[upbeat music]
[upbeat intro music]
- Today we're talking to Samuel Ross
but first let's rewind.
On Monday we went to the English forest
with Riccardo Tisci and Burberry.
[bird and forest sounds]
- Fashion is an emotion.
[drumming heavy metal music]
Today fashion,
it is about dream
but the same time is about
how collection is constructed.
[bell chime]
It was a love story between
any mermaid and a shark
'cause I'm obsessed with everything
that's come from like animal world
and nature world but as well,
everything is meta logic.
And then it was a lot of element
from the lighthouse keeper,
which is typical of England.
And then we brought the mermaid
and the sharks, let's say
in the forest because we wanted
this contrast with the freedom.
The story behind the show
it came from like a horrible happening
in the last seven months in the world.
And start saying, okay, fine.
We cannot stop.
And let's be creative
and let's not lose the emotion,
the romanticism to this beautiful
like know storytelling.
[drumming]
So this time I went back staying
at my house with my mom for three months,
which is very similar of
like, you know, this landscape.
Day by day of course I was like
I stop smoking, after 20 years
during the lock lockdown.
I've spent time with my mom and then,
but then I felt like I was start missing,
going out and be free and see people.
[drumming]
- Just walk normally, but slow.
- One of the like, you know,
the artist that we did respect is Anne.
- Riccardo invited me to do this show.
I haven't done something like this before.
[upbeat metal music]
- So we done few meeting.
- We spoke about it and then all thoughts
of how like developed.
- And then we were like listen music can start dreaming.
- And like we ended up in the woods.
[laughs]
[heavy metal music]
- And work is all about statement
and element of youth.
♪ And the voices in your head ♪
♪ She said they won't go away. ♪
- His collection and my vision for the show,
it was really fitting.
♪ The voices in my head ♪
♪ She said they won't go away. ♪
[electric guitar]
The music that Eliza wrote,
I think was really important for the show.
Eliza decided on those pieces
that you wouldn't necessarily expect
in a fashion show.
[drumming]
I very much envisioned
to change the idea of the model,
like walking the show,
models would become audience in somewhat way.
And that if I would make a show,
I would make a show also for them.
And so I like combined the circle
with a stage to have both
of these way of looking at something.
[slow heavy metal music]
- You know ring is a very
like in a fantasy energetic move.
People when they walking in a ring
is like, you know,
generating very good energy.
So the idea was I kept feeling so small
of course of all the changing yourself
and then opened the door
and then being out here
and that what it show was.
[calming music]
It is a difficult moment.
So this a very beautiful
a future like message
to the future on positivity.
- There's like a story of hope
that is told that was really important
to me somehow to point out.
[haunting ethereal music]
- It felt really interesting, very strange.
Of course I missed all the fashion world
and I missed the adrenalin of like
when the show is finished,
but today everybody have a telephone
everybody have a computer
everybody can watch from that.
Is a quite democratic way to show
to the world and to include people.
[ethereal music]
I wish all the world was here
and see it because the emotion,
it was intense,
very intense, very beautiful.
[heavy metal screaming]
- And we're back.
On Wednesday we met three visionary designers
who are trailblazing sustainability and fashion.
[Deep house music]
- Every day we wake up
and things like the climate crisis
are a daily reality.
And I thought, you know,
well what are you doing Phoebe?
We're in a crisis.
We're in an emergency.
Like what are you actually doing?
- The industry will change
as long as there's still space
for like younger voices and designers
to keep like talking about things,
because otherwise it's really easy
to go back to status quo.
- Your worth is sort of something
that I think you should always be learning from
and you should always be reassessing.
If you buy art or if you speak
to an artist or if you speak to a maker,
you understand it's kind of the world
that they're in and what they're making
and what goes into it.
I think clothes should be a bit more like that.
[jazz drums and trumpets]
- My realization was to actively try
and be part of the solution.
We just started with very simple things
like eliminating our plastic coat hangers.
That felt like such a victory as a team
that it became quite, you know,
it perpetuated the energy to try
and find the next thing
and the next thing and the next thing,
and the next thing.
We're in London.
It's a very creative city.
So we reached out to as many different studios
and designers that we knew
to see if they would be willing
to sell or pass on any excess
or dead stock or overstock fabric
that they had left in their studios.
And it was really logistically difficult
because I was having to design the collection
in response to the materials that were coming in.
So we shot my mother who is wearing a piece today,
which was a quilted textile.
