We spoke to EDEN Power Corp on how they choose to educate, rather than delegate.

By Alex Onik

Florence Provencher Proulx & Isaac Larosse - the team behind Eden Power Corp.

Appreciating EDEN Power Corp for the clothes, the visuals, and the objects is easy. To see the Hemp Fremen bag, a mycelium planter, or a clip of mushrooms exploding out of the forest floor is enough to bring out a sense of child-like wonder in even the most disinterested critic. But appreciating and understanding do not always go hand in hand. Understanding requires us to dive beyond the surface and ask how was that made, what material is that and why does any of this even matter. When you take this approach with EDEN Power Corp you will find yourself tumbling down a rabbit hole, new questions appearing before your existing ones are answered.

Operating under the guise of a multi-faceted corporation in an alternative reality, Eden Power Corp continuously builds their story from season to season, seamlessly opening the eyes of the uninitiated to the magic of renewable energy and permaculture. These are of course all part and parcel of the big picture, a path from our current world towards one that is guided by principles that are more balanced, a path towards a better life. This path starts at the EDEN Power Corp studio, the space doesn’t resemble the images that come to mind when you think of businesses operating under the principles of eco-consciousness. The walls are bare, exposed concrete playing host to beams of sunlight that burst through the wall to wall windows, providing the luscious greenery with enough energy to grow. Every surface is covered with incredible artifacts and strange objects, a lampshade made of kombucha, a hat made of an Amadou mushroom, each with a fascinating backstory. The soundscape for the studio is provided by the greenery that fills it, PlantWave to be specific, a device that emits electrical signals through the foliage of your favourite plant and then projects the resistance as music. To see the worldly assortment of obscure furniture and objects that fill the studio one needs to look no further than Bruises Gallery.

This is the world of Isaac Larose and Florence Provencher Proulx, the team behind EDEN Power Corp. Together they inhabit the space and collectively work on their brand, a brand that chooses to educate, rather than delegate. Talking to them, one quickly realises that there are no degrees of separation between the artists and the art. There is no performative aspect to what they do, EDEN Power Corp is just a vehicle to deliver their ideas and beliefs to those who choose to seek them out. While many brands grasp at straws, trying to reposition themselves as Stewards of the earth, Isaac and Florence sit comfortably on a Yves De La Tour D'Auvergne sofa and sip coffee out of Eden branded mugs (available here). They don’t need to rebrand, reposition or relaunch themselves as anything else because EDEN Power Corp was constructed on a foundation of taking care of our earth. As images of FW21 - FUNGUS yeast, moulds and mushrooms - populate Instagram we take a look at the future of natural fabrics, living clean, and the acceptance of nerdy references.

Dreaded Path: For anyone who isn’t fully in tune with the world that EDEN Power Corp has created and the ideas behind each season, could you give a little more backstory to where the ideas come from and how it all works together?

Isaac Larose: The idea for every season starts from the same place, EDEN Power Corp is a corporation in a fictional world in the future. Each collection is building the uniforms for a department within that company. We started off with Solar Energy in our first season, the second collection was based around the permaculture department, this current collection (SS21) is focused on mycelium and the next one will be fungus. For us it’s a way to have fun, it’s not the most important part of the brand. We’re having fun making it this way and keeping it really interesting for ourselves, allowing our curiosity to really dig deeper into the stuff we like. This isn’t something that needs to be explained for people to jump on board, we don’t expect our clients to follow us into it. It’s there if you want to, but if not, who cares.

DP: How did creating this whole world come about? There are a lot of references to the novel Dune throughout the brand, how does that blend into this alternative reality?

IL: It really is part of the DNA of the brand. Our logo comes from the second edition of Dune and the names of most of our products come from Dune references. I think that one reason why this is so ingrained in the identity of our brand is that the novel is about the environment, Frank Herbert was a speaker at the first Earth Day. There’s an Earth Day celebration with this Sci-fi guy making a speech because that's what his book was about, his work revolved around the environment, it’s all very inspiring. For us it’s about imagining a better future and looking for solutions, we would rather do that than focus on some dystopian world where everything is fucked. We want to focus on what the world could look like if we take action, what we can do if all stay inspired.

DP: It’s becoming commonplace to see sci-fi, anime and cartoon references within the fashion and design world. Is that something you ever consider and is this something that any brand can participate in?

IL: I’m not sure if we would have been as comfortable being so geeky about sci-fi if it wasn’t for streetwear brand doing it first, seeing Bape with Planet Of The Apes as the main inspiration for their logo. Seeing Bape use something that so nerdy but making it cool opened the door for us in many ways. Any brand can pick it up for one or two seasons but they won’t build a community around it in such a short time. It’s way easier now to just nerd out and find your community if you make it a part of your brand as a whole, it gives people time to find you and to become a part of your world.

