Hanno Fischer would prefer you not call him a fashion designer. He makes — his preferred verb — clothes for people who have already decided how they would like to dress. The brand he founded eight years ago is small, slow, expensive in a way that does not announce itself, and now in its fourth season of being quietly worn by people who buy clothes once a year and keep them for fifteen.
You have called yourself a maker, not a designer. Why?
Because design implies an audience I am not entirely sure exists. I am making clothes. People wear them or they do not. I am not advertising a worldview. I am asking the wool to behave.
The signature coat took eleven prototypes. What was going wrong the first ten times?
It was always almost. Almost is the worst possible thing for a coat. The first three were too stiff. The next four were too soft. Numbers eight, nine, and ten were correct in places but wrong in proportion. The eleventh one knew what it was for.
You stopped reading reviews two years ago. Did anything change?
I started sleeping. I started eating dinner. I made one decision a day instead of seventy. The review is information about somebody else thinking about my coat. The coat itself is the only thing I can actually edit.
How do you know when a piece is done?
When my wife stops moving when she puts it on. She is also my editor. She wears something I have made. If she is still adjusting it in the mirror after thirty seconds, the piece is not finished. If she walks away from the mirror, the piece is finished.
You said something interesting earlier about hemlines.
A hemline is a sentence about how you intend to walk through a room. The room is older than fashion. The room is older than me. I have a lot of respect for the room.
What are you working on now?
A jacket that is also not quite a jacket. I will let you know in eleven prototypes.