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JULIE GILHART: Thank you.
So Tess, I have to preface this to say that when I first
met Tess, I was a very hungry fashion
director, looking for talent.
And I was obsessed with finding the best talent first.
And so rumor had it that there was
someone who was doing production for fashion shows that
was, in her spare time, obsessively sewing things.
So in the meatpacking district-- I
think that's where I first met you, in the meatpacking
district, before the meatpacking district was the meatpacking
district-- I went to her studio, and I did.
I found this girl, and she was obsessively
sewing at a sewing machine.
But when I say obsessively, it was, the crux of her collection
was-- or there wasn't even a collection.
It was just shirts.
And she was obsessively, like, sewing
on the shirts' top stitching.
So in essence, you had a shirt that
just had all these crazy zigzaggy lines on the shirt.
So it looked very crafted.
And it was very expensive, but very cool.
So I guess my first question is-- and I never
thought about asking this-- but what
possessed you to do that in your spare time,
and how it led you to the-- I want to say indie brand,
but you're not up there in the "lights, camera, action,"
I always like to say.
You're very, like, steadfast and artistic
and doing your own thing, and have garnered, actually,
a lot of respect in a very-- without having
to shout your brand name.
So what inspired you or possessed you to start that?
TESS GIBERSON: I knew I wanted to have my own company.
So I was actually doing the show production
to support building my own company.
But I wanted to do it in my own time, in my own pace.
So I was working with the show production
to make enough money, so then I could take off
two to three months at a time to develop the collection.
So I always knew in my head that was
my end goal was to build my own company.
It was always just like, I wanted something of my own.
But my way of doing it-- at that point,
I wanted to make it very-- because I
had been at Calvin Klein.
And I had seen things on a bigger scale.
And I had seen things where it was
very-- everything was very refined and very clean and very
modern.
But I wanted to make it my own.
So when I started working on my own collection,
it was all about having this personalization with the pieces
and really, really making my own mark.
So that was my feeling, but it was also, literally,
I was making my own mark by making the mark
making that I was doing on every single piece.
And in the beginning-- I mean, I think
I just wanted to experiment, and to really
push myself as much as I could.
Because I knew at a certain point, it would be more public.
And at that point when I met you, it was still so personal.
And I could do anything.
And I hadn't revealed it to anyone yet.
And I remember-- I mean, this is stuff they always tell people.
Julie came, and she had me come up to the Barney's offices
and said they wanted to place an order.
And at the time I was like, I really
don't think I can take an order.
I just don't know if I'm ready to expand that much.
Because I was just selling to one store
and making one of a kind pieces.
And Julie had to-- actually, she took me aside and she had
to really convince me that I should take the order
for Barney's.
But it was really-- honestly, Julie
was the one who got me started, who kind of just
got me into making the production,
following the deliveries.
And I think I did it for two more seasons
when I was working part-time on my collection.
And then after that, I just did full-time,
and then I started just full-on doing my own collection.
JULIE GILHART: It's interesting because there's so much support
for designers now, in terms of mentorship and grants
and money and all kinds of things.
And then, there wasn't.
But it's really interesting.
And maybe you can comment on this, because in thinking, I've
been developing designers my whole life.
And so the really great talents, like the Nicolas Ghesquieres,
the [INAUDIBLE] the Olivier Theyskens,
those people didn't have any of this support.
Now I can't say that today there is that caliber out there.
So the only thing I can think of is
it's the way that we're doing things.
But I'm not sure-- I'm not a designer.
So I'm wondering what you think of what you were doing back
then, because how you describe that is exactly
the same way that Olivier Theyskens started,
Alexander McQueen started.
That it's very much more concerned
about the craft of the clothing, rather than
the commerciality of the clothing.
And it was a very personal thing.
So I'm wondering, what are your thoughts about that?
TESS GIBERSON: I think when I started,
it was-- I left Calvin Klein in '98.
