The Los Angeles brand is steeped in handmade Balinese artistry and a laidback spirit, making each beach-inspired piece truly one-of-a-kind.

It’s no accident that Natalie Martin’s breezy, colorful dresses instantly evoke sun-swept visions of days spent by the sea. After all, the Australian-born, Los Angeles-based designer grew up near the beach. “It ingrained an attraction to pieces that take you from the beach to anywhere,” she explains. “I love a dress.”

But 10 years ago, finding a dress to wear “from the beach to anywhere” wasn’t always easy. “There was a real hole in the market for feminine, comfortable dresses that would speak to women of all ages and sizes,” Martin recalls. So, she did what any entrepreneurial creative might do: she took matters into her own hands. Drawing on skills developed working at brands like Tod’s and Hogan — as well as childhood visits to Bali, where she fell in love with hand-blocked prints, embroidery and gauzy fabrics — she created a small run of hand-printed batik dresses. “Basically, my perfect summer wardrobe,” she says.

Now, over a decade later, Martin’s namesake label is filled with more than breezy, colorful dresses. There are silky tank tops, billowy maxi skirts, slouchy pants, beaded necklaces and eyelet kimonos — just to name a few. “When I look at the brand now, it embodies luxurious ease,” Martin says of the assortment. “Pieces that pack down to nothing and that can be dressed up or worn casually.”

Items that can be “packed down to nothing,” it turns out, are an integral to Martin’s collection — and her lifestyle. The designer still makes frequent trips back to Bali, where every piece is sourced and handmade. “It has become less about finding the artisans and more about being part of the community and helping build a community of makers,” Martin explains of her globe-trotting production process, which includes using hand-screened prints — ones that often result in beloved color variations and one-of-a-kind pattern irregularities. “It speaks to the human touch and beauty in the tiny details; I love many hands being involved in the process.”

Much like her love of the beach, Martin’s passion for the unique can also be traced back to her childhood in that small Australian town. There, she’d spend hours poring over fashion magazines and weekends combing local thrift stores in order to recreate what she saw. “There was definitely no fast-fashion so it always felt like years passed waiting for what we saw in magazines to hit our shores,” she says. “We would try to find things we could embellish. I think the slowness of fashion back then forced us to be more creative with what we could get our hands on; you would try to make your outfit different by wearing an upcycled vintage camisole you’d found at the thrift store.”

These days, Martin — who, thanks to her penchant for iconic 70s bands like Fleetwood Mac and Led Zeppelin, describes herself as “a classic rock girl”— still infuses her own outfits with that same sense of originality. She’ll wear the chiffon Lily dress from her collection sans slip, pairing it instead with a bra and silk tap shorts. Or, tuck her Ariana tanks and Jennifer shirts into jeans and shorts. “I love seeing how people style the collection themselves and make it their own.” After all, she says, the collection is modeled after her own style: “very relaxed and understated, but with a high sense of glamor.”

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