We shake hands and seconds later she’s off, gabbling away at 100mph about everything that’s happened to her in the past few days. It’s an excitable story that involves a friend’s wedding, a monster hangover and the opening of her new exhibition in Liverpool. It’s also a little tricky to take in the finer details, firstly because we’ve only just met, and secondly because she’s also attempting to open a bolted fire door so we can sit outside on the metal steps of her studio in east London. But it does provide a glimpse of what Pam Hogg’s life is like: frantic and chaotic, with the potential to crash and burn at any moment.

Perhaps this is why, at the end of every collection the designer makes, her body shuts down and she goes into hibernation. “I plummet,” she says. “For the last one, I worked four straight days and nights in the studio to get it done. Then I didn’t go to the studio for a month. I was broken, I could hardly move. You think, ‘I can’t go through this again.’”

Lady Gaga in a Pam Hogg jumpsuit in London, 2010. Photograph: Rotello/MCP/Rex/Shutterstock

And yet she’s been putting herself through it for four decades now. Hogg started designing clothes in the early 1980s, a child of the new romantic scene, a time when the fashion world rewarded the bold and the outrageous. Her punk-inspired outfits have been worn by a long list of pop legends – Debbie Harry, Siouxsie Sioux, Kylie Minogue, Taylor Swift and Rihanna – while her PVC and Lycra catsuits have become symbolic of female strength. “Every woman who’s ever tried on one of my catsuits has said, ‘Oh my God, I can’t wear that!’” She laughs. “I always tell them to just try it on. When they do, they instantly feel empowered.”

The exhibition, at the Gallery in Liverpool, covers her lifetime’s work, from studded leather jackets to wild, colour-blocked bodysuits and fantastical headdresses. It’s called Dr Hogg’s Divine Disorder because that’s how she works. It tires me out just hearing about it. Hogg makes all of her clothes herself and, until relatively recently, didn’t even have a mannequin, pinning designs on her own body instead.

She never puts her ideas down on paper, preferring to let them swim around in her head until the moment of conception. When mistakes happen, they often send her off in a totally different direction. A frayed edge might become the focus of an entire outfit. A needle left in could catch the light in such an intriguing way that, rather than remove it, she’ll simply add more to the outfit. As for deadlines, she says, on one occasion she was still scissoring away at a dress while the model was striding towards the catwalk.

The designer works on a shoestring these days: the expensive materials she dreams of working with are out of reach, she says, since she’s now viewed as a cult figure and has been abandoned by the mainstream. In 2016, when her clothes appeared alongside outfits by Chanel and Dior in a show called The Vulgar: Fashion Redefined, she just laughed. “Because mine were made of old curtains I found on the market that cost me £20 for the lot! A headdress made from old plastic flowers that I found in junk shops!”

Hogg, who declines to give interviewers her age, began making her own clothes at the age of six. She was born in Paisley, near Glasgow, and her family never had money, so she modified hand-me-downs from wealthier neighbours so they suited her. Her late father wouldn’t have considered himself creative, but Hogg marvels at his talent for turning even the most mundane piece of junk into a wonderful gift.

Hogg with Siouxsie Sioux - in one of her catsuits - at the Q Awards in 2011. Photograph: Richard Young/Rex/Shutterstock

She clearly inherited this skill, winning multiple prizes at Glasgow School of Art before moving to London to study at the Royal College. Still, she never had any intention of going into fashion until the Blitz Club, Steve Strange’s legendary new romantic haunt, came on her radar. Terrified of being turned away, Hogg threw herself into making outlandish outfits that would meet the door staff’s approval. When these caught the eye of the crowd, she started to receive her first orders.

“Getting into the club was one thing,” she says. “But inside were all these insanely creative people who would work tirelessly every single night to make their outfit for the next week. That really resonated with me because nobody wanted to be the same as everyone else. I can’t understand why anybody would. I always tell my students that the greatest gift you have is your individuality. Why would you want to be like somebody else?”

