PHOTOS BY DAFY HAGAI
STYLIST: DAPHI ELBEE

Model: Sofi Abezgauz for Devotional MM
H&M: Neta Golan

All clothing designed by Daphi Elbee

Portrait by Kazumi Asamura Hayashi

In January 1972, David Bowie and his band set out on the Ziggy Stardust Tour, an 18-month, three-continent sojourn to support the albums The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars and Aladdin Sane. As epoch-defining as the songs on those records were, it could be argued that Bowie’s persona, Ziggy Stardust, had a greater impact on sex, fashion, and the gender-bending pageantry of 70s glam rock that would eventually follow. Many of Ziggy’s most eye-popping outfits—avant-garde kimonos and billowing structural pantsuits—were made by Kansai Yamamoto, a Tokyo-based designer who had no idea that his creations would become such important visual markers in the history of rock ’n’ roll.

Japanese photographer and editor Kazumi Asamura Hayashi caught up with Kansai—who in the decades since Ziggy has continued to push fashion in new directions—to talk about the first time he crossed paths with Bowie and how his interest in Central Asian fabrics led to a coat that can cause car accidents.

Photo by Masayoshi Sukita

VICE: I heard a rumor that David Bowie wanted you to design these costumes so badly that he flew out in his jet to ask you in person. What was it like meeting him for the first time?
Kansai Yamamoto: I actually had no idea who David Bowie was until I saw him wearing my clothes onstage at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. Yasuko Hayashi, my stylist, was doing work for David Bowie and gave him some of my clothes. This was the first time I had ever met an artist who was wearing my designs. Before then, I didn’t know how immensely talented he was. (A similar thing happened to me with Lady Gaga. I only found out how talented she was when I looked her up on the internet ten minutes before I met her.) At the time, David Bowie was all about transcending gender. I didn’t know anything about concepts like that, so I remember thinking whoa when I saw him wearing clothes I had designed for women. The clothes were influenced by hikinuki, the method of changing costumes quickly in kabuki. The audience in New York saw the costumes transform a few times during the show. I realized I had done something really cool when everyone in the audience got on their feet and clapped.

I met a lot of famous people in the Western music world through David, and the one thing I can say for sure is that the best people in the world have distinctive personalities that are completely out of the ordinary.

You’ve said your work has a “Japanese beauty.” What do you mean by that?
Why was Andy Warhol obsessed with canned food? It’s the same with me, but I’m going after Japanese themes. Every artist has his own thing going on. I often use Japanese motifs and sometimes wonder if I’m choosing them because I’m Japanese. Having been all over the world and to countries with various religious backgrounds as much as I have, I sometimes wonder where I’m really from. I’m Japanese, so of course I think of myself as Japanese, and I eat Japanese food most of the time. I hardly ever eat Western food. That said, my daughter Mirai’s homemade spaghetti is really tasty! But of course I eat it with chopsticks. It would be rude to try and act cool and eat it with a fork.

Are you planning any new projects?
I can’t mention any details just yet, but I’m thinking of doing a “super show” in Istanbul. There are so many “-stan” places in the world, from Afghanistan to Istanbul, but I have never taken any ideas from them. I’ve spent a lot of time studying the materials of India, China, and Tibet, sure, but I haven’t really looked into Central Asia much. The pants I’m wearing right now are made of fabric from one of the “-stan” countries, and I think it’s a pretty intense material to use for clothing. It’s a weave, so the fabric on the outside and the fabric on the inside are different. I made a coat using a “-stan” fabric as well, and it turned out great. Like, so great that if I wear it around town people will wreck their cars from staring too hard.

You’re thought of as being very strong-willed. Do you think that’s true?
I’ve done everything I ever said I would. Everything. And that’s not going to change until I die. I just want people to remember me as someone who lived up to all of his big words. Sometimes that means I demand too much of others, though. I’m picky about everything, all the way down to the smallest details. But I wouldn’t call myself a perfectionist. If I were to aim for perfection, then even a tiny failure would make me droop my shoulders and everything would come apart at the seams. Just imagining that happening fills my head with sorrow!

Sometimes I ask myself, What were the times that were the worst for me? The answer is always when I didn’t have enough money to be stylish. My biggest wish is to keep on being the flashiest guy out there regardless of how old I am.

Click through to see pictures from the shoot.

Photos by Tajima Kazunali (mildinc.com)

Model: Takashi Matsuno (Switch)

Stylist: Yashuhiro Takehisa (mildinc.com)

Hair: Abe (M0 Management)

Makeup: Yuki (M0 Management)

Special thanks to the office of Kansai Yamamoto.

Fashion Week is like a cosplay convention for the kids who fetishized copies of i-D growing up instead of anime tentacle porn. During the fall/winter runway shows of designers Hood by Air, Eckhaus Latta, and Jeremy Scott at MADE Fashion Week, we chatted it up with a bunch of fashion's lovable weirdos. We asked everyone from musicians like Le1f and Princess Nokia to designers like Luar Zepol a bunch of questions that touched on everything from what food was in their belly to what they were using to cover up their genitals. Things got a little zany, but that's to be expected at event an where people are trying to look like a "post-apocalyptic drug dealer."

Photo by Conor Lamb

I met Daniel “Dapper Dan” Day in early January at his regal brownstone in Harlem, a few blocks from 125th Street. The brown-skinned sexagenarian jogged down his grand wooden staircase and greeted me with a stiff dap. Dan sported a wide-collared Hawaiian print shirt with oversize octagonal gold buttons and matching rust-colored lamb’s-leather vest and pants—all of which were his design.

If you don’t know, Dapper Dan was a hustler who became a fashion legend in the 80s for making bespoke menswear garments at his eponymous boutique in Harlem for black celebrities like Mike Tyson and crack kingpins like Alberto “Alpo” Martinez. His clothes were emblazoned with the monograms of European fashion houses at a time when those companies—Gucci, Louis Vuitton—were mainly producing leather goods and accessories. Eventually, when the fashion houses realized what Dap was doing, they sued him out of business. Even though his boutique was short-lived, the flashy leather and fur sportswear he crafted for the black elite was way ahead of its time and became a pivotal influence on men’s fashion and the aesthetics of hip-hop culture.

