Where the Met demands interpretation, Harris Reed, the label, has always been about declaration. Whilst studying at Central Saint Martins, Harris was commissioned to create custom looks for Harry Styles and Solange Knowles, so by the time he graduated, the brand was already established and internationally known. The overall DNA of the label is self-described as “Romanticism gone Nonbinary”, with fluidity at the core of everything the demi-couture business (demi-couture because it’s made outside of France). Of course, the world has drastically changed, some would argue regressed, since the brand’s mission statement was first penned. Has this impacted the brand’s ability to grow at a time when there’s a backlash against the very values it was built on? “I actually think it’s the thing that’s saved us,” Harris says. “The fact that we have this tactility, to jump between (dressing) different people, was able to keep us.” It’s true. Very few brands could count both Sam Smith, a non-binary artist with a body type less visible in mainstream fashion, and say, a more conservative client looking for a dress for their 50th birthday as customers. Let alone be able to maintain a sense of authenticity while doing it. “I got ridicule and more negative press in the beginning when people were like, ‘What is fluidity?’ But now it’s more accepted because people recognise that we’ve always done clothes for everybody, every gender.”
