Monday Muses: Lily Gatins

"For me, wearing black is an expression of freedom and is the grounding of my personal aesthetic. Designers like Comme des Garçons’s Rei Kawakubo, Junya Watanabe and Yohji Yammamoto introduced me to my real identity. And designers such as leonard Wong, Rick Owens, Gareth Pugh, Barbara Bologna, Aoi Kotsuhioi, Boris Bidjan Saberi, Carol Christian Poell, Iris Van Herpen, Robert Wu continue to speak to me in a fresh avant garde way." - Lily Gatins



Stylist and founder of Le Report Lily Gatins is my ultimate style icon. Lily Gatins is almost always seen covered head-to-toe in black.  What sets her apart from most of the all-black fashion set is her combination of textures and accessories.

She wears the most beautiful, dark, intricate pieces of jewelry.  The picture below had me obsessed with her rings and introduced me to a wonderfully crafted brand of jewelry, Macabre Gadgets.

Her style resonates with me because 98% of my wardrobe is filled with black clothing, with designers such as Rick Owens and Junya Watanabe who she credits as some of her favorite designers.  I don't wear black because I like the color, I see black clothing as a foundation to build my own style through the use of accessories and textures.  When I was dirt poor living in NYC and couldn't afford to buy many clothes, my black pieces were my building blocks.  I could take different pieces and build off of them with different layers and jewelry to create a different look.  I might have worn the same dress twice in a week, but I could make it look completely different through different styling techniques.

I truly respect and admire her unique sense of style.  Just like Isabella Blow, Lynn Yaeger, and Anna Piaggi, she's not afraid to take risks with her wardrobe; she could give a fuck less if people give her strange looks on the street and she doesn't follow trends.  She knows what she likes and understands and appreciates the beautiful craftmanship of avant-garde designers such as Gareth Pugh, Iris Van Herpen, and Rei Kawakubo.

Darkshadow - Rick Owens

 "I design clothes for someone who has experienced a lot and satisfied a lot of appetites, someone who's past experimenting, who's been there and done that.  It's very autobiographical.” - Rick Owens

Rick Owens is a true architect of style with his luxe leather jackets and oversized, draped jersey dresses and tops.  His clothes are elegant, dark and timeless,    He knows how to place a seam in just the right place, hanging fabrics on the bias so that the design clings or drapes from the body in a way that is flattering and dramatic.  

Rick Owens is an American-born designer but has lived and shown his collection in Paris since 2003.  Just recently, his brand celebrated it's 20th year in business, a huge milestone in an industry where design houses struggle to stay relevant season after season.  

What I admire the most about Rick Owens is his knowledge of pattern design.  After dropping out of Otis-Parsons in Los Angeles where he was majoring in fine art, he attended a trade school to learn pattern design.  Rick Owens credits the beauty of his clothing with his knowledge of pattern construction.  "You can’t convincingly get abstract until you really know the fundamentals. It’s the same thing with pattern-making. You can’t start distorting things unless you kind of know what you’re doing "

His fashion background reads out of one of those storybook tales, of where a designer starts from nothing and builds their brand into an empire. After finishing trade school, he worked as a copyist, replicating the designs of  well-known designers using cheap fabric and watering it down in which the mass-market could afford.  In 1994, he decided to leave his job in the knockoff industry and start his own line. He bought inexpensive remnants of fabric and converted them into his own fabrics through different processes of washing and dying.  From those remnants, he created beautiful t-shirts, dresses, and skirts that he started taking to the local boutiques in Los Angeles   He found a store that was willing to take his pieces for fifty percent up front.  From there he started to build his brand.  As he recalls "I never got an insurance policy, I never had employment benefits, I didn’t do taxes, I didn’t take out a loan. I had one sewer full time and then two sewers when it was more of a crunch. I was barely, barely surviving and we weren’t making that many clothes, but I had no overhead, so I was able to do it." 

He can make the most beautifully constructed jacket, with so many different  pattern pieces and then turn around and make a flowly, beautiful draped dress with only a few seams but yet is just as dramatic as his many paneled jackets. He knows how to perfectly balance a combination of hard and soft looks

What I love the most about Rick Owens clothing is the way the dress moves when you walk, the softness of the fabric on the body and the versatility of the garment.  I can easily throw on one of my simple black maxi dresses to run up to the store or add a bunch of chunky pieces of jewelry to dress it up for a night out.  These clothes are meant for the girl who doesn't follow trends, who wants to create her own unique style, who isn't about tight, short, skin-baring clothing and who loves to layer.  

Welcome to the Dark Side

     This is not a blog about what I'm wearing today or what I'm doing.  That is partly because I no longer live in the glamorous city of NYC where there was so much to do, but now in what I refer to as the "armpit of Arizona", 15 miles away from any type of civilization, where people like to walk around in dirty sweats and Duck Dynasty apparel.  I work from home designing cabinet layouts so I also don't dress up as much as I used to and get out of the house.  Another reason is that I don't have as many people in my life now out here that I could sit with over a glass of wine and discuss the beauty in the drape of a dress or the execution of a very-simple, yet well-constructed basic tee.  I feel like when I talk to people about fashion out here, I either get a blank stare, or come off as obnoxious. I have so many thoughts and ideas in my mind, so many designers that I love who are never spoken of in the mainstream, and so many designing ideas. This is my way of speaking my mind. This is a blog about my love of individual style, the fashion industry, my pattern designs and the beauty of constructing a garment.

  The title of my blog is Architects of Style because I see garments as a form of architecture.  Architects have to be precise and detailed in their measurements and design, and the same goes for fashion designers.  My true passion is pattern design; I majored in Pattern Design at the Fashion Institute of Technology and for many years took pattern design lessons with my mentor, and a genius designer who just recently passed away, Mr. Lawrence Nicolosi, I miss the days spent in his studio, analyzing the details and construction of everything from a Dior suit from the Galliano years, to a simple Liz Claiborne dress. I see pattern design as creating the blueprint for the final garment, similar to the blueprint for a new building.  A dart that is 1/8" off, a side seam that is 1/16" off can have damaging effects on the final piece.   A good designer has an eye for precision, details, simplicity, and above all else, wearability.

  The more I post on this blog, the more people will learn about my own style and ideas.  I have my own unique look; I tend to only wear the color black, always wear dresses, usually a beautifully draped maxi dress and love a big statement piece of jewelry.  I've lately been obsessed with all things Rick Owens and no matter how many pieces I have in my closet, I always gravitate towards his designs because they are easy, light, unique and go great with just about anything or for any occasion.
I practically live in this dress:

  It is very rare to find me in colors, patterns, tightly fitted garments, and jeans (I have always hated jeans from the time I was a child). This is who I am, this is my individual style, and I will never give in to trends or what others are wearing or tell me I should wear.

Some of the other things I love:

I'm a lover of a dress that moves:

All black everything:

Minimalism and a beautifully cut maxi dress:

Exaggerated silhouettes:

And of course statement jewelry:

I hope people can see and feel the passion that I feel for style, individuality, and garment construction through my blog!