So I spent from '98 to 2001 just kind of incubating it myself,
just developing it.
And I think back then, the only way to make it happen,
I wanted it so badly.
And it was just out of passion.
And there wasn't any CFDA, Vogue fund didn't exist.
That wasn't until, I think, 2003.
It was just, there was a community of other designers.
And we supported each other.
And it was through, I think, peer support
and just-- I knew inside what I wanted.
JULIE GILHART: What did you want most, though?
What was it that you wanted most?
TESS GIBERSON: For me at that point,
it was just the personal expression.
I wanted to do something that was me.
I wanted to put my own vision out.
Now I think about a company.
At that time, I wanted to develop my own vision,
and I wanted to express it.
And I knew-- I've always been very organized,
so I did things in an organized way.
But it was about having this personal expression.
JULIE GILHART: That's probably why
Calvin-- working at Calvin-- I mean,
I can kind of see a creative person working there and seeing
how it's done on a mass scale, but that you
would want to do something that was yours.
And that's how Calvin started, and Ralph Lauren and Donna
Karan.
I mean, it's really interesting.
But I think what's interesting now
is all the access that we have.
Like, we have two really amazing collaborators
that work with you.
And I think designers have always collaborated
with people, but it's almost a part of your--
it's a criteria in a way, like who you're collaborating also
is reflecting on you.
Because everyone's collaborating.
TESS GIBERSON: I went to RISD, and when I was in school,
that was part of being at RISD, was you collaborated.
You collaborated with painters or graphic designers or textile
designers, and it was just part of this give and take.
And good ideas always came from working with other people.
So it was just very much the way that I'm used to working.
And when I first started, I worked with my husband
all the time, who's a painter.
And it was just-- we started the first couple of collections.
We always were collaborating.
And I pulled my sister, who's an artist, into it.
And then we started looking out to friends who are artists.
And I worked with filmmakers, photographers, set designers,
lighting designers.
And they were just very close friends
who also I respected their work a lot.
So it's just like, I've always known
collaboration is exciting.
And when you respect the other person's work,
it's always good no matter what.
I don't think about what it has to look like.
And I don't second-guess it.
It's just if I respect someone's work and I like it a lot,
it works out well.
And so when I relaunched the new company,
that was very important to continue that.
And so I've continued it, even though now we
do things-- I don't sew it myself anymore.
I don't-- it's different.
It's on a bigger scale.
But I still maintain the collaborations,
because that's for my heart.
That's what I love to do.
And that gives me so much more creatively.
And I met Alia, and I loved her work.
And I asked her to do a video and it just
continued from there.
And then through a friend, I met Caroline.
And I loved what I heard.
And then I met her, and I thought,
it was just an instant-- it was just something intuitive that I
knew and we connected right away.
And first I asked her to be in a presentation last year.
And then I had her do music, and then it
was natural to ask her to do the music for the video.
So everything I do is very intuitive.
JULIE GILHART: So you have sort of an entourage
of collaborators.
TESS GIBERSON: I have a lot of nice collections
of collaborations.
But they're all genuine.
They're people I love and I respect.
And it's just such a natural relationship.
JULIE GILHART: Isn't it funny, because collaboration
with many designers is all about making more money.
You collaborate with a certain person
so that it will sell more product.
And it sounds like in your vernacular,
that it's really collaborating from an artistic and respect
point of view.
CAROLINE POLACHEK: Well, if I may interject,
Tess is actually a really easy person to collaborate with too.
I think a lot of designers have gimmicks in each collection,
or like maybe even a kind of extremely intense theme
that continues throughout their collections.
And I think in order to collaborate with someone
like that, you feel like you really
have to make something that goes with the particular story
or the theme.
But Tess' work is so open that it really
allows you to not only explore within your own medium,
like for example, the music I did for this video is
the kind of music I had been wanting to make for a while
actually, but hadn't had the right opportunity.
And the clothes presented the perfect way to do it.
