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- [00:01]
Arden Fanning Andrews
This episode of the Run through is brought to you by ebay. I'm Arden Fanning Andrews, Vogue's beauty editor at large. Everyone's talking about tassels right now, and that's the moment that I end up typing it into ebay. I found the perfect vintage triple chain belt with golden tassels, and it just looks so elegant, timeless. And it's on the way in the mail to me, thanks to ebay.
- [00:32]
Nicole Phelps
This is the Run Through. I'm Nicole Phelps. Today I am joined by the one, the only, Rick Owens. He joined us from his studio in Paris and we talked about Temple of Love, his upcoming retrospective at the Palais Galliera. We also talked about his first ever Runway show and his advice for young designers. Here's my conversation with Rick Owens. Hi there.
- [00:54]
Rick Owens
Hello.
- [00:55]
Nicole Phelps
How are you?
- [00:57]
Rick Owens
Can you hear me?
- [00:58]
Nicole Phelps
Yes.
- [00:58]
Rick Owens
Where am I reaching you?
- [01:00]
Nicole Phelps
One World Trade center in our new podcast studio. Where are you? Are you in Italy? Are you in Paris?
- [01:07]
Rick Owens
My office in Paris. Let's see. You can kind of see the studio, and it's a beautiful sign and. And if you see closely, but the doves have just taken up residence in the nest right outside my window.
- [01:32]
Nicole Phelps
How lovely.
- [01:34]
Rick Owens
They're being very quiet right now, but she's there.
- [01:36]
Nicole Phelps
Is it like a mourning dove or the ones that sound like they're sad? No. You don't know?
- [01:42]
Rick Owens
I don't know, but they're. They are big and juicy. She's the healthy. She's the health. Well, maybe she's. Yeah, she's just got eggs in her big, juicy does.
- [01:53]
Nicole Phelps
Is the exhibition opening the night of the show? Because the show's in the morning now.
- [01:57]
Rick Owens
We have an opening tonight right after the show. I changed my show time to 7:30, which is later than I usually do. And then right after the show, the models walk off the Runway because it's outside. They just walk off the Runway, cross the street, and walk through the garden to the opening. And we're all supposed to follow how great it's gonna be. It's gonna be a standing show, which I don't think I've ever done before, and I ordinarily wouldn't do. But I wanted there to be more capacity and I wanted more people to be able to enter the show instead of be behind the barricades. And I also wanted to serve beer. I wanted it to be like a beer bust, because it is. Well, I won't tell you about the show, but I just wanted to feel. I wanted it to feel like a beer bust that starts in the Parvus of the Palais de Tokyo and then moves across the street to the garden of the Palais Galliere Museum. So the opening of the exhibition will be immediately after the show, which I thought would be great fun.
- [03:06]
Nicole Phelps
I wanted to start by talking about the title of the exhibition. It is called Temple of Love. And I wondered if you had anything to do with the title, or it was the curator's title decision, or you came up with it together.
- [03:20]
Rick Owens
I asked for it, and the curator, Alexandra Sampson, he has been so generous. Well, everybody over there has. But I did a retrospective, like, 10 or 15 years ago in Milan, and I only did it then because they allowed me full control. Because I did not want to be interpreted by anybody. They allowed me full control. And it was such an amazing experience. I was able to highlight all of my successes and quietly tuck away any of what I thought were flaws. And while I was doing it, I was just thinking, who gets the opportunity to do this? This is like writing your own obituary. You get to define how you want to be represented forever. And then I thought, well, wait a second. That's Instagram. Everybody can do that. That's what everybody does. But to do it in such a academically recognized or officially recognized way, well, that is, of course, incredibly special. And the show that I did then, it was very bombastic. Which. Which I. You know. You know, that's something I. I can do, or I. I tend to go there. And afterwards, I was thinking, you know, if I ever get the chance to do this kind of thing again, I think I would want to do something more. More quiet and more. More maybe delicate, more nuanced. That covered the earlier years, and that was more. Not so much about the Paris Runway, but more about the construction and the way I had started out with clothes that were more. More of a tender show. I would want to do a gentle, tender show. So anyway, when they approached me with this, when the Mosaic Gallera approached me, I was beyond flattered. But I also thought, you know, I had my chance. I had my control the first time. I'm kind of open to collaboration or to compromising also because I respect what they do so much. I mean, the shows that they've had there are spectacular, and I had no qualms about submitting to what they wanted to do. And I thought, I've already satisfied my own control thing. Let them. Let the tippy top of the tippy top. Let them do what they want.
