If the name Harris Reed sounds familiar, it could be because he made the dress Iman wore to the Met Gala earlier this month, and made it onto the best-dressed list; or it could be the jewellery collection he recently designed with Missoma. Maybe you also remember him from the lace dress that he customised for Harry Styles. Even before the gender fluid designer had presented his first physical show at this season’s London Fashion Week, Reed had already achieved international fame, thanks in part to the already impressive roster of celebrity clients at the tender age of 25.
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For spring/summer 2022, the 10 looks were presented as a ‘demi-couture collection’. Its name ‘Found’ referred very literally to the fact that almost all fabrics were picked apart and recycled from second-hand clothing purchased from Oxfam. The messages of sustainability and responsibility were a top note of the collection, putting the designer’s skills to the test. There were old fashioned wedding veils and trains that were re-constructed into the long tails of spliced tuxedos, and satin fabrics of wedding dresses tailored into a panelled suit and an asymmetrical dress whose skirt is a cascade of ruffles.
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Gender fluidity has already become synonymous with Reed’s personal brand, and the collection is not only gender-neutral, but also an elaboration on the designer’s approach to intersecting softness and romanticism with the male figure. Where wedding traditions dictate strict allocations of the binary colours between the sexes (white for the woman, black for the man), in Reed’s designs, they are merged or switched in a deliberate disregard for gender-based conventions.
As part of Oxfan’s ‘Second Hand September’ campaign that promotes buying pre-loved items, one of the looks in Reed’s collection will be on display at the Selfridges X Oxfam space in London.
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