But also, I think it allows people to do something that's,
like, peaceful and neutral and tasteful and textured.
And it's really a great environment to collaborate in.
JULIE GILHART: What's the-- both of you
all should comment-- what's the process?
Like, do you come together and say, well,
what are we going to do?
Or is it like, I have this idea, and you expand on it?
How does that work, or is it different every time?
ALIA RAZA: It's been-- we've collaborated together
three times now.
We've made three short little films, or videos together.
And I think each time started with a meeting, just talking,
lunch, whatever-- talking about what she was working on,
what I was working on.
And then me looking at the clothes
that she was working on that she wanted to put in the video.
And then, just thinking about the practical stuff,
like the music and the location.
And all of that comes together to-- it's
not like we're working with million-dollar budgets,
so you're not dreaming up fantasy worlds
and making them happen.
You have to work with what you have.
So the location, the music, the clothes, all of it
comes together to inspire what you end up with.
And what you end up with is usually
a little bit different from what the original idea is.
Like, for the video that we all just worked on together,
I had this idea of spiders in my head.
And Tess had this kind of giant crochet piece in her runway
show, and it kind of looked like a spider web.
It just all felt right to me.
And now when you see the video, you don't think of a spider.
There's no spiders in the video.
The clothes aren't spidery.
It sounds crazy, but the idea shifts
over time, and with each step.
JULIE GILHART: [INAUDIBLE].
ALIA RAZA: Yeah.
It's a fashion thing, I think, and I
think if you're making films, or if you're making art,
or whatever you're making, it always
changes during the process.
It always changes as you're working.
JULIE GILHART: It's interesting, because now-- for the audience,
I'm working on this very cool project for [INAUDIBLE]
and it's the initiation of a prize.
And it's for talent all over the world.
And it's for really, really new talent.
So it's really interesting is you have access to people that
are doing things on a fashion level in places
like Afghanistan or Nigeria or just crazy places
that I would never look, or you would never have access to.
But the thing that I look at the most
is videos, because they all have videos.
And so you're looking at a picture of girls or men
in clothing, and you're reading, and you're
looking at all their facts-- the age of the designer,
and how many collections that they've done.
But it's really the video that speaks.
And then, addressing the music thing for a show,
that is so much a part of the show.
You could have a great show with great clothes,
and if the music isn't good, it can fall flat.
And it can actually change your perception of the clothes.
It's distracting.
But the reverse, if you have great music, it can also--
CAROLINE POLACHEK: It's so subconscious, too.
It totally sneaks in the back door.
You're looking at the clothes, and if the music
is heavy and hard, you don't even realize it,
but you're attributing that energy to the clothes, too.
Like, you could show a piece that's really dainty.
And if it's paired with hard music,
you all of a sudden imagine it being
worn in a really specific way.
I'm kind of new to working in fashion at all.
And one thing that I love that designers
say when they're designing, is they talk about their girl.
Like, who's your girl this season?
And at first I didn't really understand
what they were talking about.
But they visualize a person.
And it's not just the clothes.
You can visualize where it's going
to be worn, where she lives, how old she is,
what she listens to.
And I think the fashion show is the manifestation
not of just a collection, but the girl.
And that plays back into marketing and branding.
And that to me is actually the most interesting aspect
of the whole thing.
JULIE GILHART: If you ever go into a showroom--
and this happens at a high level--
and you have them showing you the collection,
they'll call each-- like they'll say "she,"
she's really going to be a good seller.
Or she is perfect, or she's my favorite.
ALIA RAZA: Who are they talking about when you say she--
JULIE GILHART: They're talking about garments on a hanger.
And I just like, I got to get out of here.
I just lose it when they start talking-- when they just
put this person.
But this is the "she" thing.
I never realized that yeah, they talk about their girl.
