Interview
Rick Owens - Haunted House
(Hint Fashion Magazine)
I first met Rick Owens a millennium ago (or 1996, whichever came first) in the Mercer Hotel during New York Fashion Week. The introduction came at the behest of Laurie Pike, who had recently launched Glue, the now-defunct alternative L.A. magazine. Rick was also in from L.A., where he was based, showing his collection to editors and buyers from the convenience of his room. He coolly articulated each "droopy" piece, his long hair sweeping against brawny shoulders bulging from a wifebeater. His gym body and California-bred conversational ease contrasted with a subversive sartorial style that was, and is, both raw and refined, haunted and haute. I knew it wouldn't be long before mainstream's groggy gaze drifted his direction, eyes widening in recognition of unexpected talent from an unexpected place. Sure enough, several years later, Rick won the CFDA Perry Ellis Award for Emerging Talent, despite a decade or so of toiling on the West Coast and having already built a cult-like fan base as defined as his physique. Some time after that, he was contacted both by an Italian factory keen to produce his collections and by Revillon, the centuries-old but struggling French furrier, who wanted to install him as their new creative director. Suddenly, Rick had every reason—if two is every—to pack up and haul off to Europe, Paris to be exact. Since neither of us could steal away to each other's adopted city (in fact, he hasn't returned to the U.S. since absconding two years ago), our interview took place entirely over the phone, during which he spoke candidly about a wide range of topics, including his love of camp, his nights whiled away in tranny hustler bars and his new furniture line. By LEE CARTER
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What are you doing at this exact moment?
I'm en route to my factory, which is an hour from the airport in Bologna. I go to Italy at least once every two weeks, if not every week, and fly back to Paris on the weekends. It's actually easy, like going from L.A. to Pasadena.
Do you remember when we met?
Yes. Actually, Laurie Pike was here a little bit ago. I want to do a book with her. She's so fucking funny. That was a long time ago.
Things have changed a lot for you since then.
It's funny, I always just wanted to have a modest company, and to be independent and comfortable. I just wanted to keep doing what I thought was right. But I would be disingenuous if I said I wasn't ambitious. In the beginning, I remember seeking out the best stores I could find while protecting my identity press-wise. I didn't do many fashion spreads. So I worked with just one store in L.A., Charles Gallay. He doesn't do clothes anymore, but he was a fashion pioneer back then. He was the first to carry Versace, Montana, Mugler—all the really extreme stuff. He was the biggest buyer in the world of Margiela's first season. I showed my clothes to him first. He bought them. And he prepaid.
Was that a happier time?
Fuck no, but it was very nice and I thought it would stay that way. I was operating on a real fringe back then. In those days, I was a part of the wicked Hollywood Boulevard hustler bar world. I hung around people like Goddess Bunny, a dwarf friend of mine, and Mr. Beanbag in super sleazy, crystal, tranny hustler bars just off Hollywood Boulevard, a couple of blocks from my studio. It fit into my aesthetic of broken idealism. That was my milieu, they were my friends. I call them my "baroque pearls."
Do you still talk to your baroque pearls?
Sure, the ones who were involved in the arts and the punk rock scene, people like Glenda. He now has a born-again country band, but he does songs like "Hot, Born-Again and Horny." It's all really sexual Christian stuff. It's really funny. He's a total perv, one of the most extreme people I know. Then there's Vaginal Davis. She was around every once in a while.
Where were you before hanging out with tranny hustlers?
I had always lived on Southern California. I grew up in Porterville, which is next to Bakersfield. I went to L.A. to go to college at Parsons, but I didn't graduate. I was an art school dropout. I studied fine arts there for two years, but it was too expensive and I didn't really see a job ahead, a real job. So I went to a two-year program at a trade college learning how to pattern-make with all these Korean ladies—not glamorous. I didn't grow up in the industry, like Marc Jacobs at Halston. I ended up working for knock-off companies in L.A. I just knocked off patterns for years.
To me, the myth of Rick Owens began with your girlfriend Michelle Lamy. How did the two of you meet?
We met through my boyfriend, one of her best friends. So it's true I'm bisexual. It's supposed to be the other way around, isn't it? People are against bisexuality. It's either shit or get off the pot. It would be great if things were that black and white, but life is all about ambiguities, and sometimes you have to make up the rules as you go along. It would have been easy for me to be completely gay. There was nothing holding me back. In fact, I started out assuming I would be a gay guy who didn't really have relationships, but who would have sex anytime.
Michelle converted you?
Not at first. I was introduced to her so I could get a job as a patternmaker. She had a sportswear company. I worked for her for two years, but I could never really understand her because she has a really thick French accent. Then it just kind of happened and I really can't imagine having a relationship with anyone else. It's been almost fifteen years. God, who knows what that would be in fag years?
I always understood her to be a restaurateur.
