Your stylist and costume work included prominent campaigns as well as covers and features in many magazines. What did you enjoy most about this work?
You have now been with Bergdorf Goodman for more than five years and are currently men’s fashion director. What does your role entail?
Styling is a very different way of looking at clothing, with naturalism, character and how a person can really live in and inhabit clothing all being factors. I loved the research involved in the costume work and how my fashion background really influenced how I interpreted clothing and character.
As men’s fashion director for both Bergdorf Goodman and Neiman Marcus my role is incredibly varied. I’m always on the hunt for new and exciting brands for our customers; constantly looking for ways to engage and excite the customer both in store and online; and working to identify and articulate trends and newness in the marketplace that will be compelling for our customer. I also work on the concepts and style the shoots for our magazine, the “Goodman’s Guide”, which comes out twice a year. I’m also always thinking of ways to expand the meaning of what we do inside the store’s physical space, including find new ways to engage and stimulate the customer. I enjoy immensely how wide and varied my responsibilities are.
Your favourite campaign? Undoubtedly my campaign for The Sopranos TV show, photographed by Annie Leibovitz. It was amazing to really be able to dive into researching the costuming, spend weeks shopping for the characters and work with the costume design team to come up with a concept for an image of all the actors around a restaurant table, complete with lots of hidden meaning.
Which celebrity feature was the most fun to work on? This is a toss-up between the Vanity Fair cover for the 2003 Hollywood Issue which featured the leading male actors of the time (including Tom Cruise, Harrison Ford, Jack Nicholson and Brad Pitt etc.), and a photograph I styled of the cast of Friends dressed as a 1930s circus troupe. Both were photographed by Annie Leibovitz. For the Friends image, I scrambled to pull together clothing and costume pieces, since we had changed the concept and spent the day fitting the actors while they were filming. We dressed each of them individually. Then Annie and I waited for them. They arrived together, truly looking like the troupe I had imagined, and it was quite a special, rewarding and overwhelming moment. I was incredibly proud of that shot.
After such an illustrious career in print, what prompted you to move into fashion retail? I had always enjoyed every aspect of fashion retail. While working in editorial I also styled a variety of projects, including the Bergdorf Goodman men’s magazine for quite a few years. Consequently, I spent a fair amount of time interacting with the buyers and merchant team as well as being in the store which I grew to know very well. I loved the people and the environment and always hoped, in the back of my mind, that someday the right opportunity would arise there. Ultimately it did. 178 The Cultured Traveller Sep-Nov 2019
Is it stressful to constantly travel the world looking for fresh menswear and streetwear for the stores of such iconic American retailers? Gratefully I absolutely love to travel and have a virtually insatiable curiosity. I have been called a cultural omnivore by a fellow journalist which I thought was very apt. I am interested in most everything and am always just naturally on the hunt for things that are new, exciting, compelling and interesting, whether it’s a new store, new brand, a recently opened restaurant, a gallery, a museum exhibition or a musical. Everything I see informs my point of view and I never know from where that next exciting idea may arise.
Tell us about your new shop-in-shop at Bergdorf Goodman, B.? On the third floor of the men’s store, developing B. has been a really fun and satisfying experience and it has been exciting to see it resonate with customers. It’s a multi-vendor concept shop for the Bergdorf Goodman customer, filled with wardrobe items and style-minded pieces that I’ve seen on my travels, plus items I’ve developed in collaboration with favourite designers. It is a way for me to showcase clothing that is a little more quiet and personal style driven. It is merchandised like a closet, with items placed next to each other as outfit suggestions to assist customers as they shop. (www.bg.com/bshop) ►