ALIA RAZA: Well, I have to say that working with Tess,
she might have a girl in mind when she does every collection,
but she's never imposed that on me or told me,
this is the kind of girl or the persona or the characterization
that you should put in the video.
It's never-- she almost tells me nothing.
She just lets me look at the clothes
and decide who I want the girl to be.
And that's a great thing about working
with people who are more interested
in kind of the collaboration between different artists,
rather than, like you were saying,
on a purely commercial level of trying to sell this image,
or this one girl.
CAROLINE POLACHEK: Actually, when
I met with Tess to discuss the music for this collection
for the runway show, there wasn't any discussion
of the girl or anything situational or social at all.
It was only about line quality.
She was showing me Bauhaus drawings.
She was showing me photographs from the '60s
of a girl inside a huge crochet installation.
She was showing me the drawings of the pieces.
And I went to school for drawing,
so this totally resonated with me.
And I just instantly heard string, piano, digital lines,
acoustic lines, lines out of tune.
And that music came right out of that, and nothing
to do with-- is she a traveler?
Is she young?
What does she do?
It was just very formal and very abstract, and I loved that.
TESS GIBERSON: And I can work that way because of the people
I choose to collaborate with.
I'm very picky about who I choose.
And it's always, there has to be the respect,
and I like their work.
And then I know it's-- like I was saying before,
then I can have that trust that it's going to be OK.
And I don't have to say, this is how it has to be.
And I think that's what a good collaboration is,
is where you can let go.
Like for me, I come with, I have the idea
and I know what my clothes are.
But I don't-- I can't tell you what the video should look
like, because I'm not a director.
And I can't tell you what the music should sound like.
I don't make music.
And I think it gets tricky when you
try-- when someone who-- if a designer tries to direct when
they're not a director, you don't get the right result.
But if I can just let it go, and really trust,
and then it's exciting.
I love not knowing what it will look like,
and then it's a really cool surprise to see the end result.
JULIE GILHART: It's interesting because I think--
I've seen so many designers when they start
in the business of fashion, pre-collections
have become so important.
Those collections that are before the runway, that
come into the stores early.
And that's actually where you can address the more
day-to-day needs, rather than the fantasy needs, in a way.
But it's interesting, because usually when
a show comes around, collaborators come in.
And what the designer told me the show was going to be about
is never what they say.
And I think it's because of the collaborators.
ALIA RAZA: Do you like that?
Do you like seeing a new angle on it, or do you--
JULIE GILHART: Yeah.
I mean, I like for people to be spontaneous and not
get stuck, and have to do that.
You have to be open, but that probably
happens in your process, like one idea
you have because you talked to her, and you all start to talk,
it sort of morphs into something else,
which really enhances the creative thing.
And it gets you away from the business of fashion,
and the trends, and feeling all these subliminal messages that
come in that you feel like, I have to do that.
TESS GIBERSON: And that's what's so important about coming up
with new ideas and actually finding new designs that
come from yourself.
I think that's what collaborations really
give me, is they continue to give me that creativity.
Otherwise, it's too easy to get stuck
into the deadlines, the deliveries.
That's all part of the business.
And I like that part separately, but I also
know I need the creative energy to come in.
And I get that through the collaborations.
JULIE GILHART: So it's also interesting,
because how do you tell people about you, in terms of, like,
you don't advertise, and you don't have a big publicist.
But yet, people-- how are you communicating
some of these things that you do?
And I'm saying that in the context
of being at Barney's when we first started.
And you'd have to put it practically
when people got off the escalator so
that they would see it.
And then you'd have to talk to the salespeople a lot.
And then you have to try and see if you
can put it in the catalog.
And so it was very basic now.
And now we have all the social media and visual things.
So one has to choose how they do that.
And that's also now I'm seeing a reflection
of how you are as a brand, too.
TESS GIBERSON: We've actually-- social media
has been great for us, because it's
a way for us to directly tell the story of what
the collection is, who I am, the project I'm doing.
It's a direct connection to customers,
anyone who's interested.