- [05:51]
Nicole Phelps
Speaking of the tippy top of the tippy top, I understand that you are only the third living designer to get a retrospective at the Pele Galliera. The other designers being Azzedine Alaia, who has since passed, and Martin Margiela. So how do you feel being part of that company?
- [06:12]
Rick Owens
Isn't that fancy.
- [06:16]
Nicole Phelps
I think it makes perfect sense. But I wonder how it feels to you.
- [06:20]
Rick Owens
Thank you. I think maybe I represent the kind of designer that is hard to find nowadays. A designer that has their own voice, that is not part of a committee. And I'm not criticizing anybody. I've always said that inspiration is 10% of any kind of success here. And My inspiration is 10%. But my partners. My partners supply the 90%. And that is the execution. That is the factory that is managing this army that it takes to get the clothes out there, get them, get them out there the way that I hoped that they would be. The distribution, getting. Getting stuff into a store on time for people to buy it. I mean, that is no easy feat. The other thing that all that I think worked in our favor is the fact that I never really had a design studio. It was just me going and working directly with the factory. Now I have no experience with the design world. Like, I just made everything up as I went along, so I don't know how it works. But from what I understand, a designer has a design studio. They create a collection, and then the collection needs to be taken to a factory for them to translate it to industrialize. We skipped that step. I went directly to the factory and fed the factory directly. I think that is what helped us. I think the fact that I communicated directly with the factory and we all cooked it up together and that what ended up in the stores was as close as possible to what I had thought up. I think that has always been our main strength.
- [08:14]
Nicole Phelps
I understand that the exhibition encompasses a wide swath of your work. Not just contemporary, but going back to pieces that you even did when you were designing in Los Angeles. And back then you had a studio across the street from your partner Michel Lamy's restaurant, Les Deux Cafe. And I don't think I've ever had the chance to tell you that I went there as a young fashion assistant in the late 90s, and it was the coolest place I had been to up until that point in my life. And I think it's still. It's still still up there.
- [08:48]
Rick Owens
Of course you did.
- [08:50]
Nicole Phelps
It was the place to go. If you went. If you went to la, it was the place to go.
- [08:56]
Rick Owens
It really was. We didn't have a lot of money then. I think people always assume that because she's older. That Michelle comes for money. And that. That. That was what got us started. And she did kind of come from money, but she blew it all before me. So. So we had to start from zero. You know, we lived off of that restaurant. That's where. I mean, if we had. If we weren't eating there, I don't. You know, that was where. That was our dining room. You know, Michelle is one scrappy little creature. And she just kind of stapled that whole project together with just spitting vinegar. And I was doing the same thing with my thing. We were just kind of improvising. And, yeah, that was. That was a wonderful time. And everybody. Everybody came through. Everybody. So we didn't need to go anywhere. They all came. They all came through at one point or another.
- [09:58]
Nicole Phelps
And I remember a show you did at New York Fashion Week before you left for Paris for good. Was it around the 911 that that happened?
- [10:07]
Rick Owens
Yeah. Yeah. In my studio, I picked up the phone one day, and there's a voice on the line goes, hello, this is Andre Leontelli. Am I speaking? Hey. Yeah. And I don't remember how he got my number, but he said, you know, well, I'm not going to impersonate it, but he said, I, you know, I saw your clothes in the windows at Henry Bendel's, and I think you. I think you need to meet Anna. So I go, okay, well, I'll be in New York in a couple of weeks. And. Because at the time, I had never really considered Runway shows. That that was a different business from my business. And I'd never even been to a Runway shop. That whole world was just. It was just a different level, and it was a different kind of world. And I didn't disapprove of it. It just. It just was different, alien. Because there was, you know, there was no fashion industry in Los Angeles, per se then. I mean, I. I hadn't interned at Calvin Klein or Donna Karan or, you know, I. I hadn't seen how it worked. So, anyway, so I went and met Anna, and I did what I always do. I packed all my clothes in a. An army surplus duffel bag. And I had my assistant Daphne, come with me, who was also. Who would also model the clothes. So we went to Anna's suite at the Ritz, and I dumped out my duffel bag on the floor, and I just picked up, like, the clothes. And Daphne tried them on, and it was very nice and lovely. So then we left. And so then, I guess based on that meeting, she decided to propose a Runway show because they wanted to support American, young American designers. And this after 9 11. I think 911 was the motivation for that. And I was a little bit torn because I thought, that isn't my world. I don't understand how to do excite clothes that would be exciting enough to sustain attention for a long enough period of time. I could risk burning out what I was. What I was doing. I could quietly survive for a while doing my quiet little thing, just selling it to my buyers out of my hotel rooms in New York and Paris. But I run the risk of burning out of, like, having that kind of spotlight on what I did was a risk. Then I thought, well, you know, I'm 40. I was 40, and, you know, I'll always wonder if. If I hadn't tried, so what the hell? So I did. And the first Runway show was wonderful. I mean, but first Runway shows always are. You're fresh, you're new, and. And I knew that. I knew I. I knew that I. I know I could do a good first show. I mean, I know it because, like, it feels honest and pure and whatever. But, you know, when. When the fifth show ends up looking very similar to the first show, people are going to turn away, and that is going to damage what I've done.
