“Clothing is always gonna say something about people.”

Question: What does fashion say about us?

Andrew Spade: I think . . . I think generally we’re . . . we’re sheep and I think that’s fine. I mean I think we all dress in a similar way, I mean, in this country. Globally it depends on other factors, obviously. You know, religion, temperature. I mean there are a lot of reasons why they dress the way they dress. But I think clothing is always gonna say something about people. I think there is a real truth in that. And you know, you can judge people by the way they dress. It’s not always . . . it won’t always be accurate; but generally you can tell whether someone is conservative or not conservative, creative or not creative. I love it when they surprise me though. My father told me a story about going to see a famous creative director in advertising in the ‘60s. And my father and all of his friends dressed like beat poets because they wanted to be like the Beats. So they wore black desert boots, and turtlenecks and black jeans. Well the audience, when someone walked on the stage dressed like a banker, they booed him. And it turned out that he was the one who was doing all this great work. And the audience loved that. You can be very straight and have a really . . . a really interesting mind. And I . . . I’ve always loved that when people didn’t have to show who they were by their clothing, but they did by their actions. So I think that I love it when people are really creative with their fashion. I think that it’s inspiring. I think it can be an art form. I think that you can see kids dressing in ways that you’re just like, “Wow.” It’s like they put a painting together. I think it’s another form of expression. I think clothing is just a way to get out what you are and show people you are unique, and that you have something they don’t have. In Japan, for example, because they don’t drive cars, they need to show who they are by the objects that they carry physically. So handbags are your Ferrari or your Volkswagen. You know, or your Prius. So you’ve got this whole dynamic of what you are, and this perception of, you know, where you stand in society based on kind of the objects you have. Where in L.A., you’ve got your Ferrari and they know who you are.

Recorded on: 7/12/07