It's just like, it reaches out directly.
We still work through PR, working with magazines,
working online, and also just publications.
JULIE GILHART: Traditional--
TESS GIBERSON: Traditional.
So I do both.
But the last two years, we've really
embraced the social media in just
being able to tell our own story.
And that's been really exciting.
And it's just, for a brand, for our brand
it's also through direct relationship
with the customers-- going to the store,
working with customers, meeting customers.
And when people wear the clothes, they become fans.
And it's really been this just growing word of mouth,
and directly working with people.
And they get it.
When they put the clothes on, they really
get what it's about.
They get what I'm trying to do.
And I don't have to say anything.
They tell me how they feel about the clothes.
And that's been so exciting to see.
JULIE GILHART: I can't help but think
that that's going to be really important for the future,
that because you see all these mass brands,
and they're communicated a lot, and they sell a lot.
I don't know, how do you all feel about that?
I mean, I'm more attracted to something--
and today people say "luxury."
But luxury to me is something now
that's not so easily accessible.
CAROLINE POLACHEK: Well, I think that actually-- maybe this
is a little bit grim-- but I do see it as a luxury,
especially in the future.
Because now that so much production
is outsourced and expected to happen at very cheap prices,
our idea of how much we need to pay for a shirt,
and with the quality of what we're going to expect,
has gotten very low.
Like maybe a girl who's like 25 thinks the average price
you should expect to pay for a shirt is, like,
between $30 and $50 or something.
But in order to make something really well,
in order to source nice fabrics--
you're not even doing something fancy, like you said earlier.
Just something that you can wear every day that will last you
for years, that's going to look beautiful on you.
To do something well costs a lot more than that, and especially
if you're working on a small batch sizes.
And I think it's almost similar to the model
for organic small farms going into the future.
You can't compete with, like, Monsanto-grown corn seed.
It, for better or for worse, is a certain kind of luxury.
ALIA RAZA: And why would you want to?
I feel like I don't think Tess wants
to be making fast fashion, and selling--
CAROLINE POLACHEK: [INAUDIBLE] money but you
can't compete with those prices.
ALIA RAZA: Oh, yeah.
True.
JULIE GILHART: I think it's a decision
if you want to be really big, or if you just want to be big.
I think that we have a-- fashion has this,
you just have to be-- to be valid, you have to be huge.
And--
ALIA RAZA: Everybody has to know who you are, and you have to--
JULIE GILHART: Yeah.
But I will tell you with every single brand, that
goes into that direction, it does lose that connection,
that personal connection.
There's always a brand connection,
but I think the kind of thing that you
stand for, very intimate collaborations.
And you have a platform.
Like you were saying, you have social media.
You can tell them exactly what you're doing,
and that's going to be interesting, I think.
TESS GIBERSON: And we do want to be big, but with integrity.
Don't get me wrong.
We are very aggressive, and we do want to grow,
but we want to do it always with integrity,
always aligning ourselves with projects that we believe in.
We have, like, with my partners we all
have very core values that we agree on.
And so as we're growing and we're always
talking about where we're going with the company,
it's about maintaining the integrity,
maintaining what the collection's about,
what the feeling is about.
And it's about connecting directly
with the women who are wearing the clothes.
Eventually, we want to do men's, but right now it's
just the women.
So we're excited to do that in the future.
But it's really making sure that everything that we're making,
we believe in, we would wear, we want
to see other people wearing.
There's a lot of thought and consideration
that goes into it.
And I believe as we grow we can maintain that,
as long as that's always important to us.
JULIE GILHART: Do you ever thing about Calvin?
TESS GIBERSON: How do you mean?
JULIE GILHART: Do you just ever think about how he started,
and how his business grew, and--
TESS GIBERSON: Yeah, definitely.
That's an amazing story.
And I have a lot of respect, so much respect for the way
that he built his company.
And that was a great experience working there.
