Harris Reed Debuts New Fluid Basics Line – WWD

LONDON — It’s been a hell of a year for Harris Reed, who has kept busy dressing everyone from Iman to Emma Watson and Harry Styles in his romantic creations and debuting sell-out collaborations with jewelry label Missoma, Etro and Mac Cosmetics.

Before the year ends the up-and-coming designer has one more trick up his sleeve: A line of “fluid basics” launching with Bergdorf Goodman, Matchesfashion and Le Bon Marché.

But this isn’t a case of slapping a label on a T-shirt and looking to make a quick buck. Reed’s aim with the new venture is to start making the message of gender fluidity, always at the core of everything he does, more accessible.

“I’m getting messages from everywhere, from Texas to Asia and South Africa, from people who want to be part of the brand but might not want to wear those really flamboyant demi-couture pieces. Those are selling for 7,000 to 12,000 pounds and we’ve been getting so many orders in but I wanted to create something that’s more accessible,” said the designer.

Laid-back T-shirts, cotton shirts, or French terry robes might seem far removed from Reed’s flamboyant universe. But when he’s not in towering platforms, sharp tailoring or Victorian-inspired ruffled blouses, Reed has always found himself in lounge wear.

“The pandemic has been going on for the majority of my design career, so I’m always sitting on meetings in lounge wear and turning them around, trying to make them my own. So this felt like it completed my world,” he said, adding that he can now offer the celebrities he works with his own luxurious terry robe to change into during fittings or give clients the perfect T-shirt to wear underneath his loud flared suits.

“I started with this heightened version of fluidity, it was almost my way of protest: let’s make the biggest hat in order to make the biggest statement and make people rethink. But now I can see that putting on a cashmere poet shirt can be camp, too; you can throw your leg up, get cozy and move your body in a much more animated way.”

A self-confessed ballet obsessive, Reed sees his new line as performance wear of sorts, where people of all genders and sizes can move freely in and express themselves.

“Expression is freedom and performance is fluidity, so we’re finding new, hopefully clever, ways to communicate that,” he added.

The line, which is priced between $128 and $318, includes jersey tanks gathered at the back, loose jersey or French terry T-shirts, cotton shirts and a terry blazer robe and matching flared pants — a spin-off of Reed’s now-signature flared suits.

Delving into lounge wear was also Reed’s way of keeping his business going without conforming to traditional business models or compromising his sustainability commitments.

‘I’m not planning on doing traditional ready-to-wear anytime soon and conforming to something which feels subpar to me, so this is my way of touching on that. I don’t see the point on having a bunch of blouses on a rack and factories churning them out,” said the designer, who instead worked with a manufacturer in Italy, which was also behind the T-shirts The Row started with and is producing a limited number of stock on traditional looms. “That way we know exactly how much product is being made, it’s being shipped directly to stores, and we aren’t producing any more until we see how it goes. This is so much more modern than conforming to traditional business models and diluting my vision.”

While there have been conversations aplenty around the need to embrace more sustainable business models across the industry, Reed has been among the few names to stick to his guns and resist jumping into the traditional seasonal calendar.

“It’s hard and as a 25-year-old concerned about running a business and having people on payroll now, I had to sit on many meetings that felt like tokenism. It made me want to do it my own way, out of my own pocket even more. My student days of saying ‘f–k you, I just want to make a giant hat’ might be over, but now I want to find ways to make the hat, still say ‘f–k you’ and also make product people can access,” said the designer, a rebel at heart who is determined to shake up the system.

As part of his mission of challenging the system, Reed also went the extra mile with a dedicated campaign featuring individuals across genders, sizes and backgrounds in a series of intimate images. “It was people who were already part of our community and this helps get our message across so much quicker. The product is unfussy so we didn’t need to create this crazy universe, gender representation, nonbinary representation and the racial profile of all the different models was everything,” said Reed, adding that he only worked with retailers that understood the message and were open to presenting the collection in line with his values of inclusion.

Looking ahead, the young designer, who was just honored at Monday night’s Fashion Awards, is gearing up to present another demi-couture collection next February — and rest assured the giant headpieces and extravagant tailoring will be making a comeback.

“I’ve got a new understanding of the brand’s vision and we’re evolving in new ways. It’s always going to be about couture and flamboyance, but also candles, jewelry and this new aspect of apparel that don’t have to compete with each other.”