How this independent label is still the A-listers’ favourite British fashion house

He dresses everyone from Nicole Kidman and Keira Knightley to Kristin Scott Thomas and the Princess of Wales, and while other brands are shutting up shop, Erdem Moralioglu is opening up a new one. So, how has he not only survived – but thrived, asks Laura Craik?

Keira Knightley attends the London premiere of ‘The Woman in Cabin 10’ last month dressed in Erdem (Aimee Rose McGhee/Dave Benett/Getty)

Fashion being a notoriously cut-throat industry, it’s an achievement to survive, never mind thrive, when you’re an independent British label. Which makes Erdem Moralioglu something of a unicorn, given he’ll celebrate the 20th anniversary of his label, Erdem, next year.

While other luxury brands are shuttering theirs, he’s just opened his second London store, on Sloane Street. He’s also just published a glossy 400-page tome highlighting his 20 years in business, featuring his longtime muse, the model Guinevere van Seenus, as well as words by Nicholas Cullinan, Polly Stenham and Ruth Rogers. “I wanted it to feel different from other fashion books, and be something that you might actually read,” he explains when we speak over Zoom.

Behind him is a large and well-stocked bookcase that’s not so much a cliche as bona fide proof of his love of literature, explaining his cerebral approach to design. While other designers chase trends so cravenly that their collections have little continuity, Moralioglu stands back from the white-hot heat of the trend cycle, coolly offering a vision that unfolds gently over the seasons, evolving rather than changing.

Erdem Moralioglu’s clothes are thoughtful, romantic and ethereal (Tom Mannion/Courtesy of ERDEM)

“It’s ironic, given my job, but I’ve always been really fascinated by the idea of permanence,” he muses. “My customer is broad, but in terms of what I need to create a collection, it’s very much this idea of being propelled by a character and a narrative. I’ve never deviated from the idea of creating collections that are chapters in a book.” Last year, a collection was based on The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall; previous collections have referenced the works of EM Forster, Derek Jarman and the Bloomsbury Group.

If all this makes him sound a little highbrow, well, he is, but not in an elitist way. His clothes are thoughtful, romantic and ethereal, but still very much anchored in the real world, designed to serve a purpose, not a whim. You don’t attract a loyal, wide-ranging clientele such as Nicole Kidman, Keira Knightley, Kristin Scott Thomas and the Princess of Wales, without serving their needs astutely.

He once said that fashion is a form of portraiture: what sort of women does he imagine dressing when he designs? “I wonder if I would have found that a much easier question to answer 20 years ago,” he muses. “It’s almost like the longer you do it, the less you know.” He can’t comment on dressing the Princess of Wales, but lights up describing the different customers he met during a recent book signing at his new store.

“So many different ages, too – mothers and daughters, gallerists and doctors, all these extraordinary women. It’s such a great pleasure when you see someone wearing your clothes that they’ve had for over a decade, and in such different ways.”

Erdem’s new store on Sloane Street, London (Courtesy of ERDEM)

He’s delighted by the prospect of a second store. “There’s something tremendously powerful about having someone walk into your environment and see your entire world and the whole collection the way it’s intended to be.” Housed in a 1920s building, it has a different feel from his store in Mayfair’s South Audley Street, although there’s continuity.

“If South Audley is her [the Erdem customer’s] home, Sloane Street is her studio. It feels like an artist’s studio, filled with the furniture she’d have, the art she’d collect.” That it was designed by P Joseph, the architecture and design practice co-owned by his husband, Philip Joseph, means its ideation of Erdem’s world is perfectly executed. “He’s seen every iteration of my work and how it’s evolved over the years, and he approached it [the design] in a forensic way.”

He and Philip have been together since 2003, having met when both were studying at London’s Royal College of Art. “He’s amazing. He has this incredible sensitivity to spaces.” He also designed the couple’s home in Bloomsbury, a neighbourhood that he loves. “We’re round the corner from the British Museum, and can walk to Soho in 20 minutes. London is so full of wonder. I miss it when I’m away.”

If London is a cultural melting pot, Moralioglu considers himself “very much a part of that”, having moved to the city in 2000 from Toronto (where he gained a bachelor’s degree in fashion) to complete an MA at the Royal College of Art. “My mum was from Birmingham, my father was from eastern Turkey, and I was born in Canada. I have no family in London, aside from my in-laws.”

His mother inspired him to choose the path he did. “She opened up the world to me. She was such a literate, amazing, intelligent woman. She passed away when I was quite young.” For his current collection, he collaborated with the artist Kaye Donachie, with whom he struck up a friendship after asking her to paint his late mother’s portrait. “That collection is definitely my most personal.”

A display at Erdem’s new store (Courtesy of ERDEM)

He’s fascinated by what he describes as “reiterations of these ideas of memory and time; shadows of this person you remember and you don’t. I remember as a child, I'd visit one grandmother in Dudley and the other one in Antakya, literally two hours from Aleppo. There's something interesting about the contrast of your two grandmothers, quite similar but also with such totally different languages and cultures. It’s always made my eyes quite open to that feeling of otherness, and not being afraid of that. It’s also made me feel ever so slightly rootless. Where you’re from isn’t entirely home. I suppose now my home is the one I've made with Philip.”

I suggest that whether you’re a designer, writer, artist or filmmaker, otherness is important, since it helps you stand apart and observe. “Yes, although otherness, that sense of difference, is something that really scares people. We live in a very strange time.”

We also live in very challenging times. With high-profile British labels such as The Vampire’s Wife and Cefinn going to the wall in recent times, it’s a testament to Erdem’s popularity and business acumen that his brand remains in such good health. He ascribes this largely to his having remained independent. “You have agility. You can adjust. You can also stay really true to yourself. I love change and I hate change, but I’ve really had to learn how to adapt. When I started, you didn’t even have online sales. Net-a-Porter didn’t exist.”

“But it’s incredibly challenging being an independent designer,” he continues. “There was this awful moment when we had Brexit, and then they took away the tax rebate for tourists shopping in London – my mind boggles as to why. Brexit was a terrible decision, and has affected so much in terms of keeping talent [in the UK]. There are so many things that could make our industry thrive, but there isn't enough support.”

Government support may be thin on the ground, but his customers’ support is deservedly unwavering.