Gareth Pugh On Rick Owens


Here are some excerpts from a Gareth Pugh interview in Vice’s Annual Fashion Issue on Rick Owens that we found interesting…

GP: “I don’t really have a cultish group of people into my stuff the way Rick does. He takes something and rips it apart. He’s more dragged through a hedge, and I like polishing something and making it as shiny as it possible…I’m closer to his wife, Michelle. He always describes himself as the distant, stern father figure and she is like the overgenerous mother. She’s very critical about what I do, which I like. It’s good to have someone who doesn’t always give you unadulterated praise.”

“I don’t know where [his famous light-up dress] is. I like that it’s just dissolved into the ether. That show was a huge stress. I actually had to lie down on the floor backstage at one point because I thought I was going to have a heart attack. Legally, Casey Spooner could only model it if he signed a death waiver.”

“I worked with a blogger called dirtyflaws and she told me she didn’t really care about fashion until she saw my show. I might not have believed her if she hadn’t shown me the tattoo she had of one of my designs on her arm. It’s nice to feel that I’m doing something that goes beyond the environment it’s created in and that makes somebody think differently about something.”

“I never buy clothes, so I don’t really have a choice when it comes to what I wear. I am very lucky to be able to pull a lot of Rick Owens and steal some of my stuff from the factory. But other than that I buy H&M hoodies and Topshop jeans. But I do have this very northern British thing about wanting to really dress up when I go out. I’m not trying to be a woman, it’s just really nice to feel like a different person—put a bit of slap on and make yourself look ten years younger.”

Gareth Pugh and Rick Owens are exclusive to 4.

Read the original blog post here on Hint.

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