It was such a good foundation for me.
And I love how systematic, how clear,
the marketing was brilliant.
You knew when you walked in where you were.
And it was so thorough, and I loved that.
I loved that then and I still love that way of doing things.
And it really had a huge impact on me,
even though I after wanted to do something
super, super personal.
Things I learned at Calvin, I still work in that same way.
There's some things I just learned structurally
that I still use when I'm working-- the way I organize.
JULIE GILHART: Well, we're going to have
to continue this conversation off-camera.
But I think it's really, really, really, really exciting.
Really exciting.
I think it's the most exciting part of fashion.
I have to say this one thing, because I was in the fashion
arena when they-- referring back to the Antwerp Six, Margiela,
Dries Van Noten, Ann Demeulemeester.
And they have those same principles.
And believe it or not, it was like over 25 years ago.
But they really-- and so I think you, all of you
all have like a really bright future.
ALIA RAZA: Those were the designers
that, when I was a teenager, I used
to pay attention to, and wish I could buy those clothes,
and save up money for those clothes,
and Margiela and [INAUDIBLE] and Demeulemeester.
So it makes sense that you said that.
JULIE GILHART: So thank you all.
ALIA RAZA: Thank you.
MALE SPEAKER: Thank you, Julie, Tess, Alia and Caroline.
We're going to now show Tess' video for her spring, summer
2014 collection.
And then we're going to go into 10 minutes of Q&A. If anyone
has any questions, there's two mics.
You can line up, and after the video
you can ask these folks any questions that you may have.
[VIDEO PLAYBACK]
[END VIDEO PLAYBACK]
AUDIENCE: Hi, I have a question for you guys.
My name is Michael.
I work here on the sales side of the organization.
And I don't know why I introduced myself like that,
because it has no pertinence to my question.
But I guess I would just love to hear all of your takes
on-- I think one of the things I took away from your guys
speaking about, sort of, your philosophy
and how you think about collaborating,
is maybe the idea that you want people to come to your store
or fashion or even your video, and be
able to express themselves through sort
of the blank canvas of your style and of your fashion.
And when I think about the brands from yesteryear,
all the big fashion brands that you guys were also
talking about, I think there's something more
about them wanting to gift you with their perspective,
or their brand, or their personality, or the her, right?
They want to give you the her.
They want to make you the her, by you exchanging with them
and interacting with them.
So I was wondering your thoughts on that idea
of the thirst for self-discovery,
even in the things that we purchase.
And not to be defined by them, but to define ourselves
in that process, and maybe how you think about
that in regards to your art, and if that's sort of on point
or not.
TESS GIBERSON: What I am always thinking
about when I'm designing, I want the clothes
to become part of the woman who's buying them.
The woman who wears the clothes, I
want-- it's about bringing her own personality out, not
putting on to her anything else.
But it's just like, when I think about the clothes,
it's about feeling comfortable, confident,
just bringing out your own inner confidence.
It's always about that.
And to mix it however the woman wants to,
wear it however she wants to.
That's a very big part of actually how I design.
And I think it's not putting something onto them,
but just bringing out the strength inside.
And it can be really subtle, but it's always there.
It's always something I'm thinking about.
And I love-- I see it.
I see when the women wear the clothes, that's
actually something that comes out.
Because everything I do, it's about feeling it's easy,
it's comfortable, it's cool.
And it's just about having this inner confidence.
CAROLINE POLACHEK: Tess loaned me
a couple looks on Trail of Summer tour, one
of which I found myself going back to all the time.
And not even just for stage, but just for everything.
And on the rack, it looks like a white shirt
with a bunch of strings hanging off it,
and a white skirt with a bunch of strings hanging off it.
And that's it.
But when you put it on, it's-- I mean,
I know this kind of idea of modular play,
because it's in a lot of things--
in our actual websites and furniture now.
But it really transformed characters.
