Bella Magee: How do you typically begin a collection – what comes first?
Hadi Ahmadi Pour: I have over twenty collections roughly conceptualised with draft sketches, writing and references stored away. They typically come to me in a hallucinatory and overwhelming way. When the new season rolls around, the decision to go with a concept is very instinctual and based on what’s resonating most intensely at the time. I pattern-cut and sew every sample myself in the studio, so the process is really rapid. Once I know what I’m leaning into, I begin heavier research; collecting reading material and writing my own to extrapolate what I’m trying to communicate. Materially, I start with the print designs and everything else flows from there.

BM: Your FW26 collection examines how mystique is constructed, what initially drew you to secrecy and ritual as topics?
HAP: When I was twelve, my older sister started reading conspiracy theories to me about the Illuminati and other supposedly nefarious actors. It completely shattered my childlike naivety and suburban perception of the world. I was suddenly confronted with the fact that society was often manipulated by different groups of people. The unknown nature of it all really stuck with me and festered – great fantasies about what these groups had access to, whether it was wealth, power, occult potential and ultimately the idea of an ‘exclusive truth’, some profound knowledge of the human experience. It wasn’t until I began to dissect it in my adulthood that I realised what I was projecting was actually quite empty in reality.
The Freemasons, who are the inspiration for conspiracies like the Illuminati, are the oldest fraternity with thousands of lodges in big cities and small country towns all over the world. They are very secretive about their rituals and internal operations, as well as what their societal contribution is. They dress up in baroque regalia, appropriating symbols from antiquity to create an esoteric image of power and lineage. When the artifice is stripped away, the reality is that most of these lodges are full of middle-aged, middle-class, majority white men in dusty rooms wearing dusty clothes, talking about the weather and organising fishing trips. They occasionally perform rituals to simulate a feeling of sacredness and further a bond with their brotherhood. This isn’t to completely discount the organisation or the beneficial function it has in its members’ lives. It’s about the human drive to believe there is more, and the disappointment when proximity reveals there isn’t.

“When the artifice is stripped away, the reality is that most of these lodges are full of middle-aged, middle-class, majority white men in dusty rooms wearing dusty clothes…”

BM: What were the specific references that fed into this collection?
HAP: I was rejected from every Masonic lodge I approached until the Grand Lodge in Sydney agreed to let me in. There’s an informal archive hidden inside, with antique regalia and rare objects on display for visiting Freemasons. I was closely chaperoned and shown their holdings; a portrait hall of past Grand Masters of the lodge, cabinets full of peculiar silver objects, handwritten and block-printed manifests. There was a point where I was in this dimly lit room overwhelmingly surrounded by symbols. After pleading with my guide, he unlocked one of their ceremonial rooms, which also housed ornate aprons sourced from lodges around the world. They were like couture dresses, laborious and intricate beading on silk and brush-painted leather bordered with hand-woven moiré ribbon. After I left, I was on a mission to find some of these objects myself. I was able to purchase uniforms and ephemera from antique dealers, which I then deconstructed and studied, remnants of which (the wire bullion fringe, embroidered velvet and brass clasps) were used in the collar of the first look, draped over the models and used in jewellery. The heavy swing of one of the Masonic coats I bought inspired the tailoring, which I exaggerated with my pattern cutting.

“I was rejected from every Masonic lodge I approached until the Grand Lodge in Sydney agreed to let me in.”

BM: The decision to present the collection entirely in white is striking, what is the thought process behind this?
HAP: For me, fashion, for all its contradictions, is the ultimate surface. The collection started with the concept of it being all-white, as the notion exaggerated this idea, providing a true ‘blank’ to project and construct my ideas. It’s the hardest colour to work with – every stitch and mark shows, and as the fabric is never fully opaque, you have to go to great lengths to mask the internal construction underneath. These pressures and limitations almost forcefully shifted the focus to cut and material. The same idea of projection onto blankness exists in Freemasonry and many cultures; white as a symbol of purity, something not yet influenced or corrupted. It is worn by the new initiates before they take on their new identity, eventually graduating to the bolder uniforms of the seniors. The system projects itself on the Masons through uniforms that suppress individual variation, so a hierarchy can be visually immediate. The collection incorporates signifiers across the whole hierarchy, but to me, it’s all hollow, so it’s flattened into monochrome.

BM: How did you create the prints and embellishments in the collection?
HAP: The print designs are the main graphic focal point. I took photos of prominent symbols adorning and carved into Masonic buildings, altering them to create mottled motifs screen printed onto garments. The symbols include a double-headed eagle (duality) an ornate anchor (stability), the letter G (the Great Architect) and a cable tow (a ritual rope worn during initiation). There are also breast and collar medallions worn by the Freemasons, similar to military regalia, refashioned in white glossy silicone and adhered to jeans and t-shirts. Another prominent feature is the silk moire ribbon, which is attributed to the ceremonial aprons worn for meetings and rituals. These manifest in a bondage fashion, caging the body across the chest and legs. There’s also this open-work knit lace material, half covering garments with raw edges, to give the appearance of an ornate surface that’s worn away to reveal what’s blank underneath. The final motif is the antique brass featured in the zips, wire bullion fringe salvaged from vintage Masonic aprons and jewellery pieces that have been artificially aged.

BM: Materials like silk and antique brass carry strong connotations – how do you decide when material should communicate meaning versus when it is used purely because it’s the best choice for the garment’s construction?
HAP: I separate the materials between adornment and form. The signifiers used in this collection, like the silk moire ribbon, antique brass and print designs, are just an appropriation of another appropriation. The Freemasons took these material motifs from ancient Egypt, Solomon’s Temple and medieval stonemasons, so when I use those same symbols, I’m further diluting their meaning. Repetition and recognition are what replace substance in a symbol that’s hollowed out and aestheticised. They express more literally the collection’s ideas with their visual and contextual value, but in isolation, they hold no emotional connection to me. When you strip back the adornment in the collection, you see the cuts and proportions I’m interested in. These details are the purest expression of the mood I’m trying to communicate. The garment has to function before it can signify, so the base material’s main priority is its drape, opacity and weight. In this collection, it’s predominantly cotton in very specific fabrications like loopwheel fleece and military fabric.

“I feel a responsibility that garment making, and everything involved with it, should remain complex in a world increasingly bleached and uniform.”

BM: How does this collection reflect your brand identity?
HAP: To me, there is no separation between my label’s identity and my own identity, not yet anyway. It’s a projection of myself and often aspects that are unevolved or not able to be expressed in daily life. The collection is conceptually rigorous but materially grounded, every idea has to exist in clothing that someone can genuinely wear. I’m trying to push away from what feels like ubiquitous merchandising, yet still grow and sustain a viable practice. There’s a consistent preoccupation with surface; it’s me trying to understand what it can mean and how it can be so enamouring. There’s a specific material focus on silicone and plastic, like the glossy raised prints and my logo object that is sewn to the back of every garment. I feel a responsibility that garment making, and everything involved with it, should remain complex in a world increasingly bleached and uniform. A tension the collection is working through.

BM: If you had to pick a song to soundtrack the collection, what would it be?
HAP: Illusory by Jarboe.

Follow Hadi Ahmadi Pour on Instagram.
Photography Joe Brennan
Fashion Tristan Levi Kane