How essential is heritage and/or a distinctive identity in contributing to a brand’s success?
Heritage, at least in the Western markets, is becoming a niche selling point to a crowd that dwindles as it gets older. It’s hard to gauge how mainstream people feel about a brand sticking to a decades-old identity, because we now have a generation of coming-of-age, aspirational fashion people who either want it brand new, or they want it vintage; and more often they want it because they saw it on TikTok, not because the brand is known for the thing.
What surprises you about the industry in 2025?
A lot of brands struggling to find their identity. A lot of brands struggling to support new creative directors as they work to build on or evolve the brand’s legacy. The fact that we have entered an era where most consumers don’t care about quality, and don’t know how to spot it. Then again, if everyone demanded quality, would that even be sustainable?
What do you enjoy most about Paris Fashion Week?
The rest of the fashion month could be going rather poorly, but we show up to Paris expecting them to fix it.
There seems to be more overlap between fashion/entertainment and fashion/sports than ever. Thoughts?
I grew up watching sports in the United States. Basketball in particular, in the 90s, went through real growing pains because the league didn’t want its players to be too expressive. You’d think those days are over, and probably they are, but I still think about it a lot. I think about [former NBA player] Alan Iverson a lot. When I watch athletes’ leagues arrive at their respective stadiums and arenas in all kinds of drip, I think that Iverson crawled so everyone else could run. It took something like 30 years for everyone to run. This stuff is all viral now, and on social alone it’s a billions-dollar industry. But when I see the overlap in real time, I think how there was a time — in my lifetime — where none of this stuff was allowed or tolerated. I should be happy we are where we are, and I am somewhat. But mostly, it just makes me think about all the other stuff that still isn’t tolerated.
Do trends still matter?
Trends have become a stealth weapon. We think trends don’t matter, we have discussions and write about it; but while we’re thinking that they’re dead because they come and go so fast, fast brands are wondering how they can cycle through them even faster so they can sell to more people. Meanwhile, your not-so-fast brands keep combing for that one viral moment so they can chuck up their prices. There’s a particular shoe made by a particular French house that cost double the price over what it was two years ago. They’ll call it supply and demand; but that demand is the trend.
What is your favourite way/word to compliment someone’s style?
If I’m complimenting someone, it’s because they’ve done something that excited me. So it’s important for me to communicate that excitement. I have no problem being perfectly honest about that.
Tell us something surprising about how you got to where you are today?
I didn’t try to be a fashion photographer, but I did want to be a very good photographer. I started a photo blog where I would take photos of people on the street and write about those experiences in the blog. I made it a fashion blog only because I thought if I photographed fashionable people, readers would find them interesting enough to then look at more of the portraits and in turn, read more of my entries. But (and this is important), while it was a fashion blog, I was always writing first and foremost about technical things. Things like learning how to shoot in different types of light; and then later different kinds of weather; and then someone offered to pay me to shoot a lookbook; and then someone invited me to photograph their runway show; and then someone at Carolina Herrera saw the blog and said, “Hey, come shoot for us.” And that was the start of my fashion career. But that entire time, I was just writing about my journey to becoming a better photographer. I just wanted to be great at one thing.
This interview has been lightly edited.