If I'd tie it one way or tie it another way,
it could look angelic and straitjackety
from one minute to another.
And even leaving the strings all hanging off
was amazing for me, because I play synthesizer on stage.
And that is the most boring instrument
to watch anyone play in the history of instruments.
It's a person standing at a rectangle.
Great.
But if I have a bunch of strings hanging off me,
every one of my emotions-- if I hit a chord,
you see it translate [BRRRAHH] into the entire thing
I'm wearing.
And that was really exciting too.
But ultimately, I could have kind of laced it up nicely
and gone out to dinner.
And I think that kind of sensitivity to the wearer
is kind of what Tess specializes in.
ALIA RAZA: I completely agree with you.
From all the clothes that I have that Tess has made,
I feel the same way.
You can wear them in-- sometimes you wear them in multiple ways
and totally make them your own.
In terms of my own work, I don't think
that I've thought much about-- I mean making art,
whether it's video art or art objects-- I never
think about how somebody's going to make it their own.
I'm just trying to kind of impose my view,
and give somebody an experience.
But I've recently started making perfume as well.
And I think that's similar to clothing, in that people
wear perfume to make it their own.
They don't wear it-- people aren't really
interested in fragrance and scent
as something that's imposed on them.
They want it to become part of them.
So it's like a whole new thing to do.
AUDIENCE: You spoke a little bit about pre-collections,
and the role of having a pre-collection that translates
into a full line, fall or spring collection.
Tess, when you start designing for one of your main seasons,
where do you start?
Like, what's step one in your design process?
TESS GIBERSON: I always start, actually
with a conversation with my husband.
We've-- honestly, since college, we've been collaborating
on just the ideas with our work together.
I talk to him about his paintings,
and he talks to me about my collections.
And we just talk.
And it's through talking and we kind of
think about different ideas, what we could do.
So with the collections-- and I did this
with my original collection-- and even when I worked at TSE,
I worked this way.
And now it's just like talking, and kind of brainstorming
what it could be, what would be a fun collection
to build off of?
And what would the show be?
And I think about what the show might
be when I'm starting the collection.
And then I usually start with a word, an idea, a thought.
And I take that and I just brainstorm
words from that, and then ideas of what it
could be in clothing, and how can I bring those
into details in the clothing, and how could I build up
a whole collection around it, and then
what would the show be, the music, the feeling?
So it's just a lot of words.
And I kind of build trees off of words, and that's my process.
And I think I just, sometimes I make it more
elaborate than I need to.
Because really, when it comes down to it, it's a formula.
You kind of know what your plan is, you know what you need.
But for me creatively to maintain
my love of what I'm doing, I need
to work like that, because it's how I discover new--
how do I come up with a new shirt every season?
I have to push myself a little bit more.
And it's fun.
CAROLINE POLACHEK: That makes you
think about what Alia was saying about spiders being
a reference for her video.
Because by the time I saw the video,
it was pretty close to being completed.
And I did not see anything spidery in it,
nor did I hear anything spidery in the soundtrack.
ALIA RAZA: But I asked you to do something spidery, and you did.
And then it kind of shifted and turned into something else,
but it-- go ahead.
CAROLINE POLACHEK: Well, what I mean
is there's a process of distillation.
Like you were talking about word trees.
And I think often, when you're chewing on the same idea
and elaborating on it, and trying to interpret it
across so many different kinds of media,
you suddenly realize that it's not the spider itself
that you were interested in.
Maybe it's the energy of a way a spider moves,
or it's that idea of angles, or it's
that idea of a thing disseminating [INAUDIBLE] web.
Or the kind of quiet predator aspect of it.
You find that there's like a thing, a quality to it.
And you could scrap the spider idea
and just go for that energy.
And I feel like that's what you're
talking about when you're going for the expanding
from a single word.
ALIA RAZA: And that's what happened,
because it went from-- I think when you said, what
are you thinking for the music, and I said, I don't know,
a spider.
