Celebrity Fashion Brand The House of Mann just debuted their first “ready to wear” collection, after rising from the ashes of the COVID-19 Pandemic. The collection, in the words of Brandon Hilton, a designer with The House of Mann, is “our take on a Pride collection.” I was lucky enough to discuss with Hilton, over email, his thoughts, and inspirations behind their latest campaign.
Hilton when discussing the Pandemic recalled,
“my brand really struggled as we mainly dress celebrities and performers and everything was cancelled for over a year so it was tough. The orders we did receive became hard to fill as materials were no longer readily available because of Trump and China, it was rough.”
He then went on to discuss the beginnings and ideas for this new collection,
So as things begin to open up and we are getting requests for custom pieces again, we wanted to develop our first “ready to wear” collection that features items that are ready to ship and are wearable in every day life, not just for celebrities and entertainers.
Today @TheHouseOfMann dressed our BIGGEST celebrity yet!!
Lady Liberty is wearing our new metallic SUPERSTAR mask, available now @ https://t.co/Jq8b1QPFxP
For every mask we sell, we are donating one to local hospitals and businesses!! #MASK4MASK ❤️ pic.twitter.com/FBI0OttaIh
— Brandon Hilton (@BRANDONHILTON) April 8, 2020
It was very important to Hilton and The House of Mann that,
“We wanted to create things that we ourselves would wear in our daily life, when we’re not doing fashion shows or performing.”
Hilton thought back to a photoshoot he did with Celebrity Photographer Justin Hyte back in the days of MySpace! He says that
“the concept was taking back power of all the nasty things people call me online, and with all my recent controversies I’ve been called every name in the book. So for our Pride collection we had the idea to make it into a shirt.”
Hilton continued that, “It is essential that we stay true to ourselves as members of the LGBTQ+ community, and with this collection, we had the idea to revisit that iconic photoshoot I’d done 14 years ago.” And thus, the FAGGOT shirt was born.
Hilton says that,
For the last month I’ve been the center of a lot of “controversy” on Twitter, getting in arguments with people like Pabllo Vittar over disrespecting RuPaul, calling out Jeffree Star for ruining career opportunities for me and most recently calling out Justin Timberlake for his fake support of Britney Spears. I’ve received 100’s of thousands of tweets/emails/messages from these fanbases calling me names I never even knew existed, so that is where the idea for this shirt came from!
The FAGGOT shirt is quickly becoming their #1 bestseller. Hilton and the design team are
“thrilled people are getting behind our campaign to “TAKE BACK THE POWER” that these words have held over the LGBTQ+ Community for so many years!”
The FAGGOT shirt is available on their website at TheHouseofMann.com and retails for $40. Hilton ends our conversation with these words,
It is time to again take back the power of the words people call me by putting them on my body. It’s like wearing them on my body is a suit of armor that protects me from them! I think it’s something a lot of people in our community can relate to and hopefully respond to.
(all photos used in this article were provided by The House of Mann.)
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