- [13:27]
Nicole Phelps
We'll be back after a quick break.
- [13:41]
Arden Fanning Andrews
The other day, I, like, went on a real ebay spree. There's this huge push for, like, 80s opulence and 80s sort of glamour, and we're going to see that returning. And so I was already kind of tapped into that just from my gorgeous ebay watch list. And I found a really beautiful Chloe blazer from the 80s and a really great Miu Miu kilt, these great Dior boots. And I'm combining them all together. Sometimes trend forecasting doesn't require something that's going to be, like, produced in the future. Sometimes you can, like, tap into the past and tap into the archive as well. That's what makes ebay a fun place to actually discover things, because you're not going in with something so specific in mind, but you have an idea of what you're interested in or what you're excited about or, you know, just truly trend forecasting. And so one thing that I would say people should be watching out for is, like, very opulent, 80s style.
- [14:40]
Nicole Phelps
I wanted to bring up that first show in 2001 or 2002, because, of course, the shows you put on now are so different. You were talking about sort of the everydayness of your collection. At the time. And now you are. You know, I don't know if you're going to like this term, but you are a master of spectacle. You like a smoke machine. You like a rose petal.
- [15:01]
Arden Fanning Andrews
Crazy.
- [15:03]
Nicole Phelps
I mean, we all like it. We all like it. We all have our cameras out from the beginning, the show starts.
- [15:09]
Rick Owens
I was afraid then that I wouldn't know how to do any show. I wouldn't know how to do a show. I never. I never really thought about it then. And at the beginning, there were a few shows that were awkward. There were some shows where I tried too hard. I didn't really know completely what I was doing, and I wasn't convinced myself. Then gradually, though, and this is where good partners come in those collections. They figured out stuff that they could sell. They found the. The few things that they could sell, and they created a business out of it. They allowed me to develop. Who gets that anymore?
- [15:52]
Nicole Phelps
Very few people.
- [15:52]
Rick Owens
That. That is crazy that they allowed me to develop. Gradually I learned, and I started relaxing, and then I started playing, and I found I became. I wouldn't say confident. That sounds a little bit cocky. But I became more comfortable so that I could explore more. And the things that I could explore were. Well, the first thing is, whenever. When I first started, I always swore that anything I put on a Runway would be available to sell. I didn't like the idea that. That it was all spectacle and that women were put on heels and these dresses like floats. And then the designer came out at the end in jeans and a T shirt, as if to say, what I presented is a fantasy, but it's not real. I always felt whatever I put on the Runway, I'm gonna live it. It's all going to be real, and it's going to be the truth. It's going to be what I think is the truth and what I'm really committed to and what I really believe in. I was thinking, okay, instead of the physicality of making people wear floats with high heels, what is another way I can use physicality to my ends to further the values that I want to promote? And how can I talk about beauty in a different way that isn't about lipstick or heels or breasts? How can I talk about beautiful intentions or beautiful behavior? That became my first thought whenever, when I started doing Runway shows. How do I. How do I promote the values of wanting to create a haven for people who don't see themselves reflected in contemporary cultural standards of aesthetics? How can I make the. The confines of our aesthetics a little bit more Flexible. How can I literally think outside the box a little bit? And if I can introduce a weirdness that is palatable enough and convincing enough, I can. I can influence maybe the way people think. If you can accept clothing that isn't. That's weird, but not too weird, because that. That is always the balance. I. I want to do weird because I want to see weird. I want to live weird. But I know that if, you know, if you go too far, it just becomes a wonderful fantasy that nobody can relate to or nobody can imagine themselves embracing. And it's not that I'm calculatingly careful about it. I'm practical. You know, there's a level of weirdness that I'm not gonna go beyond. And luckily, my limits seem to work.