And you were like, OK.
And then it turned into kind of like more alien girl
who crash landed onto a rooftop in Brooklyn in the Apocalypse.
And all of that is very subtle, but that's
what I was thinking of when we were shooting it.
Yeah.
It switched.
CAROLINE POLACHEK: Don't be shy.
ALIA RAZA: Ryan?
Question?
AUDIENCE: I just had a question, in terms
of how do you see your own fashions evolving from what you
were, say, 10 years back to now.
Like, what's the difference, even
in terms of-- even your art.
When you do something, what do you
compose maybe five years back or two years back?
How has it changed?
And what do you feel are some of the factors that
contribute to this change?
TESS GIBERSON: The biggest change for me is,
I always, originally I felt this compulsion.
I had to make it myself.
And it was just like crazy, very obsessive,
like I had to put my hand on do every single thing I produced,
which was great in the first two years
when I was doing limited edition-- was like smaller
productions.
Once I started producing, selling more and more
and the collections were growing,
there became a problem.
Because it was like physically killing me.
And then I had my first child.
And at that point I realized, this is crazy.
And I have to change the way I'm working,
because I can't keep working this way.
I mean I would literally be working 16-hour days.
And my husband has his painting studio.
We had a big loft.
He painted one side.
I had my sewing machines on the other side.
And we both just would work.
Then when we had our first child,
we realized we can't work this way.
And so it was at that point I was able to step back.
And I took a few years, I worked for TSE.
And then when I restarted, I knew the essence
of what I wanted to keep, and that
was having integrity, having the creative ideas,
it was of the approach that could keep the creativity,
keeping the collaborations.
So there was a spirit that was maintained.
But I knew I didn't have to make it any more myself.
Wasn't about me making the patterns, sewing the pieces,
doing the hand stitching.
I could step back and give more direction,
and tell other people what I wanted,
what I wanted it to look like.
And actually, I could be a lot more precise.
And I could get more of what I wanted,
because I wasn't making it myself.
And that was a really exciting and liberating point
that I got to.
So now, I can go through the creative process,
but I don't have to be-- it's not as physically exhausting.
And it's a lot more fun that it was towards the end.
JULIE GILHART: Did you have a question?
OK, go ahead.
AUDIENCE: Also, maybe a selfish question.
But you mentioned menswear.
I'm just curious.
I think there are definitely some test givers
and pieces that I would wear now.
But I'm curious how your designs could translate to menswear.
TESS GIBERSON: There's so many pieces that I think already
that I do in women's that could just be modified a little
for men's.
ALIA RAZA: Even this.
TESS GIBERSON: So yeah, exactly.
There's a lot of and the sweaters and the outerwear.
When I was working at TSE I was overseeing
the men's collection.
And I loved it.
I loved working-- I think because originally I
started at Calvin Klein.
I was in the men's collection, designing sweaters.
And there's something about menswear
that I really like a lot.
I think that with my aesthetic, what I do with women's, it's
not such a stretch to be able to modify it a bit.
But I'm also not trying to do everything at once.
I'm trying to do it the right way, with this relaunching
the company with my partners.
We have a plan of how we want to grow.
And we're right now just working on really getting
everything right with the women's collection,
the distribution, really developing the collection,
working with the customers.
And we need to just get a little bit bigger,
so we can hire someone else.
Because I don't want anymore to work the 16-18 hour days.
So I know what I want it to be, and I also
know the time I need to allow to do it the right way.
But it's absolutely in the near future.
JULIE GILHART: So, all men out there, come and see.
ALIA RAZA: And then we can do a video
with cute boys wearing cute clothes.
JULIE GILHART: Are all our dreams.
So thank you for hosting this.
Thank you for the introductions.
Thank you, Google.
Maybe you'll collaborate with Google someday.
TESS GIBERSON: Love to.
ALIA RAZA: Thank you, Google.
TESS GIBERSON: Thank you, Google.