HAPPY THANKSGIVING FROM VMAN!
Photography Dan Forbes
Market Editor Katelyn Gray
Prop Styling Matthew Jackson
BUY VMAN 24 THE DECADES ISSUE and brush up on your history for the holidays.
FROM LEFT:
SHOE CESARE PACIOTTI
LEATHER JACKET DOLCE & GABBANA
CIGAR PADRON 1926 ANNIVERSARY
JAWBONE ASHTRAY BLACK SHEEP & PRODIGAL SONS
CUFFLINKS AND PEN CARTIER
BRIEFCASE LOUIS VUITTON
WATCH DAVID YURMAN
Tuan Bui wears Black Sheep & Prodigal Sons Monolith Necklace $165, Shades of Grey by Micah Cohen jacket, $150,Robert Geller Seconds sweatpants, $292, and T-shirt, $104, Sacai cable knit shorts, $920
Winner: Occulter
A
small slice of the Lower East Side was all Derrick R. Cruz needed to
present his Black Sheep & Prodigal Sons brand of accessories and
art objects to the masses: The space may resemble the narrowest of
hallways, but it’s just big enough for Occulter’s selection of jewelry,
books and indie records. Try on the silver hexagon rings ($130) or
pony up for one-of-a-kind necklaces made from honeycomb cast in gold
($1,500). Owning such treasures might take the help of a financial
planner, but Occulter doesn’t skimp on affordable goods. Pick up
classics like T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land and Other Poems or Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis ($33), which come bound and sealed in rubber and are opened with a rip cord. 83½ Orchard St between Broome and Grand Sts (917-769-2220, occulter.org
Horsehair necklace by Black Sheep & Prodigal Sons, coat and pants Yohji Yamamoto
BLACK AND RED
Photographer Takahiro Ogawa
Art direction Kazuya Goan
Stylist Aki Maesato
Make-up Asami Taguchi @ L’Atelier NYC
Hair Masa Honda
Model Evelina @ New York Model Management
#3 -- OCCULTER (NEW YORK)
Honeycomb necklaces made of gold, scrimshaw pendants fashioned from salvaged piano keys, a rare book collection installed to seemingly defy gravity—the things that Derrick Cruz creates look like they come from some magical old-world place. But in discussing his newly opened store at 83 1/2 Orchard Street, the artist and jewelry designer explained thatocculter is in fact the term for “an instrument used to block the view of a bright celestial object, allowing the careful observation of a fainter one.” Such a description could just as easily describe Cruz himself, his vision always clearing space for others to expand theirs.
In
the days before before online sample sales and big box retailers,
shopping was an event—a way to discover new things and to forge a sense
of community. But with skyrocketing square-footage costs and compulsory
markdowns on excess inventory, the independent brick-and-mortar store
has become somewhat of an endangered species. Fortunately, fashion’s
cutting edge contingent is reviving the lost art of big city shopping
in entirely new ways.
With a fraction of the square footage and a temporary, devil-may-care air that’s otherwise missing in organized, premeditated retailing, these recession-minded shops are the anti-department stores. In line with the raved-about Monocle pop-up shops in New York, London and LA, fashion’s curatorial retailers—”curetailers,” if we may—are trailblazing a new retail experience with tiny shops that pack a big punch. “The idea is one of behemoth commercialism versus artful independent design,” Black Sheep & Prodigal Son’s Derrick R. Cruz explains of this new retail attitude.
At Cruz’s brainchild shop Occulter,
for instance, shoppers will find record albums, used books and black
honey right alongside avant-garde fashion labels. This Lower East Side
goth jewelbox of a shop is a way to show off the designer’s darkly
romantic jewelry with the added interest and credibility of a
lifestyle’s worth of goodies—all showcased in a space the size of a
punk rock shoebox studio. “For brands with a strong message, curated
boutiques are imperative,” explains Cruz. “Creating a small world where
individuals can be enveloped by your ideas and ideals is priceless for
branding…You’ll make more profit online, [but] they go hand-in-hand.”
In the Meatpacking District, meanwhile, BLACK Commes Des Garçons
is a guerilla pop-up shop that showcases the label’s limited-edition,
mid-priced BLACK collection. Think of it as a one-stop shop for cool
kids on a bartender’s budget. Besides, who needs a bougie boutique when
you can pass the savings right along to your core contingent in a bare
bones setting? Fashion’s true fanatics will not miss velvet-upholstered
dressing rooms in this to-the-point setting.
Cruz analogizes the current shopping model to the music business: “The big music monsters fell and supposedly the music business died,” he observes. “Funny thing happened though: a thousand little independent bands came out of nowhere and made a thousand little movements and new genres. We can thank their use of the internet for that. So, one could argue that, creatively, music is more successful than ever, regardless of whether or not Capitol Records is making a profit. With some good curatorial skills and some internet, I think small independent retailers and designers can do the same for fashion and design.”