I came to Dapper Dan’s home to talk with him about the topic of black masculinity through fashion for a feature that ran earlier this month, in VICE’s annual fashion issue. The conversation I had with Dapper Dan for the piece was long and unwieldy. It covered tons of history, as well as a lot of Dapper Dan’s own personal story. Although I’m extremely proud of the published piece, there was a lot jewels from Dap that just didn’t fit. Considering that, I felt obliged to give you guys a more extensive version of the interview I had with him.

One of the most compelling aspects of our talk was what he had to say about Kanye. At the time this interview took place, 'Ye had just scored his new sneaker and fashion-range deal with Adidas after complaining about his previous deal with Nike in a series of high-profile interviews. My talk with Dapper Dan about Kanye put on display how different their approaches were to realizing their fashion dreams. Dan tried to rail against the machine by making illegal, priceless garments. Kanye, on the other hand, is trying to become one with the machine and remake it in his own image by working with major brands like Adidas. Only time will tell if it will all work out for Yeezy—but, for what it's worth, I think he's on the right track to making history. Dan isn't so sure, however. And maybe that says something about both of us and our respective generations. Or maybe not. Who knows? One thing I am sure of is that this Q&A should give you a good idea of the vast knowledge and history that Dap can bring to discussions on issues of race, masculinity, and fashion. Hopefully, it won't be the last time I get to pick his brain on these topics. 

VICE: Let’s talk about masculinity.
Daniel “Dapper Dan” Day: Masculinity is something that stayed on my mind as I grew up in the ghetto. My whole life, manhood was the only thing that we could truly look forward to. We couldn’t look forward to having money. You know what I mean?

How’d you know what being a “man” was?
As a kid, I was surrounded by my older brothers, my cousins, my uncle, and all these street guys. And I was raised by my father. So there was an idea of manhood that was drilled into my head at a young age. But my personal concept of manhood I had to develop on my own.

How did that start?
Well, the most profound statement a guy ever made to me about this… I can’t give you all the circumstances under which he told this to me. I’ll just say I was in a terrible situation when I was 18 or 19, and he was in the same situation. We were battling this psychological thing. And he said to me, “There’s two kinds of men: One is a man among women and the other is a man among men… Always strive to be a man among men.” That always stuck in my head.

What does that mean?
The way your personality plays out in the group that you hang with determines your place. On the street, you don’t find out who you are until that split second when you have to make a decision. For me, it was when guys tried to kidnap me and shot me in the back.

Whoa. What happened?
The guy told me, “Get in the back of the van and lay down.” The other guy who was with me—he went in the back of the van and laid down...

Damn.
The older guys always told me that there comes that moment when you have to do certain things in your life. Prior to that, I had made a decision when I went into the street that I didn’t care if I died, because you cannot make it in the street unless you have that feeling. Guys get that feeling through drugs and getting high… But the most dangerous guys I ever met in the streets were the guys who didn’t need the drugs.

Do you think it takes a different sort of masculinity to survive on the streets as opposed to anywhere else?
There are different kinds of masculinity. But to me there’s only one true masculinity, and my father is my emblem of that. He went to work everyday, never missed a day but once in 15 years. And he was only late that day, never absent.

What do his actions represent to you?
You might call it vicarious atonement—like how Jesus died on the cross to save humanity. When you see that sort of thing played out in a person’s personality, that’s what I call masculinity. Being a man is being responsible in life to your family and your community and your country. And if you don’t like something about those things, then be man enough to stand up and change it.

In the streets, why do you think “the gangster” is what a lot of young men want to be?
If you want one sentence: It’s the holes in the shoes. When you’re deprived of everything and you see somebody in your community making it and you don’t have that staircase to go up, but you see someone else doing it a different way, [those gangsters] become your first heroes—especially if you don’t have a father. I was fortunate enough to have a father.

What is it about the gangster lifestyle that is so alluring?
It looks like magic, and it seems instant. The other process seems long and played out… You have to go to school; you have to do this; you have to do that. But when you see guys go out and sell drugs and rob, it’s like instant cash and instant gratification. They are overnight sensations. But they offer this distorted concept of masculinity.

What do you mean?
Look at all the gangsters: They all started telling when they got caught. Real masculinity is not being able to inflict pain but being able to take it. And all of those gangsters, as soon as they got busted, they flipped the script.

Speaking of gangsters, what was the crack era like for you in Harlem?
Crack flipped me out. There was a crack house four or five buildings down from my store. The people I saw going in there… I could not believe it. I’d see decent-looking people go in there before work and get their lives destroyed. The drug situation in Harlem was like what you see in Brazil in the favelas. The police didn’t even bother.

How have you seen the approach to masculinity for black men change over time?
Everybody has this concept that all black people in America are pretty much the same. No. We’re tribal. So masculinity might be defined in different ways in different parts of the country. But if you want me to address it as far as Harlem is concerned, I can do that.

Is there anything that makes today different than before in terms of masculinity in Harlem?
Back in the day, the Five Percenters, the Nation of Islam, and other militant black groups defined masculinity. If you were caught outside of their zone, you wouldn’t feel comfortable. So that had a heavy impact on us. Even guys who were not involved in the revolutionary cause would feel uncomfortable if they were not dressed a certain way. It was ironic, because the light-skinned blacks who were always considered uppity went out and got the biggest afros so they didn’t feel like outsiders. And then, when you look around, you’d see that some of the most militant blacks were light-skinned, like Malcolm. You have to remember that the Nation of Islam was recruiting guys straight out of jail, so that’s a powerful influence. Whereas the Panthers had more of an impact on people who were politically conscious and knew how governments work. The Panthers were reaching the college students as opposed to the street guys.

How do you think Obama has impacted the way men dress and carry themselves?
As far as the street is concerned, Obama’s election was like a concert. All around election time, people were wearing the T-shirts, buttons, and all that kind of crap. But to say that it kicked in a certain style? No. A certain feeling? Hell yeah. I’ve never seen so many black people at the election polls in my life. It was like the Million Man March. But did it change how black men carry themselves? I don’t think so.

Photo via Wikipedia.

