Zakharchuk decided to take his business from the realms of fiction into the real world of war brought to his home city of Kyiv.
In the southern city of Odesa, a local fashion brand had all its divisions, even its lingerie seamstresses, sewing cloth vests to fit body armour plates. Oksana Cherepanych, 36, said it was not only self-interest that fuelled her decision to redirect her company from making hotel and restaurant uniforms into a manufacturer of Ukrainian regimental outfits.
Others, like Zakharchuk, are using this moment of reinvention for missions that border on the quixotic. He is producing ceramic-plated body armour vests - a feat that involved the smuggling of a Soviet-era kiln and enlisting the help of octogenarian scientists.