It seems amazing now, but Hogg’s DIY designs were soon being sold in Harrods and Bloomingdale’s. Hogg remembers the 80s as a time of openness, innovation and creativity – before everything became “straight and homogenised with hardly any flicker of excitement”. Her star rose to the extent that, in 1990, she was invited to appear on the Wogan show to discuss Glasgow being named European capital of culture. She remembers turning up straight from her birthday party the night before, champagne glass still in hand. “I was off my head,” she laughs. “I was wearing my black PVC leggings and Terry Wogan remarked that they looked uncomfortable. So my immediate reaction was, ‘Are they?’ and I sat on his lap.”

The blood on the wedding dress I designed was all natural. Whenever I cut my hand working I would smear it on the thing

Hogg swapped fashion for music in the 90s, forming bands with the same approach she took to clothing design – writing lyrics five minutes before show time. Her friend Debbie Harry was so impressed that she invited Hogg to support Blondie on their comeback tour. Hogg still beams at guitarist Chris Stein’s description of her as a “weird Nico”.

When fashion called Hogg back in the early 00s, the industry had changed. Unable to afford a studio, she resorted to working from her kitchen at first. Her current studio, in Hackney Wick, has been a struggle to maintain, but her work has remained bold. Her 2010 collection, Goddess at War, reinvented the wedding dress with dirt, bones and even her own blood. “The blood was all natural,” she stresses. “Whenever I cut my hand working I would smear it on the thing. The same with my students: ‘Get it on there!’” Three years later, Emperor’s New Clothes caused a stir for its lack of attire, with models bringing full-frontal nudity to the catwalk, “To me,” shrugs Hogg, “it’s no different to painting a nude.”

Models walk the runway at Pam Hogg’s show during London fashion week, September 2017. Photograph: Jeff Spicer/BFC/Getty Images

Because her work is often inherently political – the 2014 collection Courage was a tribute to Pussy Riot – Hogg has a reputation for being tough and intimidating. People don’t realise, she says, that she is incredibly sensitive. I can vouch for that. Beneath the punky exterior – today she’s rocking turquoise Adidas three-stripe joggers, suede chelsea boots and huge red-framed plastic shades – she has a fragility that makes you want to give her a big hug.

She talks about losing many of her close friends in recent months, pulling down her shades to hide the tears. And there’s a sadness to how she describes her work and career . Her dreams, such as having an “atelier woman” to help bring her endless creative visions to life, are “all disappearing now”. At one point, her voice cracks and she says: “My life is nothing to me if I’m not working.”

If you're just giving people what they want it's stagnant. Give them what they don't know they want

These are difficult times for Hogg. She may be taught in colleges and cited as an influence by other designers, but this is rarely accompanied by income. She’s about to take on the role of costume designer for a production of Cyrano de Bergerac by the National Theatre of Scotland, the Citizens Theatre and the Lyceum – but this is the first such commission she has ever received. People often assume her independent streak means she wants nothing to do with the mainstream, but that’s not true. She’d happily take a commercial deal, she says, but hasn’t spent decades honing her brand only to sign her name away for peanuts. “I’ve been offered some unbelievably bad deals – and I’ve seen what signing them has done to my friends.”

Butshe’s most concerned for young designers, those whose challenging work won’t be greeted with the same open minds that hers was. Hogg begs buyers to nurture young creatives. “Even if it’s just one person to champion – if they inspire you, then give them some money for fabric or to rent a studio. Or display them in your window. You’ll draw attention to your shop and you’ll be surprised how many people might order their work. If you’re just giving people what they want, it’s stagnant. Give them what they don’t know they want.”

For all her desire for an easier life, there’s something about Hogg that would, I suspect, struggle with entering the mainstream. She’s too natural a rebel, far more artist than businesswoman, just too individual to soften her edges. As she happily says: “I’m just glad not to be termed normal. Fuck normality!”