The man who invented grunge finds inspiration at street Level. The people I'm most inspired by you can’t judge by their clothing. The guys who really have style don't even know it. Design is not some great high art form,” asserts Marc Jacobs. “I’m actually a bit suspicious of men who follow fashion too closely.”
The first time I met Jacobs was at a party back in the 1980s. A friend hurried me over to him and thrust my hand into his. “You have to meet my friend Marc,” she cooed. “He does the most wonderful knits.” We had barely exchanged hellos before Fern Mallis, then-executive director at the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA), snatched him away. He flashed an “I’m sorry” sort of smile before disappearing into a sea of faces. I should have known then that his ascent would be as fast and frenzied as the swarm of people around us. Earlier this year I watched him collect his latest in a long line of awards, Menswear Designer of the Year from CFDA, looking not much different than when he was simply a shy friend of a friend who was doing the “most wonderful knits.”
“I learned to knit from my grandmother. She loved to knit in front of the TV before going shopping for panty hose at Saks Fifth Avenue or cosmetics at Lord & Taylor or wherever,” Jacobs recalls. “Anyway, I used to design sweaters. Then, when it came time to do my senior project at Parsons, I designed these three really oversized, very heavy, hand-knit sweaters. Barbara Weiser, who was one of the buyers at Charivari saw them and wanted to produce a limited edition for the stores. They were photographed all over. That was sort of the beginning of my career. I met my [business] partner, Robert Duffy — who I'm still with — at that same Parsons fashion show. He was working for a Seventh Avenue company and convinced them to hire me straight out of school. In that first collection I continued to do the chunky, hand-knit sweaters, but with a smiley face.”
Even back then, the hyper-energetic Jacobs, who drinks pints of coffee and smokes piles of cigarettes each day, had a spirit for fun that set him apart from the sacrosanct fashion crowd. After graduating from Parsons School of Design and a short stint designing for Reuben Thomas, Jacobs and Duffy launched the first Marc Jacobs Collection in 1986. That very next year, Jacobs became the youngest designer ever to win the prestigious CFDA Perry Ellis Award for New Fashion Talent. Two years later, Jacobs accepted a job with Ellis.
But like so many things that begin so well, his time there ended badly. Jacobs’ Spring-Summer 1993 women’s collection featured over-sized flannel shirts, slouchy sweaters and chunky army boots paired with floral vintage-looking dresses. It would quickly be labeled “Grunge” and Jacobs would go down in history as the man who invented it. And while the press made it an overnight editorial sensation, it was an equally swift commercial disaster with the public. Soon after, Perry Ellis released Jacobs from his contract and discontinued the designer's line. But no matter how unsuccessful the line was, few deny its impact.
“It’s my favorite,” Jacobs asserts without hesitation. “I liked the idea of making some visual noise through clothing. I found a two-dollar flannel shirt on St. Mark’s Place and I sent it off to Italy and had it made into a $300-a-yard plaid silk. It was like the Elsa Perretti crystal tumbler at Tiffany that was inspired by a paper Dixie Cup. I love to take things that are everyday and comforting and make them into the most luxurious things in the world. But I didn't set out to be some hellion,” he continues. “There was this new kind of beauty that was starting to be recognized. Girls like Kate Moss—this idea of the shoe-gazer, this person who couldn't look up, who's sort of insecure. And I’ve always felt like that, that I never fit in. But that’s sort of empowering too.”
If Jacobs felt at all insecure about his departure from Perry Ellis, he didn’t let it show. He viewed it as a welcome break and promised to return with a bang. And in 1997, the bang was heard round the world as Jacobs reemerged at Louis Vuitton. In Vuitton, he saw a world of possibilities and moved the staid luxury goods company into a coveted fashion label. He would go on to win another CFDA award later that year and was named Best Fashion Designer of the Year by VH1 in 1998. His association with the powerhouse brand also yielded him one more prize, a line of his own. He currently designs men’s and women’s clothing, accessories, and shoes for Louis Vuitton, Marc Jacobs Collection and his newest line, Marc by Marc Jacobs.
“My style for Marc Jacobs is more American sportswear, casual yet stylish,” he explains. “When designing for Vuitton, it becomes more ‘in your face’ and continental. I just think of the people who would wear them.”
And they not only wear them, they covet them. Just as logo fever had reached feverish heights, Jacobs solicited bad boy Stephen Sprouse to cover the beloved Vuitton logo with graffiti. The resulting line of bags became a fashion obsession and sold out in the blink of an eye.
But Jacobs doesn’t like to talk about his commercial successes. “I just want things to be really good. I mean, well made. And well done. I don’t know what’s commercial! It’s wrong to approach it like that,” he asserts. “If people like something it becomes the season’s hot trend. In the end, it’s the consumer who decides. I don’t decide. I’m constantly in a state of shock that I’m in the place that I am,” he continues. “Do you know what I mean? I’m not the world’s biggest optimist. I think of myself as being very realistic, but I definitely drift toward...pessimism.” He laughs. “And melancholy sometimes.”
Nick Steele
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