And this piece was I suppose,
a protective cocoon,
all the edges of the pattern meet edge to edge
and they can fill the whole width of the fabric.
So really utilize everything
that you have in the material,
because it is a very precious resource
when you think about how much water
and carbon and energy and person power
that is used to make them.
So even if they're a dead stock or a surplus fabric,
we try and really respect it as a resource.
[deep house music]
- My brand Ahluwalia is primarily menswear.
From the beginning I've always wanted
to make it a brand that works really positively,
whether that's with people or the planet.
I was studying for my MA menswear at Westminster Uni.
And then I found out about Panipat
which is the global capital
of recycling clothing in the world.
And that's in India.
And I took my camera and I went there.
The amount of clothing that people
from all around the world
that we kind of forget about.
And I think once I saw that
and saw the sheer volume
of like what we discard,
I think there was no going back after that.
We tried to work with preexisting materials.
I hope that the idea of having something
that no one else has got
exactly the same as you,
encourages people to hold onto it.
And you can see here again on the back,
like you get these like little details that come,
that's actually a pocket flap,
that's come from a jacket
that we used to make this jacket.
So I'm Indian and I'm Nigerian
and I was born in London.
In June I released a book called Jalebi
and that was done in collaboration
with Laurence Ellis.
It centered around Southall,
so it's an area in Northwest London
that's the first and biggest
Punjabi Indian community in the UK.
And I visited there as a kid all the time.
So many people come to these areas
because they are trying to make a better life
for themselves, for their family,
but actually they're not always treated
with so much respect.
And they also have quite a difficult time.
Where we grow the materials to make cotton
where we dump our rubbish,
it's never in the west.
It's always in Africa and Asia,
and it's always someone else's problem.
As the industry moves forward
and we keep having conversations
around sustainability, to make sure
that we're including people into that equation.
[deep house music]
- It's working very much outside
of the system that is in place for you,
but we also kind of have to show
within it so that people actually see it.
My graduate collection,
I know I had lots of paint leftover
and a lot of it was painted
because my dad had lost his job
as a painter and decorator.
So I used the paint that was leftover.
That's just kind of what
how I wanted to make things.
And I've always liked that challenge.
You produce a lot less,
but you get to produce the things
that maybe you would,
you would rather produce.
My friend Nishanth who's in Tamil Nadu in India
established this incredible regenerative farm.
It's really a way of looking at clothes
and of living and of making enough
consuming that is supportive of the environment
and the people within it.
That's from weavers and dyers to farmers.
And they have an expertise that hasn't been,
I guess, written down.
We were developing textiles for Oshadi
and I was able to develop
amazing organic cottons
and learn about plant-based dyes.
I never like used leather
until a company that I worked with was like,
"We've got all this leather,
do you want the leather to do something with?"
And it's mainly scrap and that's
how we're making this patchwork in things.
The collection we just made
sort of all through lockdown,
you know we worked with a really amazing
casting and styling team.
And then we kind of made this
sort of responsive film
where we all just arrived
on this really big set
and responded to the clothes that we've made.
I think it's really beautiful,
but also like equally funny
and feels a bit anxious and feels a bit weird.
And that seems like the right thing to be making now
'cause I think everyone shares those feelings I guess.
Like even like the change that I can make
as a sustainable business
because it's like cautiously small scale,
that's the way I want it.
But the difference really happens
when I guess big brands start applying it.
And you see that now with like the work
that we did with Eco now for years
and now Prada are taking it and making it,
you know, and that's like exactly
the best thing that could happen.
It always comes from really young designers,
introducing the idea and taking the risk.
- You never know where one
step of change will take you.
- I do think that there are people that are
recognizing that there's better ways to shop.
- You can only really have hope
because the generation coming after us
from schools and from, you know, younger designers,
is that everyone wants a change.
[jazz music]
- What's up everybody.
It's Paloma Elsesser here again
with Good Morning Vogue.
Today we'll be talking to the designer Samuel Ross.
He's the former assistant of Virgil Abloh,
but most importantly,
he's redefining high fashion
and affecting social change
with his brand A-Cold-Wall.
Not to mention he donated
his BFC NEWGEN sponsorship coin
to his ex-intern.
Literal legend.
Samuel also recently set up an initiative
distributing grants to black owned businesses
and is ushering in a new generation
of black creatives in London.
[drum and base sounds]
- There's been one view of Britishness
that's been allowed.
And my job is to evolve that.
My name is Samuel Ross.
