From a youthful, breezy energy to the use of a charming daisy motif, local brand Hej Hej shares a lot in common with Mary Quant. Co-founder Alice Isles recently joined Viva's Emma Gleason at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki to discuss the synergy between the two brands, and how Mary Quant's work inspires her. Part of the Gallery's event series for Mary Quant: Fashion Revolutionary (a lineup that has also seen Dan Ahwa in conversation with Kate Sylvester) read Alice and Emma's discussion below. The V&A exhibition is on until March 13.
For me, when I look at this exhibition, what stands out is the youthful energy that is at the heart of Mary Quant’s work. Her designs helped dress and define the Youthquake in 1960s Britain. I see a similar energy in Hej Hej. It’s a youthful brand, rather than a brand for young people. Why do you think this quality is appealing, regardless of age?
Thank you I love the sound of being youthful rather than young. Fashion should be fun it is not about your age. It is about how clothes make you feel.
Mary Quant was designing for a new generation, who were rebelling against people’s perception of fashion at the time.
We feel like Hej Hej came from a similar place in that we were at a point in our lives where we wanted fashion to be fun, we wanted to wear more colour. Fashion, in general, is becoming ageless too.
Hej Hej is still a relatively young brand, it’s been four years since you and Kiki Judd founded the business. How did you meet and why did you decide to start a clothing label?
We met in our first year of university in Dunedin. We went on to live together and then later were both based in Asia Kiki was in Taiwan for four years and Shanghai for five, and I was based in Hong Kong at the same time.
We’d always talked about starting something together but it wasn’t until Kiki was in Shanghai and had access to all these amazing fabrics and makers that it all came together.
Why the name Hej Hej?
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Advertise with NZME.Hej Hej is a Swedish greeting. It speaks of the playful nature of the brand. We wanted a name that sounded fun and made us approachable.
How has Hej Hej evolved and grown since then, and what sets the brand apart from others?
When we started in 2018 we were only selling linen pieces, that were only available online via our website. Since then, we’ve brought in a knitwear collection, opened two stores in Auckland and run many popup stores in Wellington.
The biggest challenge for us has been covid having our stores closed for long lengths of time has meant we’ve had to get creative with connecting with people and telling our story.
Our biggest win has been making clothes were proud of and developing a customer base that can relate to us and enjoy wearing Hej Hej.
Much like Quant’s bold colours and fun energy, Hej Hej designs are fresh and joyful, with bright colours, easy silhouettes and a playful element could you tell us about Hej Hej’s approach to fashion and getting dressed?
We have both always shared a love of colour and dressing up. We became mothers around the launch of Hej Hej and felt there was a gap in the market for a brand that offered what we were looking for. A range of clothing that was versatile and easy to wear, but was playful, colourful and made people feel good!
We saw a piece in the exhibition called “Georgie” it was a cotton striped wrap dress and the person who bought it described it as a “happy, fun dress to wear, and beautifully made.” This is exactly what we’d love to hear our customers say about their Hej Hej pieces.
This vitality has a lot of synergy with Mary Quant’s what other things do you see paralleled in Hej Hej? Both brands use the daisy motif to great effect.
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Advertise with NZME.She wanted to make clothing accessible to all people, she created silhouettes that women could run to the bus in and feel free. We share that approachable, accessibility of fashion. Fashion shouldn’t be intimidating, people shouldn’t take it seriously it’s a way to show personality and be playful.
I think Mary Quant and Hej Hej also share a distinctive accessibility and ease do you agree, and can you tell us about why this is so important?
Mary Quant said, “The whole point of fashion is to make fashionable clothes available to everyone”. We totally agree with this point of view. We want people to throw on dresses, create capsule collections that make it easy to get dressed while still feeling fashionable and relevant.
Linen is the perfect fabric to make items that work for occasions, times of day, situations. It’s a fabric that works for all lifestyles, it’s hard-wearing but looks beautiful.
Knitwear is another signature for both brands. It was quite radical when Mary Quant began using it for mini dresses and turtlenecks the iconic outfit for the era and Hej Hej’s knits are very popular, with ribbed knit becoming something of a staple for contemporary women. Why is knitwear a key category for you? And why is it so popular?
We originally wanted to create a knitwear brand, it was an area of fashion we both love. Kiki’s mum is an amazing knitter and I think even tried to teach us when we were at uni.
While I was in Sydney I worked alongside highly skilled knitwear designers who trained in the UK to be a knitwear designer is so technical and takes so much skill. We work with an incredibly skilled factory in China who have helped us to source beautiful yarns silk/cashmere knits and have incredible technology and an in-depth understanding of construction.
I think knitwear is so luxe and, while often an investment, it is something you have for years.
The Hej Hej knits are popular for the same reason as our linens, they are accessible luxury, the yarns are high-quality natural blends perfect for the New Zealand climate! They were designed originally to extend the life of our linens but have become a Hej Hej staple.
Savvy, clever marketing was something Mary Quant did so well like her famous beauty bus. In a similar vein, you presented a Hej Hej collection on a yacht at NZFW in 2018. Could you tell us about your approach to marketing and Hej Hej’s tone of voice? It comes across as friendly and playful. How much of this was a strategy, and how much is it reflective of you and Kiki’s own personalities.
Both! Kiki in particular has a great sense of humour. We wanted to reflect our personalities in the brand. Everything for us comes back to making people have fun with fashion.
From the beginning, the brand was about making luxury fabrics accessible for our customers, so it was natural for us to use a tone of voice that reflected our personalities and use humour to create a strong brand story. We can’t take all the credit, we work with a very clever copywriter who has been working with us since the beginning and has become a good friend and important collaborator.
