Designer Sat Hari: Intentions, Kismet, and God’s True Cashmere

God’s True Cashmere’s co-founder may be Brad Pitt, but it’s Sat Hari, fashion and jewellery designer and nurse healer, who’s the driving force behind the softest and most luxurious cashmere you’ve ever felt. 

The fashion industry is coloured with personalities. It’s one of the things that make fashion so much fun to follow. So what if half of a brand is one of the world’s biggest movie stars? I meet Sat Hari of God’s True Cashmere over afternoon tea while she’s in Hong Kong and though my initial curiosities centre around her co-founder Brad Pitt, we get so caught up between interesting stories of intention and a connection of kismet dots that the actor barely comes up.

I ask the designer, who goes by her first name, Sat Hari, how she arrived at this incredible standard of softness in cashmere shirts and she tells me she grew up in India, where she had the chance to experience the hand feel of shatoosh, which is made from hair of a rare breed of antelope called chiru, that’s said to produce wool so soft it’s unlike any other and is thus reserved for kings. Although it’s now illegal to farm the wool of this endangered species, it’s this softness, which didn’t feel as if it belonged in this world, that stuck to the designer for years afterwards.

 It was because of a dream that Sat Hari, a former nurse and jewellery designer, came to start a brand of cashmere whose softness rivals that of the most luxurious Italian brands. A quick Internet search will unearth the story of how Sat Hari dreamed she gave a cashmere shirt to Pitt. But spend time with Sat Hari and you’ll get to know all the other parts of the same dream. Before that vision, one of her former patients had given her a vintage cashmere button-down shirt that was rugged and super comfortable, but as it was so old she was unable to source another like it.

But the universe was at work. Later, while on a blind date with a guy who owned a factory that had produced cashmere items for Chanel in the 1980s, Sat Hari discovered that he was the manufacturer of her precious shirt. “I asked him if he’d make one of those shirts for my friend Brad Pitt,” she says. “He laughed, not believing me at first, but eventually we begin working on the shirt together.” Sat Hari initially intended to give the shirt to Pitt for Christmas but she was delayed by three months trying to find the shahtoosh hand-feel that she’d had in her mind all along.

It’s surprising to learn that the heavenly, lightweight, softer-than-soft material wasn’t the most difficult aspect of making the shirt, but rather the hand-carved gemstone snap buttons that held the shirt closed. Carved by hand with great delicacy, as they had to be so small, the stone buttons were particularly important to Sat Hari. Her two favourite shirts in her closet are one in grey with emeralds and a black one with amethysts.

“There are seven gemstone buttons on each shirt, seven for each chakra to activate all of the energy centres in our beings and tap into the mastery inside each of us,” she says. “My intention is that my clients will always be surrounded by this energy field and to feel the love.” She’d intended this when she made Pitt’s first shirt, and so many others have since commented on just how different God’s True Cashmere shirts feel.

With blessings from Pitt and friends in the fashion industry – they include Paola Russo, founder of Just One Eye, and Richard Stark of Chrome Hearts – and a business plan in hand, God’s True Cashmere was born. Sat Hari started with a collection of seven shirts, though she initially wanted nine or 11, the number of mastery. But seven was what could be done and they were put on a rack at Just One Eye. They sold out immediately and Russo asked for another batch. It was at the height of Covid, a time when comfort was king, so the timing couldn’t have been better. The second retailer to pick up the brand was Selfridges. Jeannie Lee, former head of Buying Womenswear, saw the shirts at Just One Eye and got in touch. Sat Hari was on tour with the Red Hot Chili Peppers – another story she’s saving for another day – so she showed Lee her shirt samples in her hotel room. Then came a boutique in Switzerland, Blake in Chicago, Joyce in Hong Kong and, eventually, Mr Porter.

God’s True Cashmere is now on the wholesale calendar. Since last year, the brand also shows during market dates in Paris and New York. The collection is also expanding. This autumn sees the debut of a new jacket, waterproof nylon outerwear that’s fully lined with cashmere (even the pockets), track suits, shorts and trousers. The fashion and design worlds will also be excited to know that a collaboration with Yoji Yamamoto also debuts this year. It’s Yamamoto’s designs and GTC materials, Sat Hari tells me. Sounds like a fashion dream.

As Sat Hari intends God’s True Cashmere’s pieces won’t be bought in mass quantities that aren’t accounted for, but instead passed down to be shared with the next generation, she has a strict no-sale policy with her wholesale partners. Asked about Pitt’s involvement. Sat Hari says he enjoys the creative process. They sit down with their colour books at the beginningof the season to dream up specific colours and combinations. “His joy in the process is as pure as a child’s at play,” she says.

The word “intention” comes up many times as we talk. It’s important to Sat Hari, because “everyone deserves softness and to feel love”, she says. She doesn’t dwell on the material, even though it’s the first impression everyone has. I don’t know how many people will argue with that. We all need more softness and love in fashion.