What do you think about Kanye and his impact?
Kanye is making a mistake. He is begging and waiting for somebody. To people like me who struggled, he’s an embarrassment. He’s got all this money, and he’s knocking on the door. I was dead broke. I told my friends back then, if they weren’t going to let me in the door, I’ll just do what they do better than they do it. And do it for us.

I think the reason he’s looking for support from big corporations is because he wants to do his thing on a massive scale, one that can’t be achieved without the support of players like Adidas or Nike. 
He admitted that he’s an artist, but he doesn’t know how to sell his stuff to the public. That’s his problem. I don’t think he’s in touch. Does he know what excites the people on the street? Or is it just that he wants people to wear something because he’s wearing it? He should study why black designers before him didn’t make it. If he had done that, he would have known what to expect.

If you could talk to Kanye, what would you say?
“Let’s take this little bit of money here and put it over here in a fashion business. They won’t even know it’s us. Let’s nurture it a certain way so we can see how the game goes.” If he comes out with a line with his name on it and fails, then he’s branded a failure. When I was making clothes, people would come to me and I’d say, “No, no. They’re going to control me. They’re going to do it the way they want to do." I’d rather not come out until I can control the elements in the game as opposed to experimenting with my own name. You don’t get a second chance. Not on his level.

The biggest downfall with your business was getting sued by a lot of big fashion companies. Now they’re doing stuff that is so similar to what you did back in the day. How does that feel?
I feel like, Yeah, sucka. [laughs] And you know what? The real impact hasn’t hit yet until all the young people know. When all the young people know, then I’ll feel like, OK, y’all thought we couldn’t do this, and now y’all are copying me.

Who do you think bit you off the most?
The other guys, you can understand. They were established already. But Tommy Hilfiger, his whole style was off our backs. The other guys were already in business. All they had to do was change a little. Tommy Hilfiger, he came in with the whole nine. His whole platform began when he started sending his brother Andy to rap clubs. So he built everything on that. I pick up the paper and I think, Oh ,God, if I was white…

Can you talk about how your story would be different if you were white?
If I was white? Oh, man, I didn’t have to be all the way white; I could have been Jewish... I would have had a clique. [laughs] The only thing that ever held me back was…  Actually, my color didn’t even hold me back. My perception of my color held me back. Reverse prejudice held me back. If I had been more open to dealing with white people and Jewish people, I would have been more successful today. Back in the day I stayed angry, and I didn’t even realize how angry I was. But anyway, that’s my problem. That’s why I’m so happy about my son. He’s growing up in a different world.

Do you think the same limitations are there today for a young black man that were there when you were growing up?
No. First of all, the white guys coming up today are different. The large majority of them are not like their parents. They just have that subliminal prejudice; they don’t even know they’re prejudiced. And some of them have even overcome that! And a lot of the young black guys coming up, they’re not as angry as I was and as distrusting as I was of white people. So it’s a big difference now.

Why do you think you were so angry?
I got tricked. I have to admit it. I got tricked in the sense that those demagogues who needed us to think that the white man was such a devil exploited us to the point where it stunted our growth. I’ve seen guys where it had a more detrimental effect on them than it had on me.

Who would you say those demagogues are?
I’m not going to call out any names. Don’t start that. Are you trying to get me killed? [laughs] But trust me: I know who it is. I tell my children and my grandchildren who they are and to keep their eyes open because people make money off of you believing certain things about other people.

Do you think that has anything to do with Kanye’s perception? Maybe he has learned from stories like yours and he realizes he can’t do it himself, so he’s reaching out to those corporations to realize his dreams.
I think my expectations of what the white power structure would allow me to do was completely opposite to what his expectations are. He expects to get in the door. I expected not to get in the door. His problem is that his expectations are too high.

What’s the sweet spot then?
Russell Simmons, because he hit the right blend. Russell Simmons is a master because he hooked up with that Jewish guy and that was it. That gave him the balance that I didn’t have... I will never allow myself to limit myself to people like myself, again. There’s no growth in that. If you’re white and you don’t have any black friends, you’re missing out. And vice versa. You’re limiting yourself. You need to be gay, straight, white, black, Spanish, English, everything. The more people you come into contact with, the more growth you’re capable of. And I needed to know that when I was younger. I didn’t have anybody to tell me that. All I had were the people who were saying, “Don’t let that white man do that. Watch out.”

It’s different now, though?
My son now doesn’t have to worry about those issues. I don’t want to make him like me. I don’t want him to be like me. I want him to be himself in his own world and just snatch pieces off me and do his thing. It’s more fun for me to see how it all plays itself out.

A lot of dads try to mold their sons in their own image. What stopped you?
It was this one time his cousin was over at our house. And I didn’t like the way his cousin was talking to him, and I wanted him to beat his cousin up. But that’s me; that ain’t him. I wanted him to kick his cousin's ass. And then, his mom was like, “Uh-uh, I don’t want anybody in this house that is against this house. Blood or no blood.” I wanted to kill that little bastard. But my son is different. He didn’t grow up like me, angry at everything. That’s the beauty in him. 

@WilbertLCooper

Illustration by Craig Scott

The much-maligned Marie Antoinette had shit luck. She got married as a young teen to the impotent king of France, had her head chopped off, and posthumously became a symbol of aristocratic excess and greed. Her famed decapitation was partly the result of her all-consuming passion for fashion, claims Clare Crowston, a professor of history at the University of Illinois, in her book Credit, Fashion, Sex: Economies of Regard in Old Regime France. As a big fan of famous French ladies, beheadings, and the clothes people wore back in the day when everyone went to the bathroom in pots, I decided to call her up to learn more.

VICE: Why did Marie Antoinette’s life suck so much?
Clare Crowston: She faced serious challenges. She was Austrian, and Austria was the traditional enemy of France. Her husband was impotent and couldn’t consummate the marriage for many years, so there were no children. She was young and in a very vulnerable position. Her advisors’ strategy to boost her [position] was: Always stay close to the King; if he ever manages to have sex, make sure it’s with you and not somebody else; don’t ask for favors for frivolous reasons.