We all have fun working on the marketing. It has become an important feature of the brand, something that customers always comment on and relate to! Equal part style and attitude.
Another thing Mary Quant did differently was retail. Her Bazaar boutique in Chelsea was a sensation when it opened in 1955 – so different to the department stores of the time. What’s the Hej Hej approach to retail, how do you aim to stand out and reflect the mood of the times?
Mary Quant was so ahead of her time. More than ever retail has to change and offer customers a different experience. The fast growth of online shopping has changed people’s views of fashion and made everything more accessible getting new season products and trends instantly.
We initially only wanted to be online, but learnt quickly through our pop-ups that having retail was a really important part of the customer journey. How they learn about the brand, relate to the brand and view the brand.
Do you think there is renewed appreciation for the physical space of a store, after such limited access to them these past few years?
The recent opening of our Ponsonby store gave us a huge opportunity to showcase the personality of the brand, beyond just the clothing. So retail continues to be important but it has to be a whole experience rather than a rail of clothing.
The new Hej Hej collection launched last week could you tell us a bit about the new range, what inspired it, and what pieces are standouts?
Designed in two different timezone lockdowns, Kiki in Shanghai and me in Auckland, we looked to old faves that our customers reach for every day to feel good, injected with new colour, iconic puffy sleeves and voluminous shapes.
It’s easy to fall into a colourless rut in Winter as the days get shorter and darker, but after the year that's been, we all could do with a bit of brightness.
We created a new daisy embroidery influenced by one of my favourite flowers, the cosmos, and have explored new yarns and knitwear colours including lilacs, froggy greens and electric blues.
You’ve loved Mary Quant since you were young even doing a project on her in primary school, quite a niche topic for a child how Mary Quant’s work has influenced you over the years?
It’s the youthful, fun approach to Mary Quant’s fashion that I have always been drawn to. The colours, shapes and motifs are so iconic. Also, she is a key figure in an important time in the modern world and modern dressing. It wasn’t just fashion, but art, music such an influential time full of excitement and a sense of revolution!
Did you ever think you’d be seeing so many of her pieces in the flesh? What’s your favourite outfit or piece in the exhibition and why?
No! I’ve been lucky enough to travel to London for holidays and work over the years and the V&A is a very important part of any trip. But having such a large exhibition in Auckland feels especially important giving us escapist moments after not being able to travel and explore for a couple of years.
Moving through the exhibition I loved how relevant all the styles are, I could wear everything and feel modern. The way Mary mixed rib knits and woven fabrics feels so ahead of time. I think my personal fave was the 1965 woven pinafore dress with the layered rib knit. Also, there was a yellow Thai silk pant and top set that I LOVED. Too many things.
I love the waistcoat and tie ensemble, it’s a great example of Mary's rebellious use of menswear. I've always had a thing for 1960d style and culture, I think because so many of my family pictures are from this era. Have you always liked the 1960s? Why do you think the style of that era has endured?
I think I have always looked to the 1960s as an influence. The silhouettes and mod styling is one of my favourite eras. The simplicity of its look but structural construction but playful colour prints. It doesn’t go out of style.
I also love the music and art from the era. I believe it has endured because it was such an important cultural shift for the post-war generation. They pushed back on every aspect of life, fashion, food, art, music pushing hemlines, print and sound to a whole new level.
Miniskirts and boots are back in a big way this season, so is colour, but deeper than that, the rebellion that underpinned the youthquake also feels prescient to where we are at in 2022. I think there are parallels to be drawn between those postwar decades, and now, as we navigate a pandemic everything is in flux, and the status quo is being questioned. Where does Hej Hej sit in this, and how are you responding to this energy?
We think now more than ever it is important to be able to use fashion as a way to distract from all the other things that are happening in the world. The idea behind our latest collection, ‘Me, Myself & Hej Hej’, is that it doesn’t matter where you are or what is going on, if you put on a groovy outfit, even if you’re at home alone watching tv, then you will instantly feel positive!
Finding joy is also important right now, as there’s a lot to feel anxious about, and that optimism is something I see in Hej Hej, and in Mary Quant’s work do you have an outfit or specific colour or print you put on when you need a dopamine hit?
I always reach for a dress when I need to feel lifted. They are simple and easy but make me feel like I've made an effort (without making an effort) And if it’s a Hej Hej dress I go for one of our Daisies! Who doesn’t feel lifted by a daisy?
Florals can be so mood-altering. I'll reach for colour when I'm feeling down, an obnoxious colour or aggressive print. They shake me out of a funk and cheer other people up.
Something I’ve been thinking about lately, is that what we wear reflects what’s going on around us, how it makes us feel, and how we’ve changed. A new season gives us the chance to respond. What do you think about when getting dressed in the morning, or when considering new pieces for your wardrobe?
What makes me feel confident, and good about myself… what am I doing today. Do I want to stand out or do I want to be comfortable that day? Our moods are ever-changing and we need pieces that we can slip on that add to us.
As we’ve seen from this exhibition, Mary Quant was ahead of the times and always looking forward. If Mary Quant was put in a time machine and transported to the present, what do you think she’d be doing to shake up fashion now?
I think Mary would use technology and handcrafted skills to create modern pieces. She would still be looking to the needs of modern women through clever construction and playful shapes.
For you, what does the future look like for Hej Hej what are you focusing on, what’s next, and what are you hopeful for?
We want to continue creating clothing that makes people feel good, that our brand will bring a chuckle through our tone of voice & playful spirit. On a personal level for both Kiki and I, family is incredibly important so we want to make our family proud of us, have fun together and keep growing our business.