A-Cold-Wall is a luxury menswear brand
that I founded, self-funded in 2015.
I also run a industrial design practice
and my work has become quite known
for taking architectural forms,
brutalism, civil rights,
and combining those into articulate garments
that represent the 21st century.
[electronic music]
I was born in Brixton,
which is of course the heartbeat
of the black civil rights movement
in the UK.
- By increasing the presence of the police
within the area at the present time.
- My mother is a sociology and psychology lecturer
at North Hampton University and a painter.
My father holds a MA in fine arts
from CSM and was also a painter.
I moved out of Brix when I was a child.
All my family stayed there.
I became the cousin in the countryside
who moved up North.
So there was a constant ebb and flow
between cultural influences, between music,
between, you know, almost like code switching
to a certain degree with language.
I've had my head kicked in by skinheads.
I've had a series of altercations
with like violent racists,
specifically between the age of like 14
up to like 18,
because growing up outside of London
is very different.
My start in fashion,
it really began in The Projects.
Selling counterfeit sportswear.
Nike, Adidas, people coming
to my house to do fittings.
So I became quite known
for being the person to go to
if you wanted something slightly more
forward thinking with garments.
And that's how I started.
A year after graduating
as a product and graphic designer
from my nine to five commercial job,
I quickly realized that working
in a commercial environment
wasn't going to be enough for me and I needed more.
I started operating as a videographer.
I started operating as a street artist
in Leicester as well,
pasting artworks up at night.
I tried to reach out to Virgil
through every single channel imaginable.
Didn't have any luck, but by chance,
he happened to find my Instagram account.
After being like a skirt, a general assistant
I moved up to being his first assistant
and we worked for years.
My entry into fashion wasn't
from like a influencer perspective.
It was literally based
on skillset and hard work.
And that is what really resonated
with a lot of people,
which has opened a lot of doors,
just being very focused on the work.
So versus 21, the feeling of the collection
is this balance between
still carrying a lot of social messaging,
but listening to the fact
that people are really working from home
and that the idea of the office
is radically changing.
So the lounge knit is a heavy
way oversized knitwear piece
that has two asymmetric jacquard blocks.
One in a slate green
and one in a heather gray.
And as you can see,
we've taken our own spin
on having these rectangular shapes
kind of interlay into the architectural story.
We spend a lot of time working
on a asymmetrical G-lay,
which has a series of hidden closures
and magnetic closure.
A-Cold-Wall quickly became known for its asymmetry
and that was really informed
by this idea of being atypical
and being other, in terms
of the black existence and black consciousness
in 21st century social politics.
My job in luxury fashion
is to make sure that the garments
and the messaging is just as good
as any other house that is going out there,
which is why I often don't explicitly say
black, on the front of my work.
Black art doesn't have to show a black face
for it to be black.
And I think that's a really important point here
in moving past a apologetic way
to certain degree of designing
and communicating what blackness is.
It doesn't need to answer to anyone
nor does it need to explain itself.
This idea of re-servicing garments,
updating garments at different station points,
which we started to try with SP-1,
but also only selling people trims
and only selling people aspects of hardware
completely removes this idea
of having to reproduce garments again.
So it just makes a lot more sense
to kind of just test different ways
and how fashion can engage.
Current idea of IP is very Victorian
and in reality it doesn't work
in like the 4D reality we live in at this point.
I guess when real things happen,
you have to respond in a way,
which is, it's just real.
The grant scheme that I put together
with a A-Cold-Wall is really
about supporting young back businesses
and young black artists.
There was no real visibility on what was happening
in regards to like a black agricultural movement
in terms of black financial tech,
in terms of black philosophy for the 21st century,
there are individuals doing this,
but there needs to be more visibility.
This, we still haven't got there yet.
We also put together a fund scheme
for the Black Lives Matter movement
in North America to assist
with the civil rights work that needs to be done.
A brand cannot trade me or you, a commodity
and not having a value system.
That's gone, for good as it should be.
A-Cold-Wall has intentions to kind of move
into this much more human
and social space
whilst retaining its luxury position.
It doesn't mean we're going to give up
on capitalism because socialism
isn't a political system anyway.
It's a belief system.
And I still think that there are loads
of benefits to a free trademark here
and we're gonna keep A-Cold-Wall in that
but I do wanna start looking
at a much more socialist spectrum
to the brand coming forth for the long term.
[deep house music]
- That's a wrap on London
but be sure to come back next week
when we're headed to Milano.
[drum and bass music]