Yes, then I went off and she became the restaurateur that people know her for. That's probably why we have a comfortable relationship, because I need a lot of alone time, but she's super gregarious. It was perfect because she basically had a party every night and was very consumed by it, while I had privacy. In a way, Michelle and I had the perfect life. Money was tight, but we had a great lifestyle. We had a decent car, had enough to go away on the weekends, and ate the most glamorous dinners every night. Then the Italians contacted me.
How did the Italian manufacturers know about you?
They saw my name in a magazine article. I wasn't completely invisible. And they were looking for someone to represent. It sounded like a good thing. They had credibility with people I trusted, like retailers who I worked with for a long time. So I thought what the hell, it's either now or never. From that, I became exposed to a whole ocean of buyers I never could have gotten on my own. What's the size of your company now?
I think you'd be surprised. We're up to a pretty decent size.
More than, say, 10 million?
Yeah, generously, because I'm more interested in retail than press. I concentrate on doing tasteful separates at a decent price. I'm not kidding. We do some pretty basic things that flatter a lot of women. I think that's really cool. I'm just a wannabe Calvin Klein or Giorgio Armani.
C'mon, there's more to Rick Owens than that.
Okay, but I'm not doing anything very conceptual. My main concept is you don't have to be so conceptual. I'm minimal and straightforward. When I explain it to people, I compare a William-Adolphe Bouguereau painting with a Brancusi sculpture. I'm the Brancusi sculpture, just a slab of metal on a hunk of wood, but it's about the right piece of metal and the perfect gesture.
Editors seem intent on waving the goth banner over you. Do you hate that?
It doesn't bother me, but sometimes I wonder if they know my aesthetic is more campy than gothy. I'm just a big drama queen, but more queen than drama. My look is about an appreciation of teenage angst without actually having the angst. It's more objective than personal. I just ran across an article about Serge Lutens, the guy who did the make-up for Shiseido ads during the 70s and 80s. I was thinking I really want to know this guy. Or be this guy. We have so many of the same aesthetic touchstones. He was really into J.K. Huysmans, who wrote Against the Grain, whose main character Des Eissantes locked himself in an ivory tower collecting Gustav Moreau paintings, ivory snuffboxes and perfumes. I love the idea of an obsessive and sickly queen tucked away in his silk-lined bedroom.
So you're about drama?
It's all about drama and death for me. Like I love the opera Salome by Richard Strauss, it's right up there with Metallica. Even the films I watch. One of the best I've seen recently is Life Is a Miracle by Emir Kusturica. It was in Cannes last year, and he's a judge this year. It's about wartime in Serbia, but it's a comedy. It's really funny, really campy, really sweet. There had to be some queens behind it. It's too campy otherwise.
Let's talk about your collections. You don't seem like the kind of person who enjoys showing.
For a lot of designers their reward is the walk down the runway, but for me it's about selling. I'm not that extroverted and I have a very ascetic life. I just like the idea of the line being in stores. I'm more pragmatic. It's not about the glory for me. Also, I know that my stuff is not very flamboyant or fashiony. It's almost monotonous. I see fashion as something more permanent, like art or architecture. Designers used to be like that, but not anymore. That's what I try to do.
Tell me about the spring collection.
Spring was a really interesting exercise. I did things I swore I wouldn't do. I swore I wouldn't do things just for effect or put things on the runway that people couldn't wear. I broke both of those rules. At the time I felt very confident, and looking back I still do. But for some reason, at the moment, I didn't recognize I was breaking those rules. I did these ridiculously sculpted pieces, but now I see it was only a means to breaking the cycle of soft, slouchy, beigy stuff. I over-corrected by making things retardedly simple (laughs). I do have a retarded sense of humor, almost grotesque in a way.
You're so hard on yourself.
Fashion is a competition whether you like it or not. I felt I had to do something very different, which I think was a reaction to press. I thought either you can become obsessed by press, or you can take it as a challenge. Now I think I over-compensated. I reacted against the descriptions of me as dreary, gothy and dirty. So I went for sharp, crisp and constructed, which I've always been interested in anyway.
Does the press often play into your creative process?
I'm a little disappointed in myself that I was affected by press more than I thought it would be. I thought I would be impervious. I used to think I'm 40-something, I know who I want to be. But I'm a little more thin-skinned that I thought.
What about fall?
For fall I decided to do whatever the fuck I wanted. As an American, I'm probably very easy to dismiss as crude or naïve, but instead of worrying about it, I just decided that I am crude and naïve. I noticed there's a tremendous confectionary and feminine mood in clothes right now, which is very Parisian, like the Eiffel Tower glittering with lights at night—so nuts, so garish, so magical. The French know how to gild the lily, but I'm all about dead lilies. So for fall I wanted to do something bleak with simple aerodynamic lines, and in fabric that's falling apart and pilling. People just aren't going to come to me for a trend. People come to me for things that are a little poignant, a little broken.
Yet there's something seemingly unbreakable about you.
