Hanwag

Hanwag was founded in 1921 when Hans Wagner, who came from a family of shoemakers, opened his own workshop in the small Bavarian village of Vierkirchen. From the start Wagner kept production on site at his own premises rather than farming work out, a structure that has stayed central to the company's identity as it grew from workshop to boot manufacturer.

In 1936, Hanwag supplied the leather ski boots used at the Winter Olympics held in nearby Garmisch-Partenkirchen, an early marker of the technical, mountain-focused reputation the brand built over the following decades in trekking and mountaineering footwear. The factory was looted during the Second World War, but Wagner restarted production soon after, first briefly under the shortened name Hawa before returning to Hanwag, built from his own name, Hans Wagner.

The company remained independent for most of the twentieth century before being sold in 2004 to Sweden's Fenix Outdoor Group. Despite the change in ownership, Hanwag has kept its headquarters and a significant part of its production in Vierkirchen, a village now connected to Munich by a fast urban rail line, more than a century after Hans Wagner opened his workshop there.