As Mary Teague prepared to leave Australia for a holiday in Hoi An, her friends offered some travel tips. The essential one? ‘You’ve got to go have something made.’

Hordes of tourists descend on the central Vietnam town’s famed tailoring shops to commission inexpensive clothing, either copies of pieces they already own or ones they’ve seen in stores or in magazines. But Teague found herself drawn to something else: the many stylish boutiques selling ready-to-wear fashion. ‘I must admit I’m quite surprised that there are a few of these around,’ Teague said on a late-summer afternoon at The O Collective, a shop that opened in 2015 and sells clothing, shoes, accessories and home furnishings by 10 Vietnam-based labels.

Tailoring is still hugely popular among tourists in Hoi An, an ancient trading port that lies 30 kilometres from the central city of Da Nang and down the road from several beach resorts. But in the past six years, nearly a dozen boutiques, most of them owned by Europeans or Australians, have cropped up amid the historic old town’s recognisable lantern displays, creating a new, eclectic fashion scene that is slowly gaining international renown.

‘Some people have the perception that everything in Hoi An must be cheap – so, yes, there are people that are not our customer group,’ says Louise Bach Mogensen, the Danish businesswoman who founded The O Collective and the Hoi An-based clothing label O-Thala. ‘But there are enough people who understand good design and are willing to pay for good design.’