I’ve updated the gallery with some lovely photos of Rooney, alongside sister Kate at the Animal Equality Inspiring Global Action Gala on Saturday (Oct 27) – both dressed in pieces from Rooney’s Hiraeth fashion line, which is completely free of animal products. Enjoy the photos!
WWD – The story of how Rooney Mara added “fashion designer” to her résumé is not unlike that of many who spot a hole in the market and aim to fill it: she couldn’t find what she wanted to wear in stores, and, believing others might feel the same, set out to create it herself.
A longtime vegan, Mara was struggling to find clothing that was both animal-free and at a quality level above fast-fashion.
“I’ve always loved Stella [McCartney] and I’ve worn Stella for stuff, but other than Stella there really aren’t many,” Mara says over the phone from Los Angeles. “In the last few years there have been a few other places that have popped up like Susi Studio, who makes a lot of vegan shoes, and Good Guys Don’t Wear Leather. I know a lot of them because I don’t wear or buy leather anymore, so I had to search around. But it wasn’t really exactly what I was looking for, which was how this thing sprang about. I had a need and I felt like there was a sort of gap in the market.”
Born from that was Hiraeth, a line of vegan and ethically made clothing, footwear and accessories, priced between $160 and $1,500, that Mara founded with close friends Chrys Wong and Sara Schloat. Launched this past February, the line has expanded into Barneys this August, with plans for further growth on the horizon.
“I’ve known Sara since I was little; we grew up in the same town and went to school together and have always loved fashion together,” Mara says. “We had been talking about doing something like this for awhile.” She and Wong, a former wardrobe consultant for Barneys, met around seven years ago.
“That’s how this conversation started; if we’re searching for that wardrobe we might as well make that wardrobe, and maybe sharing that wardrobe for people,” Wong says.
Continue reading “Rooney Mara on Vegan Fashion Line Hiraeth”
ANOTHER – In support of 2018’s Fashion Revolution Week – an opportunity to reconsider the industry’s impact on the world, and the people living in it – anothermag.com is running a week-long series of stories about ethical fashion. Here, we sit down with Rooney Mara to find out more about her new cruelty-free brand, Hiraeth.
Who is it? Seemingly not content with a career as a critically acclaimed, award-winning actress and dedicated philanthropist, Rooney Mara has turned her attention to the fashion industry with new design venture Hiraeth. As an almost lifelong vegetarian and longtime vegan, Mara’s brand was born not out of a burgeoning desire to design but more so out of a frustration with not being able to find clothes that allowed her to maintain her personal values, across all aspects of her lifestyle. “A few years ago I decided to stop wearing and buying leather. I really love clothes and it was really challenging to find anything that felt like it was high quality and designed, especially shoes,” she explains. “There are a lot of more inexpensive vegan options, and to me they were cruelty-free in the animal sense but I couldn’t be sure where they were being made and if they were cruelty-free in the human sense. There are a lot of people doing faux fur and faux leather but there isn’t really anyone who have also cut out wool or silk – we don’t use any animal products whatsoever.”
The word ‘Hiraeth’ translates from Welsh as ‘a sense of longing or homesickness for a home you never had, or cannot return to’. “It just really resonated with me with what we were trying to do,” Mara says. “It’s a feeling that I’ve had so many times in my life. In the world we live in today there’s just such a an extreme disconnection from everything, from each other, from the earth, from what we eat, what we wear. The meaning of Hiraeth reminded me of that of what we were trying to get back.” These feelings were mirrored in those of Mara’s childhood best friend Sara Schloat and they founded the brand together. “We’ve lived across the street together since I was one!” Mara says. “We’ve been best friends since we were 11 and have been wearing the same clothes since that time, we’ve always shown up in matching outfits by accident. We have very similar style and sensibilities.”
With neither of their backgrounds lending themselves to that of technical design, the creation process has been one of shared references alongside an appreciation for classic cuts and staple pieces. “I’ve always had very strong opinions about design in a sense but I wouldn’t call myself a designer,” Mara muses. “We have references from culture, art, we design that way, through sharing things. I think more than anything there was a mood that was very clear to me, I was particularly inspired by female artists who were socially minded or rule breakers, those pushing boundaries with art, people who were eccentric or showing the underbellies of societies.” The brand’s Instagram feed reads as an open scrapbook of these inspirations, as a portrait of Diane Arbus (who inspired a pair of studded faux-leather slippers of the same name in the debut collection) sits alongside drawings by Egon Schiele and Kiki Smith.
