Pour It Up by Rihanna. That would be the theme tune to Alexander Wang’s life, apparently. Sorry, spoiler. We aren’t good at keeping secrets. Neither are we good at patience. So, just because we couldn’t wait (positively bubbling over with excitement) – here’s part two of our interview with the wonderful Alexander Wang. He’s celebrating ten years of the brand that bears his name, so we sat down with him in his London store, marvelled at his glowing visage and quizzed him on all things Wang. The results are here…
Jack Moss: So, have you achieved everything you want to achieve? Are you always looking for something new?
Alexander Wang: I definitely don’t feel like I’ve achieved everything. I think that there’s a big vacancy right now in American fashion for a big lifestyle brand to emerge, you know? You had Ralph in the eighties and Calvin in the nineties. Michael Kors was probably the last big American brand to come up. I feel like right now it’s a really interesting time for American fashion because I think people are kind of seeing what’s going to happen, what’s the next big brand that’s going to happen. That’s really interesting for me you know.
JM: What do you are the essentials of becoming respected in fashion? What’s the best advice you’ve been given by someone?
AW: Be yourself, be authentic to yourself. I think the most important thing is not to forget where you came from and to be you know, and to work hard and to just to be authentic. I think sometimes in this industry that is so much about a façade that some people fall under the pressure to have to be something, you know? You don’t have to be pretentious to sell a dream, to be aspirational.
JM: What’s the Alexander Wang brand ethos?
AW: YOLO?
JM: Good answer. When you think about the Alexander Wang person, who are they?
AW: It’s definitely someone who lives in a fast paced world, who’s metropolitan, who enjoys spontaneity and risk taking and is exuberant and loves to have a good time, and enjoys everything that they do.
JM: In your last show you showed men’ and women’s looks together right? How do they kind of work together?
AW: They’re definitely in the same universe, but I always like the idea that the girl’s more dressed up and can do super sexy, buy the guy is more dressed down, I like the idea that opposites attract. I was thinking of those iconic couples – Kate and Johnny Depp, Carolyn Murphy and Brandon Boyd, Zoe Kravitz and Penn Bagley.
JM: They have a similar vibe.
AW: Yeah. Exactly, similar vibes but there’s kind of that feeling that the girl likes her a guy a little bit scruffier, you know?
JM: When you’re working, how much control do you have to be in?
AW: As much control as to get thing’s done.
JM: That’s tactful! Do you think you’re quite relaxed when you’re working?
AW: I think it depends on the time. I want to work with people who I can trust, and people I can delegate to and build a rapport with. That takes time. For the most it’s a collaboration and I really enjoy working with other people you know, I don’t do things by myself.
JM: So when you’re working it’s about input from the whole team?
AW: Yeah, of course!
JM: So, talking about the store, which we’re in, obviously, why did you choose London as the European boutique?
AW: Well, you know, we’d been looking for a long time at Paris and at London, and you know London is our biggest European market, wholesale wise, so we definitely knew we had a customer and an opportunity. There was nowhere in Paris that I liked, and it was a really interesting, developing street. This was a post office and an art gallery before …
JM: I remember. I used to intern around the corner a long time ago, and I always used to have to come to the post office that was underneath here. What do you like about London?
AW: I really love the people here. I just love their sensibility and you know, a good sense of humour, and they’re quite inviting and it just feels really warm, you now what I mean? Obviously it makes it easier for me that I can get around and communicate but still feels like a completely different culture.
JM: What’s your favourite thing to do here?
AW: Eat, I like to go to restaurants. I think you guys have incredible cuisine and restaurants.
JM: That’s nice to hear; Americans always say we have bad food.
AW: Really? Oh!
JM: Would you say that New York is still your favourite place to be?
AW: I feel like that’s home for me so there’s always kind of a bond to where you’ve really grown up and spent most of your life…
JM: And do you think New York has the certain energy? What’s the link between you and New York?
AW: It just feels like a really big kind of melting pot – whatever you want you can find it in New York, and at any time, and that is really exciting for me.
JM: If someone was going to spend a day in New York, what would you recommend they do?
AW: Come to our store on Grand Street and visit.
JM: Of course!
AW: I love going uptown actually – as much as people think I kind of hang out mostly downtown, I probably spend most of my time there. I love going to Central Park, I love Madison and Park Avenue, I love the restaurants up there, and the majority of my friends live uptown.
JM: Do you have a mantra? A theme song?
AW: Oh, Rihanna. Pour It Up!
JM: Amazing. But do you have one of those: ‘never take no for an answer’-type sayings…
AW: There’s an old Westwood shirt that I posted on my Instagram a while back that said ‘be reasonable but demand the impossible.’ That really resonated with me because I feel that I dream big, think about things that other people would go, wait, how are we going to do that?! Inless you’ve tried, you never know if it can happen or not. And then if you tried and you can’t … whatever, then you accept it, move on.
JM: What’s one thing that the world doesn’t know about Alexander Wang?
AW: One thing that the world doesn’t know … I actually get social anxiety. A lot of people see me at events and parties chatting to everyone. But at the Met Gala, or you know, CFDA, events like that where people are really taking your picture, you get really nervous.
JM: It’s also very tiring just talking to so many different people.
AW: Yeah, and I think sometimes it’s hard to see the other side of that, so it’s not just specific to me, but I do know that it occurs and can become quite frightening sometimes.
JM: Who’s your fashion crush? Or muse, maybe.
AW: Ok, I think sounds cliché, but I think Rihanna.
JM: I thought you might say that…
AW: She wears anything – you know, when you’re sometimes like didn’t see that one coming, but you’re just like, bad gal RiRi, she can do whatever the hell she wants.
JM: If you weren’t doing what you’re doing, what would you be doing?
AW: This is pretty much the only thing that I think I ever saw myself doing, I’m pretty good at events planning (he laughs)
JM: Where would you see yourself in the next ten years?
AW: Hopefully doing exactly this, and loving every minute of it, you know, growing and learning and being able to build connections with people around the world.
JM: And the nearer future, are there any exciting things coming up that you can talk about? Or just working towards the show?
AW: Yeah, just working towards the show, it’s going to be a really interesting September for us because we’re going to have a new format in the presentation, so yeah, keep an eye out.
JM: I will definitely. Thanks Alex!
Photographs by Jason Lloyd-Evans, backstage at AW13, AW11, SS11, AW10
