and a refusal to chase volume. The model only works with client support, customers who intentionally want Canadian-made quality and understand its cost: $35 for a T-shirt, $110 for a hoodie. It’s not luxury pricing, but it’s far from a Hanes three-pack. In a moment when people want to know where their clothes come from, they can point to a real place that employs Canadians and pays a living wage.

Even with tariff anxieties from American customers, 2025 was a strong year. Canadian buyers rallied, with sales up 100 per cent according to Thakkar, and domestic customers are the majority for the first time. Much of that growth has been driven by online word of mouth and endorsements from men’s-wear voices like Vancouver-born writer Derek Guy.

“Maybe it sounds a little braggadocious, but we have made a name for Canadian fleece,” Thakkar says. “There’s a handful of knitters left in Canada, and when it comes to fleece, I think we’re the largest and best.”