What Hestra is known for
Founded in 1936 by Martin Magnusson in the Swedish village of Hestra, the family firm began making leather and wool gloves for local lumberjacks before turning to ski gloves. Now run by the fourth generation of Magnussons, it produces more than two million pairs a year.
Hestra takes its name from the Swedish village in Småland where Martin Magnusson began making leather and wool gloves in 1936, originally to protect the hands of local lumberjacks. As the nearby Isaberg resort — one of Sweden's earliest ski destinations — grew, Martin's sons Lars-Olof and Göte, both keen skiers, joined the family business as teenagers and steered it toward ski gloves.
Ownership has stayed with the Magnusson family for roughly 80 years and four generations: a third generation of Svante and Claes was followed by a fourth generation of Niklas, Jacob, Anton and Jonas, who run the company today. That continuity is unusual among glovemakers of comparable scale, and Hestra has used it to grow well beyond a single village workshop — by 2021 the company was producing more than two million pairs of gloves a year.
The firm's public materials describe fingertip sensitivity and protection as the twin goals behind its glove construction, a framing consistent with its origins serving manual laborers before skiers, and its range still spans both technical ski gloves and everyday leather and wool styles.
Best for — Swedish-made ski and everyday gloves from a fourth-generation family maker
Sweden
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