And how did fashion come into all this?
There is a great line from one of her letters that basically says that she used fashion to give the appearance of having credit. Now, in the 18th century, when people spoke of “credit,” they were talking about somebody’s reputation and credibility. Credit is a great example of the gray market of female power at the time—through credit women could indirectly influence the whole machinery of the royal government. What Marie Antoinette was saying in her letter was that to have credit you have to appear to have credit. She was paying much more attention to fashion than previous queens ever had—they stayed closer to the traditional court dress codes—and she was trying to lead fashion and use her ability to create new styles and dominate fashion as a way to gain attention and to claim some kind of prestige in the eyes of the court.

That fashion sense meant she worked directly with designers, right?
She had a fascinating relationship with a woman named Marie-Jeanne Rose Bertin, who was one of the official fashion merchants to the queen. Bertin sold her these fabulous three-foot-tall hats. She was sort of the original Coco Chanel—the first really famous celebrity stylist. Antoinette relied on her to craft the appearance she was looking for; theirs was a very close relationship.

And presumably this seriously pissed off the common people?
It came to symbolize what the queen was doing wrong: She was spending too much money, she was having relations with the wrong kinds of people, she was focusing on frivolous things. The people said the queen was bankrupting the aristocratic families by encouraging noblewomen to follow her fashions, and that she was also bankrupting the state.

And presumably, as well as upsetting the masses, this also irritated the nobility?
At first it went OK, but as the expenses mounted and the impending bankruptcy of the French state became clear, it attracted more and more negative attention. There were rumors he was not the real father of her children, that she was having affairs with all kinds of people—lesbian affairs with her friends, for example, including Bertin.

As far as sex goes, the clothes themselves she was wearing at the time, were they considered to be racy?
She was wearing clothes that were extravagant more than sexual. But there is a very famous portrait by the artist Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun of Antoinette wearing a very simple chemise. What was shocking about it was its informality: It was a plain white linen dress with a frill around the bust. The queen is supposed to be armored behind stiff corsets and wearing extremely expensive formal wear. This looked like the queen being painted in her nightgown. There might be a sort of sexual component that people felt there, but it was as much a social shock as it was a sexual shock.

Being old is cool because once you hit a certain age you're completely untethered from all social rules, reaching a new clearance level in "fuck it" for every decade closer to death. Turning 40 awards you the Prozac-Viagra yin-yang, 50 grants you the proverbial flatulence pardon, and 60 puts you in the clear for calling bullshit when you see it.

That's why we invited our sweet angel Dottie to come hang out with us at fashion week. You see, Dottie just turned 70, so that means she's been given the go-ahead to ask obviously important but regularly ignored questions like "Why are the models so thin?" "Why does that snuggie cost more than a Fabergé egg?" "Who is that man in the leotard, and, more importantly, where is his penis?"

New York Fashion Week is like an acid trip that never ends.

From the first day of going to shows onward, you become a style warrior. Figuring out an outfit every morning is hard enough, but trudging through the snow trying to take photos while writing notes of shit you see brings fashion to a whole new playing field.

Just like too much acid, too much fashion in one week rarely ends well. In fact, fashion and I have a love-hate relationship. Last Fashion Week I got so sick I took myself to the ER. The goal of this fashion week was to power through the copious amounts of drugs, smoking, not eating, and trudging through the artic cold without getting sick. Clearly, I failed. I do love fashion, but not enough to stand another hospital bill. Not sure how I did it, but thank God I survived. I’ve become another fashion warrior in the NYC power game. Here are a few photos I took throughout my hectic-ass journey of a week.  

Miyako Bellizzi is an NYC-based photographer and stylist. She works as an editorial assistant and Fashion Week correspondent for VICE.

It's hard to have a passion for fashion when you can't even afford to eat the holes out of donuts. This weekend, however, your broke-ass is in luck because Patrik Ervell is having a sample sale in NYC. The sale starts today at noon and could be your only opportunity to get your hands on that leather backpack with the horse-hair straps or one of those nifty club-collar shirts without sticking up bejeweled old ladies on the Upper West Side. To get hyped up for the sale, check out our super long interview with the designer, who finds inspiration from things as disparate as shoegaze and science. And then hurry on over to Howard Street in SoHo today, or at least before the weekend's over, to cash in on the deep discounts. 

Patrik Ervell Sample Sale
February 21 - 23
35 Howard St. 4th Floor (Buzzer #6)
New York, NY
12 to 6 PM

Check out Patrik Ervell's latest collection on his website.

Fashion is a lot of things. It's glamorous and beautiful; it's hard to pin down and hard to talk about. It's esoteric and readily available, heady and supremely simple, rarefied and widely appealing. It technically effects everyone but, in the grand scheme of things, doesn't really affect shit. And we like that.

In a world with increasing transparency, it's cool that we still have something a little opaque. You know, something that you can't quite put your finger on. We like wondering if we should be mindless hacks ooh-ing and ah-ing with shifting eyes every time a look comes down the runway, or if we should be making fun of people who look better and smell nicer than we do. 

Maybe we just don't get it? But what if we did? That's pretty trippy (about a seven on the tripter scale) if you ask us. So naturally, when we had all this B-roll eye candy left over from our fashion week coverage, we got stoned and made this video.

Gaspar Gloves lace gloves, PRB Studio necklaces, earrings, and rings, vintage bracelets

PHOTOS BY LOGAN WHITE
STYLIST: KRISSIE TORGERSON

Photo Assistant: Ariana Papademetropoulos
Makeup: Melissa Abad
Hair: Darine Sengseevong
Models: Lauren Avery, Dasha Nekrasova, Sylvia Kochinski

Maison Close bodysuit, Va Bien underwear, Wolford tights, Kiki de Montparnasse belt and cuffs, Gemma Simone earrings

Emerson jacket, vintage hat; PRB Studio earrings

Burberry jacket, American Apparel thigh-highs, PRB Studio shoes and earrings, Gaspar Gloves lace gloves

Kiki de Montparnasse corset, PRB Studio necklaces, earrings, and rings, Gaspar Gloves lace gloves

Kiki de Montparnasse corset, Clare Bare underwear, Wolford thigh-highs, Missguided shoes, Gaspar Gloves lace gloves, PRB Studio necklaces, earrings, and rings, vintage bracelets; Kiki de Montparnasse bra, Maison Close underwear and garters, American Apparel thigh-highs, Gaspar Gloves lace gloves

Kiki de Montparnasse corset, Clare Bare underwear, Wolford thigh-highs, Missguided shoes, Gaspar Gloves lace gloves, PRB Studio necklaces, earrings, and rings, vintage bracelets; Kiki de Montparnasse bra, Maison Close underwear and garters, American Apparel thigh-highs, Gaspar Gloves lace gloves

Emerson jacket, vintage hat, Gaspar Gloves mesh gloves

Anachronism in Action corset, American Apparel pants and choker, Carlo Pazolini boots, Gaspar Gloves mesh gloves

Wolford thigh-highs, Missguided shoes, Gaspar Gloves lace gloves, PRB Studio rings; Emerson jacket, vintage hat

On the cover: Jeans, shirt, and beret by American Apparel. 

