Entering 2026, Norwegian high-end outdoor brand Helly Hansen joined hands with the Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club to kick off the first brand event of the new year with a sailing journey. Luxe.CO was invited to attend.
On 25 January, in Victoria Harbour, Hong Kong, Asia’s largest sailing yacht, Zili 5, together with the medal-winning M32 catamaran Chinaone.Ningbo, which has claimed honours at the M32 World Championship, sailed side by side, leading the fleet across the blue waters.
With a 177-year history and widely regarded as a pinnacle of sailing culture in Asia, the Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club will also embark on an in-depth partnership with Helly Hansen. Building on the club’s deep competition heritage and international membership network, the two parties share a common vision of promoting the development of water sports, inspiring and supporting more people to take on the rigorous challenges of the sea.
At the event, Asia’s largest sailing yacht Zili 5 and the accomplished M32 racing yacht that once competed around the world with the Chinaone.Ningbo sailing team appeared together. Guests personally took part in the sail-hoisting ceremony, listened to professional explanations from members of the Chinaone.Ningbo team, experienced the exhilaration of harnessing the wind, and immersed themselves in the sailing lifestyle advocated by Helly Hansen.
Among major outdoor sports brands, Helly Hansen is one of the few high-end brands with a century-long sailing heritage. In recent years, as the brand has expanded its channel layout in the Chinese market, its brand awareness has continued to rise year by year, thanks to its professionalism and reliability. Helly Hansen is now gradually becoming the choice of many hardcore outdoor enthusiasts and high-end consumers.
This collaboration with the Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club will further consolidate Helly Hansen’s professional influence within high-end sailing communities, while conveying the brand’s “north-south parallel advance” strategy in the Chinese market. With water-based scenarios at its core combined with multidimensional outdoor experiences, the brand continues to strengthen professional recognition and lifestyle penetration among consumer groups in South China and coastal regions.
According to the 2024 annual report released by Chinese apparel company Youngor Group (SH:600177), the joint-venture brand Helly Hansen (not consolidated, accounted for using the equity method) benefited from strong momentum in outdoor and sports consumption, achieving rapid growth, with sales up 116%.
Helly Hansen product lines developed around sailing
The founder of the Helly Hansen brand, Helly Juell Hansen, was himself a ship captain who forged an inseparable bond with the sea. For more than a century, the brand has drawn inspiration from extremely harsh natural environments, continuously pushing innovation to protect sailors around the world with professional equipment designed to withstand wind and waves.
In Norway in 1877, Helly Juell Hansen and his wife Margrethe ran a waterproof equipment factory. At the time, their products were mainly intended to protect sailors from icy rain and snow at sea. In a chance experiment, the couple used coarse linen soaked in linseed oil to make waterproof garments and sail covers, unexpectedly achieving excellent results. The following year, they took a jacket made from this waterproof fabric to the Paris World Exposition, where it won a major award and quickly gained fame across Europe.
Having once served as a ship captain, Helly Juell Hansen understood better than anyone the harsh survival conditions faced when sailing in Norway. As stated on the brand’s official website, “To conquer the sea has become an inevitable destiny for Norwegians.”
As a result, Helly Hansen is highly favoured among top sailors across the world’s five oceans, maintaining long-term partnerships with elite sailing athletes and professional associations. The brand is also an official sponsor of The Ocean Race.
After entering the Chinese market, Helly Hansen has been committed to supporting the vigorous development of sailing in China. The Chinaone.Ningbo sailing team, long sponsored by the brand, once again stepped onto the podium at the M32 World Championship at the end of 2025, highlighting the rise of Chinese sailing strength.
In June 2024, Helly Hansen’s design elements appeared on Asia’s first trimaran, launching the Circumnavigation of China Sea Sailing Season. The participation of celebrities such as Huang Jue and Van Ness Wu sparked lively discussions on social media.
Anchored in the spirit of sailing, Helly Hansen has built a product system covering diverse outdoor scenarios through the integration of professional functionality and design aesthetics. At present, the brand focuses on three core categories: sailing, outdoor activities and skiing.
Looking ahead, Helly Hansen will continue to roll out diverse activities through combined scenarios such as sailing and hiking, integrating the culture of South China, optimising product and channel layouts, and deepening connections with local consumers.
This event was not only a professional sailing activity that “carries forward a century-old sailing spirit and opens a new eastern route”. By choosing Hong Kong, an international sailing hub, as the venue, Helly Hansen also revealed its strategic determination to deepen its presence in the southern Chinese market, integrating its ocean-born brand DNA into the construction of a high-quality outdoor lifestyle in the Greater Bay Area.
｜Image Credit: Brand-provided
｜Editor: LeZhi