DP: It seems that there are many ways to become a part of the EDEN Power Corp world, not only by consuming the clothes.

IL: We named some of our items, the Caladan shirt, Arrakis and Fremen bags, after references from Dune. There are people who are going to get it and understand it and feel apart of it without having to buy the clothes, they are going to be apart of the community. When we launched we started getting a lot of reactions from people outside of the fashion world, they were fully weighing in and interacting with the brand because there’s this whole subculture of mycophiles. It all grows out into different groups, it’s never going to be exclusively fashion or streetwear people. We really miss the pre-COVID community aspect. We have this space that we separated into two sections, this part was made to receive guests and the other space is where the samples come together. We want to bring back this sense of togetherness in the summer months with outdoor events in a way that people will feel safe.

DP: Looking at this collection, what are some standout items that you’re both proud of?

Florence Provencher Proulx: The Enoki pants we made with a snap in the back are really great. They are perfect for foraging, or a Montreal winter, they keep the bottoms of your pants away from the ground and it makes it easier to see where you step. If you want baggy pants, you don’t want the back to be slouchy and dragging on the ground, you just close the snap on the back. It’s similar to what you would see with ski pants.

IL: The candles we made with a local Montreal candle maker are really cool. We’d seen some of her work at local shops and then we connected to make this project. It’s really interesting because there’s a study that shows mycelium extracts of polypore mushrooms (Reisha and Amadou) have been shown to benefit the immune system of bees. It’s our small way of highlighting this relationship between the two by making beeswax candles in the shape of a mushroom.

Isaac & Florence at their Montreal-based studio.

DP: How has your experience been when it comes to the materials you use? Is there any struggle between what you want to do and sourcing fabrics that line up with your brand identity?

IL: Working with companies that believe in the same things we do makes everything more complicated. For example, we only use 100% recycled cotton t-shirts which means that we don’t have as many options for factories to work with. If one goes bankrupt, or there’s anything going on with COVID it becomes super difficult for us. When we have these limitations it allows us to get very creative, we aren’t paralyzed with having too many options and we just have to use what we have. It’s great for us to see how much the sustainable fabric industry is exploding right now, there are so many new technologies coming out. In our next collection, FW21, will be our first time using the new Ventile waterproof eco-fabric with 100% recycled and natural fibers and working with lobster mushrooms to produce dyes for our shirts. Looking at this collection, the material that we used for the sweatpants didn’t even exist last year last. For us, it’s exciting to be apart of this movement and to have access to all of these new fabrics to experiment with. The people within this movement are all working towards the same goal so everyone shares information with each other, it’s not something that anyone can do on their own.

DP: What’s great for EDEN is great for everyone else

IL: We could never have developed new fabrics because we’re too small for that. Bigger brands can help textile companies finance research and development. Brands like Adidas, H&M or Stella McCartney are already investing, they will have access to all of these new fabrics first. As time goes on we will all get access to it, fabrics like mushroom leathers, it’s all stuff that exists and will become apart of fashion as a whole moving forward. We all have our own role to play.

DP: What brands are making gear or using fabrics that excite you currently? Are there any within the outdoor space?

IL: We really like what Klattermussen is doing, this season they have a wind repellent material that is made of 100% organic ripstop. They also have a synthetic fabric that is made out of castor bean oil and its water repellent which is a super-advanced way of using eco-friendly materials. There’s also Story mfg, they make everything in India, everything is done with natural dyes, they pay everyone fairly, it’s a really impressive brand. We really like Kiko Kostadinov and Wales Bonner, we don’t buy many clothes anymore but we enjoy what they are putting out each season. Also Gr10k, they are an Italian brand what they are doing right now is super cool. We’re always excited to see what Post-Imperial comes out with, every season is interesting because they make everything in Africa and use traditional Nigerian techniques to dye the clothes, it’s not something we see anyone else doing.

DP: One aspect of the brand that really stands out is the way in which you communicate with your audience, you clearly lay out what you believe in but it never comes off as if you were telling people what to do.

IL: We want to be a good influence, but we don’t want to tell people how they should live. People hate being told what to do, they hate hearing “do this” or “don’t do that”, we don’t think that’s how you’ll change the world. The only way you can make stuff happen is by changing the way you’re living and hopefully, that’s going to influence other people to follow. You face much less resistance this way, you don’t need to argue with anyone from an opposing viewpoint. Even if you have all of the facts, the more you argue the more the other person is going to lock into their position. If someone doesn’t want to open their eyes you can’t force them to do it. That’s how we learned, we surrounded ourselves with very hippy friends who never preached to us or forced us to do anything, they were just happy and we wanted to be apart of that.

DP: Thank you Isaac and Florence!