London, Paris, Milan, New York and Holt? Where? A sleepy village in Norfolk, eastern England to be precise. While style watchers have grown accustomed to clothing brands and designers being based in one of the fashion capitals, increasingly that is not the case. The internet is providing both publicity – allowing fashion consumers to make their own discoveries – and a route to market, with its reduced overheads compared to bricks and mortar and direct-to-consumer sales allowing fledgling brands to grow steadily off low turnover. Add to this a growing localism – which in fashion terms is seeing more cities establish their own Fashion Weeks – and the desperation of fashion buyers internationally to differentiate their stock from the competition’s and meet the demand for freshness of an increasingly knowledgeable consumer, and the lesser-known names from the fashion wilds can suddenly become hot tickets. Cottage industry or star-in-the-making, fashion is thinking small in more than just its sizes.

OLD TOWN HOLT, ENGLAND

When Marie Willey and Will Brown discovered an old and characterful pair of British work trousers left in a pub, an idea formed. The result is Old Town, a brand using tough traditional cloths – cotton twill, moleskin, wool serge, tweed and cord – to create an evocative line of handmade-to-order men’s and womenswear withechoes of pre-war, ‘golden age’ England: trousers are high-rise; knitwear is Fair Isle; prints, 1950s-inspired; shirts, pullover or in Aertex.

It is a utilitarian philosophy that has inspired a number of other British workwear-based brands too, among them Albam and Oliver Spencer. “We are the slowest growing business you could find,” says Willey, “but all the talk of recession is an advantage to small, more customer-focused brands like ours, because suddenly they are standing out. Customers are pickier, about product, service and the environment they shop in.”

RONALDO FRAGA, SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL

If one São Paulo flagship store draws fashion followers it is the crazy world espoused by Ronaldo Fraga. A Brazilian blend of Franco Moschino and Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, Fraga imbues his clothing with sharp cutting, playing with proportion and inventiveness but also great whimsy. Trompe l’oeil dresses suggest the wearer has their knees folded to their chest; waistcoat and trousers are stitched to together to create a chic romper suit; skirts come made of tassels, random quilting or, it seems, paper doilies; prints are loud; tailoring is cropped but wearable. Fraga has been a regular at the city’s fashion week since 2002 and recently begun selling in the Japan and the UK, where London’s Design Museum chose his work for its 2008 Designs of the Year showcase. Global distribution cannot be far behind.