Why outerwear and how did it expanded into the full RTW collection
You originally started your collection with just outerwear. Why outerwear and how did it expanded into the full RTW collection it is today?
I had began my career as an apprentice in the garment center. As a result, I'd spent hours at fittings. I knew all about tailoring. I knew about setting in sleeves, shoulder pads, the right way to cut the arm hole and that kind of thing. I didn't see great jackets, great coats and great quality at an advanced contemporary level, which is really where I felt that myself and my friends were able to spend and shop. I thought there was something, especially with my aesthetically European eye, missing. So, it was really a great way to kind of dip you toe in and see what the response was.
And the response was great. In the first season, we started selling to Intermix, Touch My, Henri Bendel and this was kind of right in the beginning of the depression in 2008 and 2009. So after about a year of doing this, all the retailers said this is great but you know we really kind of need to see a full collection. We want to see the pants and the blouse and all the kinds of things that go with the look. And so that's how we segwayed into doing a full look. I didn't think about it at the time, but the chance for transmogrification of going from one special item into a full collection was a great way to see whether it worked.
