What Burlington is known for
Argyle hosiery in the Scottish diamond, from the long-running German house. At Printemps.
Burlington's sock business traces back to Burlington Industries, a textile manufacturer founded in 1923 in Burlington, North Carolina. The brand's defining product, however, is a German invention: the first socks carrying its now-signature Scottish argyle diamond pattern were produced in 1975 in Schopfheim, Baden-Württemberg, turning what began as an American textile name into a European hosiery label built almost entirely around one motif. In 2008, FALKE KGaA, the German hosiery and knitwear house founded in 1895 by Franz Falke-Rohen and still family-run today from its headquarters in Schmallenberg, acquired the rights to manufacture and distribute Burlington-branded clothing, leather goods and accessories across Europe and other non-European markets, folding Burlington in as a distinct label within the wider Falke Group. For decades Burlington existed almost exclusively as a wholesale and multi-brand-retail name, sold through department stores and specialist hosiers rather than its own shops. That changed in January 2019, when the brand opened its first-ever standalone store, a 92-square-meter space at Schadowstraße 11 in Düsseldorf's Schadow-Arkaden, finished in raw walls and white surfaces built as a minimalist backdrop for the argyle pattern's color. It remains, as far as documented here, the brand's only company-operated physical retail location.
How ORBIS reads this city
Best for — Scottish-diamond argyle hosiery from a historic German-run brand
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