Louis, tell me about your early days when you found out that you were interested in fashion and wanted to pursue a career in fashion.
I’ve always liked fashion. I always like to dress well and always want to dress to impress. So, among all my friends, I was the one who was always standing out (fashionwise), you know, like the one who dressed the best. I was stressing everybody to all my friends. “If you’re going to go out with me, you got to dress well.” (laughs)
I started to like it from an early age; I started liking everything in fashion, the suits, many men’s accessories, and stuff like that. So from an early age, I knew that I was into fashion.
Fashion is a huge world. There are designers, pattern makers, models, photographers, stylists. When you started experimenting and trying on clothes, was it difficult for you to figure out what fashion area you wanted to work in?
Well, I actually went to school, Miami International University of Art and Design, which is part of the Art Institute. That school is big for fashion. I went to school for visual effects and motion graphics, but the whole school was surrounded by fashion students, and there was fashion everywhere. They have fashion shows, and there is fashion everywhere. So I always got inspired by seeing all the mannequins, the work in the hallways, and all the fashion stuff.
And I knew how to do media, and social media, back in those days when social media was starting. So I started, and I said: “I’m gonna start doing my own thing.” I was getting paid to create things for other people. And I’m like, “wait a minute, what if I start taking my own pictures? what if I start curating my feed in this type of way on Instagram?” what if I start modeling, you know, my own style, putting my own twist to it and that’s when I started getting more into men’s fashion, into men’s suits. And that’s how you and I met, in LA Fashion Week, so that was fun. It has taken me on a path that I’ve liked so far.
And you get to know a lot of people. And you get to travel a lot and interact with different people and talents, right?
Lots of cultures, it has taken me to many great places like LA, Paris, Italy, Mexico. It’s been fun. It’s been great.
Collaborations have become particularly popular in the last couple of years. We see people from different cultures collaborating to create new things. We’ve seen some great collaborations like Balmain x Barbie, Dior x Birkenstock, Adidas x Gucci.
The great thing about collaborations is that you mix different talents and different vibes to create something new. So I want to ask you, in the influencer world, how likely is it that these collaborations happen? Do people like working collaboratively, or is it more of an individual thing?
I don’t design, but I’m more into styling, styling myself. I don’t know how to style other people! Sometimes I do collaborations with other influencers, other girls, and couples in shoots for Instagram. We try to mimic someone’s feed into my feed, and now that Instagram has these collaboration settings out, it’s even better because we post a picture that goes to both of our profiles, which is awesome.
And then, more people see it! You get to introduce someone to your audience, and then this person introduces you to their audience right.
Yeah! Which is fun. It’s really cool, and it’s easier for you. You only post it once, and that’s it.
Tell me about the craziest photoshoot you’ve ever done. Maybe the location was crazy, maybe the people around you were crazy. What comes to mind?
I went to Thailand for Thailand Fashion Week, and I went sightseeing, so I went to three different cities, went to Chiang Mai, and went inside a tiger’s cage and took a picture with a tiger. We had a photoshoot with a tiger! I was super scared. I think that was the craziest thing I have ever done. Just sitting right next to a tiger and then trying to pose like everything’s ok.
Since you started working in fashion, what has been the biggest challenge for you?
To keep up, to keep up with every trend. As you said, fashion is fast, and every month there’s something new. So the hardest thing is actually to keep up, try to make a style work with your style. And that’s what’s been the most challenging thing, especially nowadays in fashion. It comes so fast and goes so fast. So trying to be unique with your own style, so if I want to wear a suit, I don’t want other people coming out with the same suit.
So one thing that I started doing some time ago was when the whole suit thing was going on with men’s fashion. I started wearing a belt on my waist, so I was invited to a show, and I only had a white suit. And I asked myself: “how can I make this suit more attention calling?”
So I grabbed a white belt that I had. I wrapped my waist, and then I went like that to the show. No shirt. I only had the blazer, the pants, and the belt tight. And everyone loved the suit that night. It was really cool.
I think you were wearing something similar at LA Fashion Week because I saw you and said: “that’s a very cool suit. I want to be his friend.”
It was a pink velvet blazer and a black belt with black pants. Yes! A lot of people started reposting those photos, so that’s when I realized you gotta go with things that are not so common.
What’s your favorite fashion season, and why?
I live in Miami, so you know it’s always like summer here, but I like winter, I like layering, I like wearing the suit, the jacket, the tie but it gets very hot here. So I don’t get to wear a lot of layers, and every time I travel to Europe or to very cold places, I love wearing layers. I wouldn’t say I like living in winter, but I like winter fashion.
Miami has a very specific fashion vibe. It’s very different from New York’s fashion or LA’s fashion. How would you describe Miami’s vibe?
Well, here, you were a lot of linen. I would say there’s a lot of white, pastel colors, and very flowy. I see people wearing flowy shirts in the streets, at parties, and events. I’m always going to go for linen pants and a linen long sleeve shirt. And for girls, I see flowy dresses. There’s a lot of wind, and we are on the beach, so there’s a lot of flowy clothes with movement over here.
What advice would you give to someone who wants to pursue a career in fashion, specifically as a fashion personality?
You have to be wild. You have to put your own style and not be scared to do different things. Everything has been invented already. You just got to reinvent it and adapt it into that era or that trend that is going on at the moment. Don’t try to invent something new because pretty much everything’s been invented already.
But put your own twist, your own style, and do it with love, do it like you actually like doing it.
You were saying earlier that one of the biggest challenges for you has been to keep up with how quickly things are evolving in fashion. And they’re getting quicker with more social media with a certain easiness for emerging designers from any part of the world to become visible.
How do you see the future of fashion in social media? Do you think it’s going to get even quicker? Do you think things need to change? What are your thoughts on that?
I have a feeling that fast fashion is not going to die soon. It’s going to be even faster, but I will say that essentials, though, are always good to have. If you have essentials that you can mix with new trends, that’s a good key not to overwhelm your closet.
How would you describe an essential garment? What is an essential for you?
So, essentially for men, I can speak about menswear, I don’t know much about women’s, but for men, it’d be a black long sleeve shirt, khaki and grey slacks, white sneakers, a black pair of formal shoes. Maybe a white, grey, and black t-shirt, either crew neck or v-neck. Those are essentials, things you can mix and match with new fashion. If you have these new crazy-looking pants, you can tone them down with an essential, which would be a crew neck t-shirt or a white shirt.
You can find Louis Andre at:
instagram.com/reallouisandre/