I'm like the tortoise. I had a long time to simmer. Twenty-year-old guys who get a lot of press have a lot of pressure to live up to. I couldn't have done it. I was a mess at 20. I was really scattered and emotionally sensitive, and probably a lot more self-absorbed than now, which is plenty.
Do you even bother reading fashion magazines?
Not really. I can't enjoy them anymore. I feel over-saturated with fashion. Interior mags are much more soothing. I just got the latest issue of World of Interiors. They go everywhere, but not like Architectural Digest going to castles. They cover the weird stuff, like huts and anything that's interesting. I like interior magazines because they're like clothes, but bigger. It's like putting on an environment. There's nothing aggressive or ostentatious about them.
Maybe you should dabble in interior design.
Well, here's something I haven't told a soul yet. I'm launching a furniture collection during men's week in July. We show men's here in the house, and we have our Revillon sales here, and since I'm already doing the furniture for the house, it makes sense to show the furniture as its own line.
Whose the manufacturer?
It's being made by this guy who lives in my house while he's fixing it up for me. He does everything here, he's a treasure. He used to make the prototypes for the furniture designer Gaetano Pesce. It'll launch with blown-glass vases, chairs, tables and lamps made of plywood, plexiglass, resin and beaver fur. The main influence is Brancusi and the other is Courbusier, so it will have a lot of curves but also a lot of geometry. I'm trying to find very classically graceful lines but in a primitive way.
xplain to me how you got the job at Revillon.
They asked for a meeting. It was such a small company with no hierarchy. There were like three people running it. I felt I could build it from scratch my way. The company is from 1723, so it's the oldest luxury house in Paris. Most designers take these kinds of jobs for the extra income to support their own companies, but my company was actually bigger than Revillon. Taking the job was more of a prestige thing for me. It was kind of thrilling to be in contact with something that old, such a part of Parisian culture. And I like fur, I've always worked with fur. But these furs are major. What's the most incredible fur you've worked with?
Last spring's collection was all about swans and snakes because I've always been inspired by Marlene Dietrich's famous swansdown coat. I was able to get swansdown from Caron, the French parfumier that's the only place that still makes swansdown powderpuffs. When you touch it, your hand kind of goes numb because it's so soft. We also made a hand-embossed mousseline handpainted with scales to simulate shed snakeskin. I would love to work with mouse skin. I think someone did it recently. I haven't done it because Revillon would never, but Rick Owens might.
Have you gotten flack from anti-furists?
No, and I'm so disappointed. I expected more. At the last show we did have some demonstrators covered in blood laying on the street in front of the venue. But there weren't even that many, I was told.
No cream pies in the face?
I'm waiting. It'll be interesting to see how I react. I never think about it. I've gone through worse than that.
Like what?
Like whatever crack neighborhoods I lived in when I was in L.A. Who cares about some silly woman with a pie?
I hear munching. What are you eating?
I'm eating ladyfingers as I leisurely watch white peacocks walk across my lawn (laughs). No, Revillon's a good gig. It's a pleasure to work there, and it's retailing well. In fact, we're in the middle of sales right now. Sales are done here at my house.
Tell me about your house.
I just bought it, but Michelle found it. It's such a coup. It's in this square in the 7th, Place du Palaise Bourbon, a block away from Place Concorde and across from the American Vogue offices. It was for rent for a long time, but we just kind of forced them to sell it to us. It's five floors. We do sales in the showroom on the first floor, my office is on the second, the studio is on the third, and we live on the fourth and fifth. It's so private and quiet, and we have a terrace that overlooks the gardens of the Ministry of Defense. It's probably a little big. I could have done with something a little more modest, but it's so fulfilling to see the look on all those Frenchies' faces when they hear where I live. They don't think I could possibly deserve it.
Do I sense friction?
No. Paris received me with open arms, but I'm not grafted to its bosom either. I love it here, but I have this deliciously adolescent sense of alienation.
Okay, in wrapping up, what do you think your life will be like in five years' time?
I don't really know. There was a minute there when I almost sold my company to a big conglomerate. Negotiations lasted a year. To expand like I wanted, I knew I'd have to be partners with somebody, which I'd never done before, and I knew I'd have to concede a lot. Everyone was telling me I shouldn't compromise my integrity, though, but people don't know I've been doing this for ten years. In L.A., I used to drive my stuff to the sweatshops and ship them myself. So I though maybe it's time to sell out. I also wanted to buy a house and settle down. Mostly I wanted to be able to open stores. I don't know of any independent designers who can do that without backing. So I talked myself into it.
But?
I told the various people I had been working with that I was leaving, but only because I had to think about my future, to take the chance. They kind of did a huddle and came to me with a better offer. Now I'm partners with my manufacturer. It doesn't include store extensions, so that was my compromise, but I was able to buy my house and have some security, and I'm able to still shape the maison and stay in touch with everything. I'm still independent, which is an amazing thing.
Everything about you is amazing, Rick.
No, it's appalling. (laughs)
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