Rick Owens, Founder & Creative Director of his namesake label
Grunge Aesthetic / Brutalist / Androgynous
Origin: California, United States
The Lord of Darkness
Rick Owens studied the art of pattern making and draping courses at the Los Angeles Technical College. Due to a scarcity off work, Owens accepted a position cutting patterns for illegal copies of designer clothing. Not much later he founded his namesake label, in 1994. Rick Owens was largely under the radar, but due to his avant-garde aesthetic he has garnered a cult following, who prized him for his slim-fitting leather jackets and distressed sensibility.
The fashion industry eventually noticed the ability of the designer, who was able to translate his goth-like vision into a couture-like sophistication. Owens is the essence of the movement that defies the norm with effortless fluidity, in Rick's own words." if you're going to do something exaggerate it!”. Together with his partner Michele Lamy, he creates collections that are a mix of classic influences and straight up brutalist designs.
“I design clothes for someone who has experienced a lot and satisfied a lot of appetites. Someone who’s past experimenting, who’s been there and done it. It’s very autobiographical.”
Since winning the CFDA's New Talent award, Owens' rock-inspired designs have wowed the fashion crowd. His "glamour-meets-grunge" collections center on luxe leather jackets, directional dresses and urban knitwear. Owens attraction to goth motifs, dark glamour and vampire aesthetic are explained as an adolescent attraction to transgression.
Despite the perception that Owens' style is often viewed as brutalist, there’s an undeniable brightness about his humanity, something that rarely comes across.
