DORÉ

Jean Touitou’s brand, A.P.C., has been a favorite of mine for absolutely ever. And when I say ever, I mean it. I was 17 when I started saving my money to buy… well anything I could afford from his amazing brand. When it started, it was so revolutionary to me. Deep, cool, humble, fun, and super chic at the same time. It represented, exactly the woman that I wanted to be. Years later, A.P.C. is more than ever a part of our landscape and more than ever an island of quiet rebellion.

To understand the spirit behind such a cult brand, you have to meet it’s founder, the endlessly inspiring Jean Touitou.

[podcast_episode episode=”262739″ ]

On being a history teacher…
I was educated as a history teacher because I didn’t want to touch money because I thought money was disgusting and didn’t want to be a business person. I wanted to have the look of a teacher, it was nice to me. Gray suit, white shirt, little suitcase, taking the train. But then I realized it was not fun at all!

On activism today…
I’m surprised there is no more activism now. The conditions for me to be an activist then are much worse now. The difference between the poor and the rich are huge now, much bigger than they used to be. The working class today has no margin of error in their money. I’m surprised no one is a communist anymore.

On capitalism…
I’m not against capitalism. To be against capitalism is like to be against the rain; there is nothing you can do. Maybe establishing rules. We should establish a rule that no yacht owner should have a yacht longer than 100 feet. Mine is 44 feet and I’d be so happy with 60 feet. 100 feet seems huge enough. There is no limit. I’m just saying we need a doable utopia.

On the days of CBGB in NYC…
The Bowery used to have this club, CBGB, it was not only young people posing and pretending to be suicidal. There was real music, poetry and real artistic action against the existing system of show business and if I may say, corporate rock and roll. If you listened carefully to people performing there, it was very interesting. No musician could play like the Ramones could play. I don’t want to enter into details of musicology, but believe me!

On deciding to do fashion on his own…
I wasn’t satisfied. After Kenzo, I did Agnès B., which I started in America, and then I did my own brand with a Japanese designer, named Irie. I’m still friends with all of them, I just got sick of all the big prints. I learned a lot with Kenzo about the process of print but I wanted something extremely radical, which is when I started A.P.C.

On financing A.P.C….
I financed A.P.C. and had no family money, but by designing and producing clothes for big brands that couldn’t do it by themselves. I know leopard print skinny pants and that has fueled all of my military outfits for men and very strict outfits for woman, these were financed by my capacity of making what is called “sexy” clothes, which I find such a turnoff, but I may be a pervert, but I don’t think I am. The idea of sexiness in today’s world is a total turnoff. But it has been useful to create money.

On e-commerce…
I wanted to be more aggressive in the business because it costs a lot of money to open stores, so I thought we could sell more on e-commerce. But there is something strange and saddening to me, the more you want to do business on e-commerce, the more ugly your website has to be!

On wisdom…
Wisdom is if you’re a sailor and the weather report tells you can go, but maybe you stay in the harbor. Or, if you’re a very well-trained boxer and there is a fight in the bar and it could be exciting to destroy everyone, but instead, just keep away from it. I think it’s much nicer to try and have a quieter life, which can guarantee your inspiration. That’s the key thing.

On walking as work…
If you work too much, you might lose your fresh ideas. We are workaholics, we just don’t need to be at the studio all the time. If you’re a walker, you know that when you walk, a lot of ideas come. I walk a lot in the morning and at night, and that’s still working, it’s just a more peaceful way to work than being behind your computer. I prefer to be that way where the ideas come from the very bottom of you, and not superficially.

On collaborating with people…
It’s not that easy to collaborate and keep a friendship happening. Because at the end of the day, these guys send their bills! But, I happen to be friends with a lot of people we work with and I love them to challenge us and find things to say about our collection we would not have found ourselves. And that’s maybe one of the secrets of the longevity of our brand. We consider ourselves in need of other people. I’m happy to say people are influential and we have people working with us and we’re proud of it.