Ones to Watch: Dahm Home

Founder, inventive and editorial director Catharine Dahm quietly launched her namesake, luxurious idea style label, Dahm Home, in Paris this yr. 

Dahm hails from Indiana and moved to Paris after slicing her enamel within the business as the previous cofounder of sustainable, modern label Rabot. Dahm Home is her debut impartial and self-funded model (she’s at the moment started fundraising for Assortment 02’s fall and spring 2025 strains). 

The Dahm Home debut Assortment 01, “Welcome to Earth,” was designed to “have a good time the artwork of craft and artistic storytelling” with ready-to-wear designed and sourced in Paris. The 26-piece fall assortment brings forth the concept of “magnificence, fragility and swish circularity of life,” via handcrafted particulars, thematic symbols, pure hues and supplies. 

“For me, design is so private and I needed every assortment to be centered round a theme,” Dahm mentioned. Every of her inaugural, heirloom-minded collections (set to launch for fall and spring) will embody the concept of storytelling, additional expanded upon with coinciding Dahm Home magazines. The debut Assortment 01 journal, distributed internationally by KD Presse, encompasses a combination of writing, poetry and editorial photograph tales. “I don’t need it to really feel like a listing; it’s actually its personal universe. Particularly for a luxurious model, it makes it simpler for folks to buy and be a part of the world.”

Dahm’s luxurious ready-to-wear balances a timeless ethos with a play on the masculine versus female in construction and fabrication, however the surprising delight of her types shine via their sensual-meets-whimsical particulars.

Dahm mentioned she liked the concept of, “I dreamt I used to be a flower — as if somebody was dreaming and morphing into these flower shapes,” which resulted in blooming, three-dimensional florals, as seen as shapely trousers hems; on the breasts of tailor-made tops and “Hunzicker” gown (in wool or raw-edged, silk organza), and within the type of hand-painted petal sleeves and collars of her brown cotton sateen menswear “Harding” shirt with mother-of-pearl buttons and silk satin duchess piping.

“I do have this Paris-Indiana as a part of the model as a result of I really feel prefer it sounds charming. I’m utilizing that because the tag for every part and I’m planning to shoot my second assortment there [in Indiana] — I really feel like you need to incorporate your roots slightly bit,” mentioned Dahm, including clothes are named after ladies in her life, such because the petal-hemmed “Linda” pants, named after her grandmother who had the rule modified at her daughter’s faculty to allow women to put on pants as a substitute of skirts. “That’s what I imply after I say design to me is so private — I wish to pay homage to folks that encourage these clothes.”

A powerful throughline of the gathering is her use of hand-embroidered pure glass, beads and stones as built-in jewellery — a nod to the gathering’s esoteric concepts of life and evolution.

“There’s an incredible store within the third [arrondissement], it’s like Harry Potter’s store with floor-to-ceiling packing containers of all classic glass beads. I’ve loads of glass Murano beads from Italy within the assortment — the removable sleeves have classic Murano glass. They’re actually timeless, elevated and sensual particulars…if in case you have an excessive amount of that it may possibly simply be overwhelming, but it surely invitations you to take a look at issues and convey you nearer,” she mentioned. All through the gathering, prospects are invited nearer to watch her hand-beaded spirals fabricated from lapis, malachite, pearl, jasper and lemon quartz, to call a number of. The motifs could be seen on the busts of her structured corset tops and clothes, which properly supply a stability between the playful and sensual. 

“This gown is so horny on — it has a corset physique and actually takes this theme of evolution with Malachite on the female facet of the physique for earthy power and grounding; Lapis on the masculine facet for air and sky power. No one’s going to take a look at that gown and assume, ‘Oh, masculine power,’ but it surely’s private. I don’t ever need something to really feel too customized — it must really feel refined, and has a contact of caprice,” she mentioned of the tailor-made black wool “Yireh” corset gown with entrance slits and distinction stitching.

Different particulars all through the gathering stem from the concept of convertibility, as seen via hook-and-eye closures on tops; outerwear, denims and trousers with button-up-or-down, -on-or-off accents, and lengthy, wrappable ties on blouses and clothes.

Approaching Assortment 01 as an natural launch and “advertising assortment,” Dahm sells direct-to-consumer through her web site underneath the preorder mannequin (with a made-to-order timeframe of 4 weeks) with costs starting from $265 to $4,478. The founder and artistic sees the Dahm Home buyer akin to the Bode crowd — “intelligent, clever ladies who’re working in industries equivalent to structure, publishing, design — those that have an appreciation for fashion and wish to spend money on clothes that also feels related, feels trendy, however that they will have and ideally preserve for a very long time.”

Since debuting Assortment 01 through e-commerce, she famous prospects have responded effectively to her “dialog between construction and fluidity with these little nodes of magnificence on high.” 

“In addition they just like the teetering between the poetry of female and masculine, yin-yang,” she mentioned. As an illustration, the Dahm Blazer (a one-piece wool and silk black blazer with dickie-like cotton and silk vest and mother-of-pearl closure) atop the Costello skirt; different favorites have been famous because the Claire, Aline and Catharine tops; Leonard pants, and coats.

“First impressions are so essential. I’ve been spending loads of time and sources on ensuring every part feels private as a result of I would like the primary contact level for a purchaser, for press, for purchasers to essentially perceive what I’m attempting to do and never really feel like ‘after three seasons, she’s received it discovered.’ As a result of actually, loads of the time you solely get one shot; even too, I do know it typically takes a number of seasons for folks to realize traction, and I would like there to nonetheless be a primary assortment that’s robust like proof of document.”

Dahm plans to evolve this mannequin over the following few years into an atelier mannequin, the place clothes can be personally fitted for shoppers. As well as, she’s going to unveil her spring 2024 assortment — an growth of her “sensible tailoring with surprising poetic touches” — to wholesale for the primary time throughout Paris Style Week. 

“Spring 2024 can be Assortment 01, ‘Welcome to Earth,’ Half 2. The concept is that every assortment lives for a full calendar yr and is split into fall and spring, with {a magazine} launching yearly to coincide with every assortment to increase the storytelling. It will enable the silhouettes and storytelling to construct/flourish for a full yr as a substitute of too rapidly folding into a brand new assortment every 4 to 6 months,” Dahm mentioned.