PHOTOS BY JAIME MARTÍNEZ
STYLING BY ELLA CEPEDA

Styling Assistant: Natalia Comel
Models: Ixchel, Lucía, Daniel, Cuauhtémoc, Arantza, María José, Octavio, Natalia, Alma

UNIF coay, H&M shirt, American Apparel skirt, Vans sneakers.

Rook Brand coat and hat, Tony Delfino jeans, Vans sneakers; Roberto Sanchez tank top, Levi's shorts, vintage sneakers.

Cheap Monday dress, T.U.K. shoes, vintage accessories. 

Cheap Monday sweater, Alejandra Quesada leggings, Vans sneakers, vintage hoodie.

Rook Brand shirt, Levi's jeans, Nike sneakers.

Carolina K dress, Alejandra Quesada shoes.

Vintage hat and coat, Cheap Monday shirt, Levi's jeans, Dr. Martens boots; H&M coat, Thrasher shirt, vintage jeans, Nike sneakers. 

All illustrations by Jocelyn Spaar

My boyfriend and I have called it quits, broken up. The breaking-up part is done, but I am still living daily with an unshakeable sadness, which is only increased by the knowledge that there are practical things I need to do to disassemble our seven years together—buy cardboard boxes, empty his closet, separate our books. But I haven’t done any of it.

Here’s what I have done: gone through my underwear drawer and sorted my lingerie.

This was a lengthy and emotional process, although some decisions were easier than others. There were two bra-and-panty sets, for instance, that I immediately threw away, putting them down my apartment building’s garbage chute to make sure I couldn’t have second thoughts. These were the pieces he had given me most recently, one a gray satin Elle Macpherson balconette bra and thong, trimmed with yellow ribbon, and the other a gray mesh full-cup bra embroidered with small fuchsia flowers. Both were pretty, and in good condition, but I associated them with those sadness-tinged late visits in which we both knew things had changed.

There were other easy decisions. Some things (a black underwire from a recent Agent Provocateur sale, a 50s-style polka-dot number from Fifi Chachnil via eBay) could stay right where they were. He might have seen or even liked these, but I’d bought them in his absence and they held no particular significance. A few (Princesse Tam-Tam pieces I’d picked up at a recent online sale from my favorite boutique) were new enough that he’d never encountered them.

The remaining three sets of lingerie I own went into the Archive, which is what I call a particular drawer of my dressing table. The Archive contains a plain brown cardboard box, which holds several of those overpriced linen underwear-sorting boxes, each of which in turn holds bras and panties tenderly wrapped in tissue paper. In total the Archive consists of some 12 sets, the oldest of which (a pink Liberty Print demi bra full of holes) date back to my first boyfriend. To this drawer I added the slightly padded pink silk polka-dot bra and ruffle-trimmed bikini that had always been his favorite, the navy silk Mimi Holliday comfort bra and matching French bikini that I was wearing the last time we saw each other, and a green lace Princesse Tam-Tam set that I bought on a happy vacation to Paris years ago.

I remembered the fun of bringing that jade-colored diaphanous getup back and modeling it for him in our hotel room, and how much he enjoyed my pleasure in them, and pretended to care that it was a brand that was, at the time, hard to get in the States.

My thinking, in memorializing these intimates, was not merely that I didn’t want other men to see any of these things. Although that was certainly part of it, that possibility still felt remote and vaguely grotesque. Rather, it felt to me a way of paying respects, of laying something to rest—sort of like retiring the number of a beloved ballplayer. I quietly embalmed the clasps of a relationship forgone. I deliberately put aside garments inlayed with intimacy.

Of course, the Archive isn’t only for relics of past loves. Even before our breakup, I had enshrined certain things (the blue floral soft-cup set I was wearing on our first date; the black Princesse Tam-Tam balconette bra that was the first he ever saw me in), and my curation is in fact somewhat idiosyncratic. There are sets that have accumulated the indignities of age—flaccid elastic, torn fabric—I can’t bear to throw out, because I associate them with good luck on job interviews or confidence at a particularly terrifying party. There is one teal lace situation in there that, although it looks innocuous—moderate coverage, underwire, boy-short—is in fact so powerful I had to put it in the drawer just to contain its gray magic; men seemed to find it as irresistible as Aphrodite’s girdle, and I was not sure I was woman enough to govern it.

Part of the thinking behind my Archive is simply that these things are expensive. You can’t give your old lingerie away—well, you probably could, but I don’t think I’d choose to give it to anyone who really wanted it. And it feels wrong (garbage chute notwithstanding) to literally toss away the priciest garments I own. Short of creating some kind of tired performance art, or a grotesque variation of a T-shirt quilt, I don’t really know what to do besides throw them in a drawer. There’s a sentimental preciousness to my practice, I know, akin to preserving in amber moments that are irrevocably extinguished, but I do this because for me lingerie has always possessed a certain power, and not a merely sexual one.

Shortly after the breakup I attended a literary festival in Philadelphia and ended up visiting a high-end lingerie shop not far from my hotel. The store was feminine and boudoir-ish, with chandeliers and perfume wafting through the air; in the way of contemporary lingerie shops with pretentions to “elegant naughtiness” or whatever, it carried a gratuitous selection of discreet vibrators and the occasional handcuff set. I found this somewhat tiresome—I just wanted pretty underwear, not to crash a nightmarish bachelorette party, and besides, if I wanted sex toys I’d go to a sex-toy store—but I could live with it. And I needed a lingerie fix; following the breakup and the accompanying Archiving I was feeling both terrible about myself and in need of underpinnings.

