The Story: Mānoa for Tai Swim x Hawai'i Swim Show

Every year, we start drawing our Tai Swim prints long before most people will ever see them. They may stay in the vault for a while so it's fun to go back and revisit our favorites from time to time. Sometimes we know exactly what a print will become. Other times, a little sketch turns into something much more meaningful. Mānoa started with a lily.

Austin has always had a really distinct way of drawing. His line work is playful, abstract, and full of little details that you might not notice right away. His prints have easter eggs and hidden symbols that further explain the print or add whimsy. It's one of my favorite parts of getting to integrate our art together on our fabrics for Tai Swim. For Mānoa, that story started with something very personal. Austin drew this print for my birthday, a few years ago.

The lavender purple itself was inspired by the tranquil calmness of Mānoa Valley, at Lyon Arboretum. The lush green valley, the flowers, the feeling of being surrounded by the powerful wall of mountains, it felt like the perfect setting for the colors that we felt resonated best. This print can also look like an abstract crownflower, orchid, and other flora one might find on a nature walk in the valley.

Hidden throughout the print, you'll find hidden symbols amongst the flowers.

The stories behind the prints

We've always wanted our prints to mean something.

Being from Hawaiʻi, we're surrounded by places, people, plants, animals, colors, and stories that naturally become part of what we create. But we never want to arbitrarily name a print after a Hawaiian place or word just because it sounds beautiful. There's always a reason. We want to be able to tell you where something came from. Why we chose it. What it reminds us of. And, when we can, the story of the people who inspired it. That's especially important to us as Tai Swim continues to grow.

Mānoa

The finished Mānoa print is a soft, romantic lily floral in shades of purple, feminine, dreamy, and a little whimsical.

It's the kind of print that feels beautiful at first glance, but gets even more special once you know what's hiding inside it.

From a birthday drawing to Hawaiʻi's biggest swimwear stage

Before Mānoa ever made it to the website, she made her debut on Hawaiʻi's biggest swimwear stage.

We launched the collection at Hawaiʻi Swim Show, surrounded by some of the most exciting swimwear designers, buyers, models, and creatives from Hawaiʻi and around the world.

Seeing Mānoa come to life on the runway was such a full-circle moment for us. We styled the collection on a range of bodies and wanted the debut to feel playful, feminine, and unmistakably Tai Swim. And after months of having this print exist as sketches, samples, and tiny details on a computer screen, watching real women wear it for the first time was pretty special. The lily he drew for my birthday had become a full collection. And a print that started as something incredibly personal was finally being shared with our community. That is one of our favorite parts of what we do at Tai Swim: watching something that started as a little idea become something that belongs to so many different women.

Mānoa is available now

Mānoa is our newest Tai Swim capsule and one of our favorite collections we've ever created.

Shop the full collection, pair it with our matching accessories, and explore a few of our other favorites currently our now.

SHOP MĀNOA

Made with aloha,

Tai + Austy
Tai Swim