Review of Haderlump Spring 2024 Fashion Show
Berlin is cool. Berlin is fashion.
By Dao Tran
People who don’t know anything about Berlin know Berlin is cool. People who don’t know anything about fashion know Berlin is fashion. And when you take a look at Haderlump, you can totally see it’s Berlin fashion. I was talking to Christiane Arp, head of the Fashion Council Germany at the Haderlump show, and fully endorsing their decision to highlight the young and upcoming designers in their second outing as stewards of Berlin Fashion Week. Because if Berlin has anything to offer, it is the fresh and the new.
For their second outing altogether, Haderlump has got it together. Their Spring/Summer 2024 collection, Opus Manuum, is an homage to craftsmanship. With professional staging at the Wilhelm Hallen in Berlin placing their team and atelier front and center, it tied them full circle to the inspiration for the collection, “the people behind the craft and the craftsmen from the 19th and 20th centuries whose work was forgotten by the Industrial Revolution.” It’s a topical reference, as we find ourselves on the eve of the AI evolution, which may cause another wave of obsolescence while creating new demands. The Industrial Revolution was also the inflection point at which clothing started to be mass produced instead of made to order. Interestingly enough, one of the promises of AI are to, for example, better predict demand so as not to create waste. At Haderlump, “everything is designed and manufactured in-house and produced only upon request to avoid overproduction.”
As producing fashion with maximum sustainability and circularity is a core principle, Haderlump explains that “for custom items, we use textile scraps from the Textilhafen Berlin. For all other products, we use deadstock fabrics from Recovo and our own recycled fabrics that we are producing in Spain.” In keeping with the idea of sustainability through durability and long term investment pieces, they offer free repair of their pieces, damage allowing. In fact, the name Haderlump itself is a reappropriation of what was once a derogatory term for scrap collectors who provided paper mills with old fabrics. Founded by Julius Weissenborn and Johann Erhardt in 2021, they transform “rags” into unique, high end pieces. One can tell that each garment is handmade with deliberation and care in their atelier in Berlin Neukölln – you can feel the hands on approach in the interesting fabrications and the love of perfectionism in the details.
First and foremost, Haderlump does good pants, and good pants are hard to find.
Pants can make a collection. Pants can make a brand. Their materials and cuts and patterns are recognizable and covetable. Do pants well, be known for that, and that’s a great place to start.”
Yes, everybody’s doing cargo pants again – and these are pretty great. As are these sailor pants. The raw edge, paint splashed pant could be a good signature look. And the shorts over pants gen brings up the range that is served – there is definitely something for everyone.
Opus Manuum reimagines the workshop aesthetic, giving classic workwear staples a futuristic-industrial silhouette. The neutral color palette of blues, black and brown gives it a uniform feel, while the good tailoring gives it a design sensibility, makes it a statement. This is not just any gown, skirt, or coat.
They also serve good accessories and hardware. This briefcase or this toolkit could become it bags. There is an industrial anonymity at the same time as a quirky uniqueness. They also played a great hand in handing out one of the best goodie bags at the show: a Converse Chuck Taylor x Haderlump collab bag – so awesome. Though it was a missed opportunity to not slap a logo on there. And who doesn’t need good gloves and sleeves?
Haderlump serve the many parts of ourselves with marketable consumer products.
They embody that which makes Berlin fashion exciting and aspirational – they sell urban aesthetic and dynamic in directional garments, they have identity written on the sleeves.”
And add value through artistic intervention. The creative act makes it unique. The resource poor or conserving are often the most resourceful. Haderlump creates new value with previously overlooked materials. This is Berlin.