The place didn’t carry my favorite brands, and the aesthetic wasn’t really to my liking, but I still found the experience soothing. Shopping for lingerie has been a reliable emotional palliative for me for years. I searched the color-coded racks and found a couple of simple lace tops with respectable matching bottoms. The saleswoman started a dressing room for me behind one of the extravagantly swathed purple velvet curtains and suggested a bunch of things that weren’t really my style but I agreed to try on anyway.

Then the couple came in. This particular shop encouraged couples shopping—they advertised it, I learned later—and there was a special chair set up right outside the two adjacent dressing rooms. After selecting a bunch of stuff for his ladyfriend to slip into, the dude in question ensconced himself smugly in said chair while the saleswomen plied him with cheap champagne and—I kid you not—chocolate-dipped strawberries. My heart (covered by a hideous, sheer, cherry-appliqued bra I had tried on to be polite) sank.

If this sort of folie à deux brings couples a frisson, well, more power to them. But let me just say that from the perspective of the naked woman in the next changing room, it’s not conducive to a big sale. I was of course glad to know babe looked hot in that ludicrous merry widow, uncomfortable to hear that a thong showed off her muffin top, and really, really wished her boyfriend wasn’t looking to see what I was picking off the racks to try on myself. A man slipping into a Victoria’s Secret can be sort of endearing. A droopy master-of-the-universe who dictates his woman’s (he likely refers to her as “his woman”) underwear choices while chomping on a chocolate-dipped strawberry, not so much.

The first modern bra, after all, was invented by a woman, a bohemian poet and publisher who wrote under the name Caresse Crosby—in 1914 she was granted a patent for a “Backless Brassiere.” While the dialectics of the history of lingerie vis-à-vis the male gaze are thesis-worthy, no one can deny that at the end of the day, the bra’s original purpose was functional—not to mention a welcome departure from the corset. And isn’t that part of the appeal? Something made for a specific, pragmatic purpose that we choose, in the face of all fiscal sense, to render beautiful and luxurious? Yes, one can get esoteric: merry widows, corsetry, pinup bullet-bras that cater to a range of niche tastes. That’s not what I’m talking about here. I mean the things most of us wear every day.

The things I like tend to hew to a pattern: shades of blue and green, underwired, demi-cup, with a bottom that is neither too spare nor provides too much coverage. While the occasional thong is a necessary evil under certain pants and skirts, I always find them vaguely jarring when I catch sight of my reflection. They get a special place of shame in my underwear drawer, too, which is ranked in descending preference order—in stark contrast to the chaos of the rest of my drawers, or, indeed, life.

I could venture a guess about the origin of my love of lingerie. Perhaps a line from a teen novel, or a scene in a movie. Or maybe, instead, it can be traced back to an adolescent reaction. My mom gets her underwear at discount stores, and while I lived at home I did the same. Ours was not a house where one went in for self-indulgence, and my desires felt secret and shameful.
I remember slipping into the dowdy lingerie store in the suburban town where I lived and furtively buying a discounted peach-hued DKNY bra and matching boy short. It was hardly Agent Provocateur; this particular shop specialized in bras for women who’d had mastectomies, and the selection was, shall we say, limited. My first set didn’t fit right. In retrospect the band was four inches too big and the cup a size too small. (I would find this out from the Orthodox Jewish professional fitters I’d visit on the Lower East Side some years later.) But I didn’t care. I smuggled them into the house and donned the set for a chorus concert, feeling wicked and vaguely guilty.

It wasn’t that anyone was going to see them. I didn’t have a boyfriend or even the prospect of one, and the thought of anyone seeing my underwear, had it even occurred to me, was as bizarre as it was remote. But it was, I think, the beginning of a change, an understanding, however hidden, that something utilitarian can be a source of pleasure, could be a performance of my own creation. And this was heady stuff. Less so when the woman at the shop apparently told my mom I’d been in, what I’d bought, and how “cute” it was that I had finally filled out and was “turning into a little woman.”

And yet, my course was set. My tastes in life are generally simple. I’m fine with the roughest generic toilet paper, crummiest wine, and secondhand clothes, but since I first started earning babysitting money as a teenager, I’ve been secretly spending a disproportionate amount on underwear.

I’m not saying I’m buying, like, Eres and Carine Gilson pieces—although I do stalk the Barney’s lingerie floor fingering thousand-dollar bras like a low-rent pervert—but the things I buy are certainly more than what I can, in grown-up terms, afford. I take care of them (hand-washing in the special solution, carefully sequestering each bra from the marauding hooks of any others) and tell myself they’re “investment pieces,” which by definition makes no sense, particularly when I retire them in the prime of their lives to a cardboard box, never to be seen again.

We all have our totems and ways of exorcising the looming demons of past loves gone wrong. Of course, I don’t want an exorcism. I want an Archive, a reminder that there were moments amid the chaos when there was something special underneath that I cherished and cared for.

Left: Bess jacket, Vintage T-shirt, Morris Janks pants; Obesity & Speed denim vest, Clu top, vintage Levis, T.U.K. creepers, L. Jardim body harness; D-ID Jacket, American Apparel top, Gypsy Warrior skirt, American Apparel tights, Underground boots; Obesity & Speed leather vest, Unif flannel, Morris Janks dress, Sock Man tights; Right: Cheap Monday top, Diesel Skirt, L. Jardim body harness 

PHOTOS BY ALAN YUCH
STYLIST: MIYAKO BELLIZZI

Stylist’s Assistant: Siena Scarritt
Makeup: Taylor Treadwell
Hair: Sara Jane Booth at Takamichi Hair
Nails: Holly Lynn-Falcone
Shoot Assistant: Bobby Viteri
Models: Petra Collins, Alice Lancaster, Jude Liana, Sara Grace Powell, Ondine Viñao