- [18:55]
Nicole Phelps
Do you think it is the weirdness that creates the devotion? I think one thing we always remark on when we're at your shows are the people who come in head to toe. Rick Owens. And they, you know, they look like they could be from another planet with the big, big boots and, you know, they're these giants in this. These incredible outfits. What do you think causes this devotion, creates this devotion?
- [19:21]
Rick Owens
Well, I've given them a world, I guess, where they can get away with that and where they can celebrate that I'm celebrating weirdness, and that liberates them. I had that when I was young, and I've talked about this a lot, but when I was in Porterville, in a very conservative town, I remember seeing in the sales bin in the basement of Kmart, David Bowie's Diamond Dogs album cover. And there was this grotesque glamour that shocked me, and it disturbed me because it exposed. I felt exposed. It exposed something in me. Part of it was my suppressed shame because my flamboyance. I had had to suppress my flamboyance, but to see it celebrated here, it. It just. You know, it made me blush. It made me turn red. That somebody had seen me register and respond to this album cover in this basement in my little town. It. It unnerved me. It. But that was such. That was so liberating. It was such a release, and. And it. It showed me that there was a place I could go. I could. There it was. It was a haven. I think I've always thought if I could do that for somebody, that would be a life well lived.
- [20:41]
Nicole Phelps
Is that one of the albums that's on the. In the exhibition? I think there are some album covers.
- [20:46]
Rick Owens
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that is.
- [20:47]
Nicole Phelps
Is that something you worked out with the curator? You said, I want to put these.
- [20:51]
Rick Owens
Yeah, his Direction was he, you know, we needed to collect ephemera. And so I, I proposed things that I'd already shown but then added onto because it had been, you know, 10, 15 years since the last time I showed things. But, you know, there's going to be a lot of similarities because I don't change. I don't throw things away. I don't throw ideas away. I don't throw first loves away. That was another thing that disturbed me. Designers who kind of embrace this whole aesthetic and then reject it to turn to something completely new, I don't. It disturbs me. There is a voraciousness, a voracious consumption in that disturbs me. And I wanted to be the opposite of that. I wanted to be consistent. I wanted to be loyal. I wanted to be faithful.
- [21:56]
Nicole Phelps
More with Rick Owens after the break.
- [22:13]
Arden Fanning Andrews
I like ebay for one of a kind items. Things that feel limited edition or collections that can't be found in stores. And with the ebay authenticity guarantee, I know that when it arrives, it's real. It is a piece that is coming from the designer's collection, the designer's archive. One of the biggest conversation points for some of the parties that I'll go to during Fashion Week are the pieces that I'm getting off of ebay. Everyone's a little bit intrigued and excited whenever they hear that you were able to find something on this digital treasure hunt.
- [22:47]
Nicole Phelps
I wonder, working with Alexandra Sampson, what you have uncovered or discovered about yourself. Oh, did. Did. How does he see you differently than you see yourself, if at all?
- [23:03]
Rick Owens
I'm not sure yet. And maybe in these days, I'll find out because he is very discreet and very elegant and has kind of left me to my own devices. And we, I mean, we've collaborated on everything. But he's very. He might be manipulating me. I'm not really sure. We'll find out later. But he's been very gentle in his. In his suggestions. But now I'm starting. I am starting to get kind of an idea because we're. Right this, right this minute, we are reviewing all of the texts. Everything is coming together, and there's like, all of the texts, the descriptions of each look and the wall legend, the legends on the wall, and, and he's writing all of them. So only now am I kind of getting an idea of his perception of me and what he wants to highlight or what he thinks is worth highlighting. And it's, it's funny. It's, it's. I'm sure it's going to be very Illuminating. But the other thing is, there is he. It was his idea to include this statue of me pissing that I had done for PT imagine like 20 years ago.
- [24:22]
Nicole Phelps
I'm so glad you brought this up. I was a little afraid to bring this up.
- [24:27]
Rick Owens
And at that time, I was doing this statue anyway for the house. And the idea was it was just kind of my portrait over the mantle place moment. You know, I just got this house and I thought, you know, when a man reaches a certain level of success or security, he commissions a portrait to go to be the. The master of the house, of the mantle place. So I thought, I'm gonna do that, but it's gonna be a wax figure and it's going to be pissing. Pissing has been a motif for a long time. My first big profile in Europe in ID magazine. I. I gave them a portrait of myself, a self portrait of two. There's two of me, and I'm pissing into my mouth. And it was partly because. Partly to acknowledge my, like, sex club past, because I, you know, I thought, I'm presenting myself as this married guy and you know, it. I need to kind of explain. I don't want there to be any. Any idea that I'm trying to cover up my past or something. Something. So. But it was also. I've always used it. It's always. Pissing has been kind of a little poke, mocking propriety. Because propriety becomes condemning judgment a lot of times. And that has always been there, and it will always be there. It is. It is a force in the world. There is good and evil, and there always will be. But I feel like there's always been a balance and everything is about balance. My personal life, it's always been a balance between control and collapse. I've always been attracted to both extremes, and how do I find the right balance for me? And I've gone to both extremes.
