Artist Lecture: Captains of the Fashion Industry

For the lecture assignment I chose to attend the “Captains of the Fashion Industry” lecture on Monday the 27th. The topic of the Fashion Industry series was “Gurus of Denim”. After reading the fliers and seeing that there would be many designers from various brands of jeans, I came into the lecture expecting to see at least 5 or 6 people. But as the lecture began, the host of the lecture, Mark Werts, I only saw three microphones set up. And then I realized that there were only going to be two actual guest speakers, Jerome Dahan and Adriano Goldschmied. Adriano (AG jeans) spoke first and talked about how he wanted to bring jeans into a new realm of society’s perception. When he first began to make designer jeans, blue jeans were the utilitarians’ clothing of choice. Jeans were cheap work clothes and not a luxury item. He even admitted that he himself did not like the fashion industry at first because why would people spend money for nothing? Adriano actually got involved in the fashion business by accident. Although I don’t have any notes about exactly how he got started, I do recall what were some of his codes to live by. He repeatedly said to have passion for what you do, love what you do, and work hard. He said that you have to find different things and have new ways and ideas that other people don’t. The next speaker, Jerome Dahan, (7 for all Mankind, Lucky, Citizens of Humanity) spoke quite a lot about his journey in the fashion business. He started at Guess jeans for 2 years but wanted something more global. The designer jeans in the U.S. at the time were only Levi Strauss and Wrangler. Then he was offered a percentage of the Lucky Brand Company and begin to design for them. He needed to be involved in every aspect of the company and trusting people is important. But eventually he had to leave Lucky because of his ideas for a new brand that would have a different audience and customer group. Thus, 7 for all Mankind was born. It quickly became very popular but soon did not trust some of the people in the company and moved on to start Citizens of Humanity. Both speakers stressed the importance of loving what you do and having a passion for it. I really enjoyed listening to their stories and advice. It was a great lecture that provided insight and more understanding of the fashion industry.