Obesity & Speed denim vest, Clu top, vintage Levis, T.U.K. creepers, L. Jardim body harness; Bess jacket, vintage t-shirt, Morris Janks pants; BLK DNM coat, Tess Giberson sweater, L. Jardim necklace

Left: Obesity & Speed leather vest, Unif flannel, Morris Janks dress, Sock Man tights, Gypsy Warrior earrings, L. Jardim hand chain; Right: D-ID Jacket, American Apparel top, Gypsy Warrior skirt, Topshop earrings, vintage belt

Left: Schott jacket, Bess sweater, BLK DNM pants, Unif boots; Tripp jacket, Nastygal top, Tripp pants, Sock Man socks, T.U.K. creepers; Right: Tripp jacket, Diesel skirt; 6397 jumpsuit, Fuct hat, L. Jardim necklace; Morris Janks top, L. Jardim body harness

Left: Morris Janks top, BLK DNM pants, L. Jardim body harness; 6397 jumpsuit, Dr. Martens, Fuct hat, vintage chain; Schott jacket, Bess sweater, BLK DNM pants, Unif boots; Right: Cheap Monday top, Diesel skirt, Hue socks. Dr. Martens, L. Jardim body harness; Tripp jacket, Nastygal top, Tripp pants, Sock Man socks, T.U.K. creepers; Morris Janks top, BLK DNM pants, T.U.K. creepers, L. Jardim body harness; Schott jacket, Bess sweater, BLK DNM pants, Unif boots

Bess leather bra, Cheap Monday top, L. Jardim body harness; Schott jacket, Trash & Vaudeville top, vintage earrings, L. Jardim necklace; Unif top, L. Jardim body harness

The Boyfriend. Robert Geller top, vintage pants

PHOTOS BY CLAIRE MILBRATH

STYLIST: MILA FRANOVIC

Assistant: Darby Milbrath

Models: Brandon, Martin, Bazhad, and Alejandro 

The Artist. Stussy Delux jacket, Dockers pants

The Basketball Player. American Apparel shirt, Nike shorts and socks

The Boy Next Door. Diesel underwear

The Weightlifter. American Apparel shorts

The Tennis Player. Paul Smith shirt, Thom Browne shorts

The Businessman. Filippa K shirt, vintage suit

The Skater. Wings + Horns top, Levi's jeans

The Stoner. Stussy shirt, Alexander Wang pants

The Chongo. Givenchy top, Dickies bottoms

The Chiller. Vintage top, Barena pants

The Student. Engineered Garments top, Yaecca pants

The Cop. Vintage shirt, pants

The Raver. Stussy sweatshirt, Bape x Stussy pants

The Handyman. A.P.C. + Carhartt shirt, Acne jeans

The Pool Boy. American Apparel swim trunks

The Dad. Tommy Hilfiger boxers, Fillipa K shirt, S.N.S. Herning cardigan

The Frenchman. S.N.S. Herning top, vintage pants

The Hunter. Browning top, A.P.C. jeans

The Eurotrash Guy. Stussy top, Kappa pants

The Logger. Givenchy shirt, Acne jeans

CWB jacket and shorts, Nike sneakers, vintage hat

PHOTOS BY CAROLINE MACKINTOSH

STYLIST: ANEES PETERSEN

Model: Geoff from John Wizards

Clothing designed by Anees Petersen

CWB jacket, vintage sunglasses; Vintage top, Y&L shorts and pants, Nike sneakers and bag, CWB hat

Vintage t-shirt and running tights, Nike sneakers, Columbia hat, Huf bag; Vintage hat, 2bop t-shirt, CWB shirt

Y&L t-shirt, jersey and pants, vintage sneakers, 2bop hat

2bop t-shirt, CWB shirt, vintage shorts and hat; Y&L t-shirt, jersey and pants, 2bop hat

Columbia jacket, Black In Black goggles; Columbia Jacket, CWB shorts, Nike sneakers, Black In Black goggles

Vintage top, CWB hat; 2bop t-shirt, CWB shirt, vintage shorts and hat

American Apparel tank, Y&L t-shirt and jersey, 2bop hat; CWB shorts, Y&L pants, Island Style bag

CWB shorts, Y&L pants, Nike sneakers, Island Style bag

Vampire's Kiss
Patrick wears T-shirt from Gap; Joanna wears skirt from Radio Vintage London, tights by Wolford, and shoes from Forever 21

PHOTOS BY CARL WILSON
STYLIST: ELLA WHITE

Makeup Artist: Laura Glover
Models: Paul, Steve, Jonathan, and Joanna from Body London; Finlay from Nevs; Patrick, Joe, and Jack from D1

Bachelor Party
Paul wears top by Lacoste, jeans from Zara, and sneakers by Nike; Jack wears sunglasses by Persol and shirt from Radio Vintage London; Finlay wears top by Lacoste; Patrick wears jacket and trousers by Burton, shirt from American Apparel, and shoes from Blitz Vintage; Jonathan wears top by Lacoste; Steve wears jacket from Blitz Vintage and T-shirt from American Apparel; Joe wears glasses from Ray-Ban, leather jacket from Radio Vintage London, shirt from River Island, trousers from Topman, and shoes from ASOS; Joanna wears suspender belt and garter from Mimi Holliday, stockings from Ann Summers, and vintage shoes

Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Top from Rokit.co.uk, skirt from American Apparel, socks by Vans, and sneakers by Converse

Call Me
Tights by Wolford and vintage shoes

A League of Their Own
Dress from American Apparel, socks from Topshop, sneakers by Converse, and vintage heels

The Lover
Hat from H&M

Spike of Bensonhurst
Joanna wears skirt from American Apparel and shoes from Oasis; Jack wears shirt from Rokit.co.uk, jeans from Blitz Vintage, and sneakers by Puma

Ever fantasize about being your favorite video game character? Well, Ammerman Schlösberg’s latest collection is turning our daydreams into reality. With garments that appear to be straight out of a baby-doll ninja comic, the young design duo was able to capture the charm of cosplay and refine it into something wearable for the everyday gal who daydreams about lace and murder.

Enjoy.