- [26:30]
Nicole Phelps
How has working on this exhibition shaped your thinking about your next collection? You're going to, as you said at the beginning of our talk, you are going to have a Runway show and it's going to spill out into this. This opening night. Without giving too much away, of course.
- [26:46]
Rick Owens
No, I don't. I don't know how literally, and I never really know how. I'm always kind of. I. I think I. I'm lucky enough that I have this delusional. I try not to overthink things too much, and then afterwards, I analyze the hell out of them and. And I see. Oh, you know, I see the references. I see and I pick them apart as much as any vicious queen would any collection. I'm, like, doing the same thing to my collections. Like, oh, that's such a rip off of this. Or so I don't know yet. But it's going to be cohesive. It's. It's not going to be a shocking departure. It's going to be enough movement. I hope that will feel relevant, but it will still be consistent with everything that I've done, which is the most important part to me. Michelle always tells me, you only. You only like dead artists. And I go, yeah, because I want to see the full. The full story. I want to see that they maintained integrity and that they maintained their pureness from the beginning to the end. I don't want somebody new who's fresh on the moment and exciting, who's gonna turn around and refute what they've done before. I. I want somebody who has. Has really meant it, and that's who I want to be anyway. The name, though, Temple of Love. I thought if I'm gonna. If there's. If there has to be a title, I want it to be something. Something loving. Like, just say the word love, and that's a good thing. Just. Just make other people say the word love, and that's a great thing. That's just good to do.
- [28:26]
Nicole Phelps
Rick, we. We talked about your early days as a designer a bit. And on this show on Vogue's podcast, we talk a lot about how hard it can be for young, independent designers to. To break through and to keep a business. So for the young, striving designers out there, what words of advice do you have?
- [28:46]
Rick Owens
Oh, God, I don't think I have any. This is such a different landscape from when I started. And when I started, I never thought. I'm as surprised as you are that I got this far. So I had never anticipated. This was never a goal. My goal was just to be a pure artist. A pure, struggling, starving artist. I always talk about Charles James because he was living kind of in squalor in the Chelsea Hotel, making beautiful, exquisite things that he never delivered, apparently. And I am summarizing his life terribly. But I only wanted to have. I only wanted to be an eccentric designer living, doing exactly what I wanted in, like, a niche somewhere off Hollywood Boulevard. So it was just circumstance that led me here. But, I mean, that needs to be the goal. The work itself needs to be the goal. And, you know, I say this to my partners, which kind of makes them crazy, but I was saying, I don't want to get bigger I just want to get better. So I think that's all I've got.
- [30:02]
Nicole Phelps
Thank you. I can't wait. I can't wait to see the exhibition.
- [30:05]
Rick Owens
Hopefully you'll reach out and I'll be able to give you a mini private tour.
- [30:10]
Nicole Phelps
I would. I would love that. That's it for the Run Through. See you Thursday. The Run through is produced by Chelsea Daniel, Alex DePalma and Joanna Solotarov. It's engineered by Jake Loomis and James Yost. It is mixed by Mike Kutchman. Stephanie Karaoke is our executive producer and Chris Bannon is Conde Nast's head of Global Audio.
- [30:59]
Arden Fanning Andrews
The other day I, like, went on a real ebay spree. There's this huge push for like 80s opulence and 80s sort of glamour and we're going to see that returning. And so I was already kind of tapped into that just from my gorgeous ebay watch list. And I found a really beautiful Chloe blazer from the 80s and a really great Miu Miu kilt, these great Dior boots. And I'm combining them all together. Sometimes trend forecasting doesn't require something that's going to be like, produced in the future. Sometimes you can like tap into the past and tap into the archive as well. That's what makes ebay a fun place to actually discover things, because you're not going in with something so specific in mind, but you have an idea of what you're interested in or what you're excited about or, you know, just truly trend forecasting. And so one thing that I would say people should be watching out for is like very opulent 80s style.
- [31:58]
Rick Owens
From PRX.