Why the CSM graduate is redefining the way we think about beauty – and irony
The Dazed Beauty Community is our ever-expanding encyclopaedia of creatives and emerging talent from across the world who are redefining the way we think about beauty. From supermodels to digital artists to makeup prodigies transforming themselves in their bedrooms, these are the beauty influencers of tomorrow who embody everything Dazed Beauty is about. Discover them here.
“I always wanted to be a vet, but I couldn’t because I’m an animal myself,” says Harry Freegard, or Harrie Bradshaw, as London’s favourite young anti-fashion designer is known on Instagram. Rather than administering eye drops to cats, Harry turned his steady hand to a sewing machine at 18, when he moved from Wiltshire in South West England to London in order to study fashion at Central Saint Martins. There, his 2018 final collection exhibited dizzying new heights of narcissism; themed around his own funeral, it included commemorative plates reading "In Loving Memory" and culminated in a grand finale that saw Harry riding down the catwalk on a scooter wearing a pink strapless dress and a “Harry is Dead” headpiece made out of newspaper.
Harry describes his style as “post-ironic glamour”, a line that can be chaotically traced through all of his looks, which generally take the tropes of high feminity and distort them into something brilliantly cheap, DIY and unpolished, like his trademark neon pink blusher, smeared all over his cheeks, to his scanty wrap dresses made out of, well, a scrap of old material. This aesthetic, which formed the basis of his BA show, has earned him the title of a prankster, since his beauty looks and outfits generally take about five minutes to throw together and yet no one is quite sure whether or not he's being serious.
Either way, something's working. Since graduating, Harry has closed for Rottingdean Bazaar at LFW (where he served a look of global proportions – see it to believe it), and appeared on the cover of Dazed with Vivienne Westwood. He has also moved away from design for a while, currently taking pictures and directing with collaborator Christian Denbigh. “At the moment, other than trying my best to develop cirrhosis, I'm shooting some gorgeous things that had gorgeous NDA’s that will be out gorgeously soon,” Harry explains, ominously.
What are your dreams for the immediate future?
Steady employment and heels in a men's size 11.
What about the future future? It’s the year 2080 and the two sexes have become obsolete in favour of one single type of human. Describe your perfect evening in…
Mutate and chill.
If you had to replace your body with that of an animal or a mythological creature, what would you go for and why?
The natural choice would be the mythological creature Pete Burns. Self explanatory.
You venture outside, and you encounter a hostile alien race with an inability to see colour, while sound is their only mechanism for communication. What would you play to them to inspire them to spare you?
The Come Dine With Me theme song.
And finally, if you really had to choose, would you rather Colonise Mars or build a utopia in the centre of the earth?
Following in the dainty footsteps of Barbarella I would gallantly choose to have some cheeky fun on mars – Carry On: Colonising Mars, with a cryogenically preserved Barbara Windsor… out soon.