PHOTOS BY WILLIAM EADON

Makeup: Laramie for Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics
Model: Kirsten Kilponen
Hair: Sean Bennette

All garments by Ammerman Schlösberg, unless otherwise noted

Crown by Kristen Dempsey

PHOTOS BY JONATHAN LEDER
STYLIST: ANNETTE LAMOTHE-RAMOS

Photo Assistant: Roland Hulme
Stylist’s Assistant: Hally Erickson
Makeup: Mari Hattori
Hair: Ginger Ralph at Woodley & Bunny
Models: Brittany Nola and Amelia G. at APM, and David Bias

Special thanks to Rick Muller at Catskills Retreat

American Apparel T-shirt; American Apparel top, vintage jacket from Screaming Mimi's, J. Crew skirt, Marlies Dekkers bra

Marlies Dekkers bra, Nixon watch

Forever 21 dress, vintage jacket

Lorick dress, Stolen Girlfriends Club sweater, Nixon watch, Baggu backpack

Levi's shirt, Marlies Dekkers underwear, American Apparel socks, Nixon watch, Burton notebook

Vintage dress from Screaming Mimi's, Nixon watch, vintage bracelet

American Apparel dress and tights, Burton shirt, Analog jacket, Pamela Love necklace. vintage belt

Whit sweater, vintage necklace

Stolen Girlfriends Club dress, Levi's jacket, American Apparel socks, Vans shoes; Crooks & Castles sweater, Burton notebook

Altamont shirt, Von Zipper glasses; vintage sweater from Screaming Mimi's

American Apparel dress

Lorick dress, Commune jacket; Etnies shirt, vintage jacket, Quail skirt, vintage necklace

Levi's jacket; Marlies Dekkers bra, all clothing vintage from Screaming Mimi's

Crooks & Castles sweater; Marlies Dekkers bra

Katerina Nis briefs

PHOTOS BY: GIBSON FOX AT FEELTHEFUTURE
STYLIST: RENEE WARNE AT FEELTHEFUTURE

Hair: Kyye Reed
Makeup: Miriam Nichterlein
Models: Kathleen McGonigle at IMG, Ebony Gallant at the Wolves, Rowena Xi Kang @Chadwick Models, Eilika Meckbach at EMG, Newsha Syeh

Special thanks to Sun Studios 

Soot dress, POMS earrings

P.A.M. dress, Triangl briefs

Yuliy Gershinsky top; Lonely Hearts pants

FEELTHEFUTURE top and gown, American Apparel tights, vintage shoes, Prada bag

Pelvis top

Verner dress, FEELTHEFUTURE top

Verner dress, FEELTHEFUTURE top

Louis Vuitton top, Rolex watch; Prada bag

M.Y.O.B ear cuff

All photos by Miyako Bellizzi

VICE: Last night I got so stoned I couldn’t speak…
Eric Schlösberg: Last night we got stoned and then ordered $100 worth of Dominos pizza. There were people here, but still, $100 of Dominos. There were 40 chicken wings, 6 pizzas, two cheesy breads, Cinna Sticks, and a two-liter bottle of Coke.

Sounds like my kind of party!
Just a typical Sunday funday for us.

I really like your looks today. Do you guys usually switch roles in the way you dress?
Eric: She’s always has a "super-sexy baby-doll stripper" look.

Elizabeth Ammerman: Eric is always going for the “ugly-cute, abrasive, very scary dead baby-doll freak” look.

I can’t stop looking at both of your eye makeup—so rad!
Eric: It’s the best loose glitter in the whole world. It sticks in clumps and will never come off. Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics makes the glitter, and the red shadow I’m wearing is Make Up for Ever.

Where are you from?
Eric: I’m from Miami

Elizabeth: I’m from Amarillo, Texas. Moved here for school to study fashion design at Pratt.

How did you guys meet?
Eric: We worked at Seven New York together. It was actually my first job when I moved to NYC, in 2006. Whoa, WTF?! It's crazy how old I am now. I can’t believe I’m in my mid 20s. Ugh.

You and I both. It's weird.
So I was working, and Liz came in and I helped her buy a House of Holland dress and a matching pair of shoes. Then, when she left, a coworker and I told our manager that Liz was really cute and that they had to hire her. So we did!

Really? So you became best buds after that, or what?
Well, then we started hanging out, going out a lot together, and when we were at work we would just talk all day about like, “OMG! Did you see the new Aitor Throup pants we have? They’d be so much cuter in cream with ruffles and shorter." Then we would go on these long tangents. One day we just decided to do this ourselves.

What was your inspiration for your spring/summer 2014 collection?
Elizabeth: The concept of Alice and Wonderland. Or Alice going down the rabbit hole in the Matrix taking acid. There’s also a lot of Lolita cosplay and dominatrix and bondage elements.

Eric: The Matrix as a sex club is the vibe.

I can definitely see Japanese girls eating this shit up.
Elizabeth: I know, that’s what we want!

Where do you sell your pieces other than VFiles?
We also sell at Opening Ceremony in much bigger quantities than at VFiles. I heard Lauryn Hill wants to buy the sheer pink dress but not sure if she actually did or not. But that would be super-exciting if she did!

What influences your designs?
Eric: We are both heavily interested in the process of getting dressed in the morning and what we feel is missing and lacking in our lives. For example, opening up the closet and wishing I had a little nurse bag to go along with my outfit. So all of a sudden we have a desire to make a nurse costume.

Is there a process to that?
After every fashion week, we give each other a week to not speak to one another at all—sometimes more.  We tend to live with each other the week before showing the collection. We come together after that time and we start a conversation about what we are both into personally and stylistically speaking. It’s always the same vision when we get back together. Then we start getting into, “Wouldn’t it be so weird if we did it like that with a twist of this?” We then look at images, get really deep into our research, and the vision evolves into something more. Because we do a more costume-forward fashion line, we like to have our collection well-researched.

This season is a vomit puke ball of art history. We couldn’t choose a time period, so we took all our favorites and mixed them into one. This may offend some costume designers, but whatever, fuck them. I feel like these video-game girls are a mix of everything, so it makes sense.

Is that your fall/winter theme then? Video-game girls?
Elizabeth: Yeah, we’re envisioning this girl in a video game who is being chosen to match with someone like she’s an assassin.

Eric: Slaying people left and right!