Some collaborations are built around product.
Others are built around story.
The Marina-Strone Collection sits firmly in the second category.
Social enterprise Two Good Co has partnered with Australian fashion label Alémais and food personality Melissa Leong to create a limited-edition collection that transforms a family minestrone recipe into wearable design using food and fashion as vehicles for tangible social impact.
At its heart is Marina.
A Recipe With History
Marina is a graduate of Two Good’s Work Work employment program. Her family minestrone recipe, passed down from her mother, has become one of the organisation’s most loved dishes. Known affectionately as Marina-Strone, it carries generations of love, resilience and care.
It is cooked by women participating in the Work Work program and served as donated meals to women’s refuges across Sydney.
This year, that recipe moved beyond the kitchen.
From Pot to Textile
Together, Two Good Co and Alémais have translated Marina’s story into a textile collection that captures the warmth of shared meals and the power of connection.
Designed in collaboration with Alémais co-founder and creative director Lesleigh Jermanus, the collection includes:
Each piece is rooted in ritual, cooking, sharing, nourishing, and each purchase carries direct impact.
Buy One, Give One
The Marina-Strone Heirloom Throw marks the fourth instalment of Two Good’s Buy 1, Give 1 initiative. For every throw purchased, an identical piece is donated to a woman staying in a refuge, offering warmth and dignity during winter.
Limited to 500 pieces, once sold out, 500 throws and 1,300 Marina-Strone meals will have been donated, with 50 per cent of profits reinvested into empowering and employing women living in crisis.
The Long Sleeve Everyday Tee and Market Tote each include a meal donation with purchase. The Market Tote arrives filled with a Marina-Strone starter kit, Olsson’s sea salt flakes, Mr. Olio extra virgin olive oil, Mutti tomato paste and tomatoes, Carmelina borlotti beans, Two Good’s herb mix and Maestri Pastai orecchiette, honouring the ritual of selecting ingredients with intention.
It’s design as care.
Food as Language
Melissa Leong joins the campaign as ambassador, reflecting the shared belief that food is a universal language of identity and generosity.
The collaboration builds on the success of Two Good and Alémais’ 2024 Cook in Colour collection, reinforcing shared values of craftsmanship, sustainability and meaningful storytelling.
For Marina, seeing her family recipe evolve into a collection has been deeply personal.
A meal once made during scarce times one that made people feel loved, now exists as textile, garment and gesture.
The collection becomes more than product. It becomes continuity.
Since 2016, Two Good Co has delivered more than 323,000 meals and 25,000 gifts to women’s refuges, alongside providing over 106,000 hours of paid employment and more than $3.2 million in wages through its Work Work program.
What began as a soup kitchen in Kings Cross has grown into a nationally recognised social enterprise built on one simple idea: food can change the course of someone’s life.
The Marina-Strone Collection extends that philosophy translating nourishment into something you can wear, gift or wrap around yourself.
The Two Good Co x Alémais Marina-Strone Collection is now available via LINK
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