DAGGER Turns Portrush Skate Memories Into ‘Play Hard’ for Fall/Winter 2026

DAGGER Turns a Cold Portrush Winter Into Something Worth Wearing

Fashion label DAGGER unveiled its Fall/Winter 2026 collection, “Play Hard,” with founder and creative director Luke Rainey turning memories of growing up in Portrush, Northern Ireland, into one very personal cold-weather wardrobe.

This is not seaside nostalgia with the sun turned up. Rainey goes back to the opposite version of the place — the tourist season gone, arcades boarded up, winter weather rolling in and young people left to make their own entertainment. For him, skateboarding became escape, culture and a way to belong when there was not much money or much else to do.

That lived-in energy is what gives “Play Hard” its bite. DAGGER takes school uniforms, sportswear, workwear and early-2000s skate references, then runs them through oversized outerwear, denim, knitwear, graphic pieces and layered jersey. Nothing feels interested in looking too polished — which is exactly the point.

“Play Hard” Starts With the Place That Made Luke Rainey

DAGGER describes the collection as a love letter to Portrush, the working-class seaside town where Rainey grew up. Instead of recreating his childhood literally, he pieces together the atmosphere: empty arcades, fog, distant sounds, flashing lights, bad weather and the kind of boredom that forces you and your friends to invent a world of your own.

Rainey’s version of skate culture is less about selling a perfect image of rebellion and more about what it gave him when options were limited. The collection keeps coming back to resilience, rough edges, fragility and community — the good stuff that can happen when you have very little except each other.

School Uniforms, Workwear and Y2K Skate Get Recut

The clothes carry those memories without turning into costume. Oversized outerwear, battered-looking denim, knitwear and layered jersey sit next to more familiar school and sports references, while workwear gives the collection a tougher backbone.

There is plenty of early-2000s skate DNA in the mix, but DAGGER avoids the easy route of simply photocopying an old skate-shop wall. The silhouettes are bigger, the styling is rougher and the familiar pieces feel slightly displaced — like somebody remembered them after too many years and rebuilt them from whatever details survived.

Vans and Eastpak Hit the Memory Button

Two brands from Rainey’s own youth become part of the story. Vans appears throughout the collection in hand-customized versions of his favorite Authentics and Slip-Ons, while Eastpak comes in through a far more personal object: the Pack’r backpack he carried when he was younger, covered in drawings and patches sewn on by his grandmother.

That backpack reference says a lot about what DAGGER is doing here. “Play Hard” is strongest when the clothes feel connected to objects somebody actually used, ruined, fixed and kept — not when nostalgia is treated like another graphic trend waiting to be printed on a T-shirt.

DAGGER Is Growing Up Without Cleaning Itself Up

The FW26 release also marks another step in DAGGER’s move from cult streetwear label toward a fuller fashion identity. Founded in Berlin in 2020 after Rainey unexpectedly lost his job, the brand started with €300 and a dismissal-letter line that became the basis for its enduring “All the Best” slogan.

Six years later, the clothes are traveling much farther than Portrush. For Fall/Winter 2026, DAGGER is launching with 20 retailers worldwide, including Dover Street Market Paris, Antonioli in Italy and GR8 in Japan, while keeping the DIY, worn-in spirit that gave the brand its reason to exist in the first place.

And thank gawd it has not been sanded down along the way. “Play Hard” works because the collection understands that growing up does not mean pretending the scraped knees, bad weather, stupid nights and people who kept you sane never happened. Sometimes that is thee whole wardrobe.

Dig into the DAGGER Fall/Winter 2026 campaign below — a little Portrush winter, a lot of skate-bred attitude and enough rough-around-the-edges styling to keep the memories from getting too pretty.

Sources: DAGGER / Berlin Fashion Week / FY Magazine! Campaign images: DAGGER.