Why do I want it? The debut collection juxtaposes soft suiting, shirts and slip dresses in shades of ivory ‘satin’ with buttery faux-leather trousers and harnesses matched with sturdy, built-to-last footwear, in the form of combat boots and minimal loafers. Interchangeable and simple to self-style, it is created with wearability and practicality at its heart. “I love clothes, I love fashion and I love looking at it on other people but I don’t like getting dressed every day, so I wanted the clothes to have a uniform quality to them,” Mara explains. “It comes from my own sensibilities. We wanted to make clothes for a modern woman who is slightly rebellious and edgy but also dreamy and romantic. That’s kind of how I would describe myself, I like those two edges of things.”
Despite their firm brand values, Mara insists Hiraeth is not asking its audience to adopt an entirely new lifestyle to be able to wear the clothes. “It’s not realistic for most people, I think it’s better to go into it slowly,” she says. “I just wanted to provide another option that was both high quality and design. A lot of people who are going to buy our clothes probably won’t be vegan but maybe they’ll expand their consciousness about the materials of their clothes and shoes in a way they’ve never thought about before.”
Where can I buy it? From August 2018, follow @hiraeth.collective on Instagram to see the brand’s ongoing creation process, and launch announcements.
VOGUE – Rooney Mara isn’t your average celebrity turned designer. Her new label, Hiraeth, created with her best friend, Sara Schloat, is quiet, elegant, and comes with a sincere message. Since going vegan seven years ago, Mara had trouble finding non-leather jackets and shoes that aligned with her values. “I realized there aren’t many [faux leather] options available for someone like me who is interested in design and wants high-quality pieces,” she explains. Mara was thorough in her search, too, and disqualified products from major chains with questionable ethics. “In fast fashion, you can find faux leather boots that are really cheap, but while it’s cruelty-free in the animal sense, I didn’t necessarily know where those things were made, or if they were cruel toward humans,” she says. “I didn’t want to compromise on either thing, and I wanted pieces that were made to last. So it really came out of my own need.”
She first started with shoes—specifically combat boots. “Finding a pair of really nice vegan combat boots is sort of impossible—the kind you can dress up, but also run around town in. That was my first order of business.” The project “snowballed” from there into a tightly edited ready-to-wear and footwear operation that eliminates not only leather, but also wool, silk, and cashmere—essentially any material that involves an animal. That makes Hiraeth stand out from the other cruelty-free brands out there. Along with supple-looking “leatherette” trousers and a matching harness, there’s a raspberry corduroy suit, a few Japanese poly “satin” blouses, some velvet items, and an ivory slip dress—timeless pieces with just a touch of romance. She intends for them to live in your closet for a long time, too. “Something I really struggled with was this question of, Do people really need more crap?” she says, only half-joking. “There’s so much waste, so it was important for us to make pieces you can wear forever, or at least, long enough for it to mean something.”
Even if you’re not vegan, her message of conscious shopping should resonate. It goes back to the label’s name, Hiraeth. “It’s an old Welsh word that translates to a homesickness, or a longing for a home you can’t return to, or a home that never was,” Mara explains. “It’s this nostalgia for lost places and people. When I came across that word, the meaning really resonated with me. In our world today, there’s such an extreme disconnection from everything we do—from the earth we live on, from each other, from the food we eat, from the clothes we wear,” she continues. “We’ve grown so disconnected from everything, and I think it creates that feeling of wanting to return to someplace that maybe we’ve never even been before, but deep down, we know we’re missing something. With clothing, [no one knows] who made their clothes, or where were they made, or what they’re made out of. People are not at all aware of those things.”
In contrast, Hiraeth is produced entirely in Los Angeles, and Mara had the chance to meet every person who will be making her clothes. “That was really important to me—to know where everything comes from, and that it’s all coming from a place of integrity,” she says. You can see a few behind-the-scenes snaps of the Los Angeles factory on Hiraeth’s Instagram, too, plus a first look at those combat boots. See more of the collection in the slideshow, above, and follow Hiraeth to find out when (and where) you can buy it; prices will range between $160 and $1,500.
