PS i love you
CFDA’s Womenswear Designers of the Year, Jack McCollough’s and Lazaro Hernandez’s fall line for Proenza Schouler is their most grown-up collection to date
It is rare to spot only half of Proenza Schouler. “We take a week off from each other about once a year,” says Jack McCollough. “The other 51 weeks we’re together.” “We like each other,” Lazaro Hernandez says as he grabs McCollough’s arm and laughs.
Partners in life and creativity, the pair just got back the night before from their customary post-runway-show voyage. This time around the first stop was Tennessee’s Great Smoky Mountains. Then they went their separate ways, as they do every year (McCollough went to Los Angeles, and Hernandez visited family in Miami), before reuniting in Mexico. “It was a healthy retreat,” says Hernandez. “After the spring show, we had the craziest trip: Fiji, New Zealand, China. It was insane. We got back and were so tired. This time we were like, ‘Let’s just go to Mexico and chill’.”
On this chilly day in New York, there is a sense of triumph at Proenza Schouler’s SoHo headquarters. Their latest collection has elevated them to a new level. The city below is wheat-pasted with posters flaunting their sleek new logo. No longer just New York’s It label, Proenza Schouler is on the fast track to become a major global brand.
The designers’ sublimely austere Fall 2013 collection, the latest departure in a career full of them, is dominated by black and white. “It was reactionary,” explains McCollough, and a natural pendulum swing after their spring collection of python biker vests, laser-perforated leather minis in acid colours, and photo-printed satin studded with enough grommets to set off a metal detector. Some critics dubbed it ‘The Tumblr Collection,’ slack journalistic shorthand that reduces its evolution to casual web surfing. “We explored colour, texture, and print to the highest extent—where do you go from there?” says McCollough. “You can do more, and it will be overkill. We had to take it to a new place and clean the slate, do something that felt more sober.”
But fall’s narrow colour palette and classic elegance are deceptive. The linchpin of the collection is the designers’ stealth use of technology. “It is all high-tech,” says Hernandez, seated across from McCollough at a table in their private office. Both are wearing jeans: McCollough is in a white T-shirt; Hernandez, a simple blue cashmere sweater. “That’s what interests us, exploring technique and pushing the boundaries,” says McCollough. What at first glance appears to be a traditional tweed suit is composed of strips of leather and yarn. A black-and-grey sweater shimmers because it is embellished with silvery curb chains. The collection is beautiful and a career high point, but it must be seen up close to be appreciated on a deeper level. “The look changes season after season,” McCollough explains, “but the vibe and attitude of the girl is consistent.” Adds Hernandez, “It’s always rooted in today.”
With the pair’s boyish appearance—they’re both 34 but look younger—it’s hard to believe that Proenza Schouler was founded in 2002, while they were students at Parsons School of Design.
We knew we had to take it to a new place and clean the slate, do something that felt more sober,” says Jack McCollough
Barneys New York famously bought their entire first collection (which also happened to be their senior thesis), and the rest was fashion history. These days, the company is in a period of significant growth, which began in 2008 with the out-of-the-park success of the PS1 bag, their accessories debut. In 2011, Proenza Schouler received a major funding pipeline with the help of Theory founder Andrew Rosen and the investor John Howard, who became partners in the brand. “We’ve been trying to up the ante,” says McCollough. “We’ve made a huge effort.” Public relations was brought in-house, and the New York staff increased to 100 people. But there has been an even greater recent stride. “We have a board of directors now,” Hernandez notes. “That’s really pushing us and …” His voice trails off as he looks over at McCollough, who has a swatch of leather pressed to his face like a bandit mask. Only his eyes are visible. Hernandez gives him a push. “Sorry, I was smelling it!” McCollough says with a laugh.
“We are definitely not business people,” Hernandez says. “For that we have Shirley, who started the business with us,” adds McCollough. “She’s more behind the curtain.” Shirley Cook, the CEO of Proenza Schouler, met the designers when they were at Parsons and she was a student at New York University. “They always had not just great taste but interesting taste as well,” says Cook, who refers to them as “family”. “What attracted me to them was the way they think. We started as naive, excited kids working on a ‘project,’ living together, spending all of our time together, etc. As we mature, as a company and as individuals, we respect each other for all new reasons.” The most obvious example of the Proenza boys’ continued acumen was the opening last fall of their first boutique, on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. The space, designed by the modernist British architect David Adjaye, is an industrial take on chic, with reclaimed wood beams, rusted-bronze screens, and speckled concrete walls. But the location was surprising, given that the Proenza girl—epitomised by Chloë Sevigny, Vanessa Traina, and Kirsten Dunst—is the ultimate downtown denizen. “It felt more unusual,” says Hernandez. At the mention of the word unusual, McCollough starts laughing. “We always laugh at that word,” he says, and then in a faux pompous voice, drawls, “It’s verrrrry unusual.” “It means ‘ugly’ for us,” Hernandez explains. “‘Oh, well, that’s so unusual.’ Everyone expected us to have more of a downtown-cool place. The reality is the clothes are high-end and of a certain quality. We want the downtown girls to go slum uptown!” However, a downtown Proenza Schouler outpost is in the works. “It makes sense to be in both places,” notes McCollough.
Asked to describe the dynamic between the designers, the stylist Marie Chaix, who has worked on the Proenza shows for the past five years, says, “Lazaro is more outspoken. Jack is more thoughtful and calmer. They complement each other in that way.” And creative consultant Jen Brill, a friend and colleague of McCollough and Hernandez’s for a decade, observes, “In design they complete each other,” she says, adding, “They are still as curious as they were when I first met them. They always want to learn, and you can see it in their work. They’re yin and yang.”
Today, you’re more likely to find the pair cooking and gardening at Snow Farm, their Berkshire country house—where many of their ideas germinate—than in a nightclub. “The days of staying up late are behind us,” admits Hernandez. “Our idea of what constitutes ‘fun’ is different these days.”
“in design they complete each other,” says jen brill. “they’re yin and yang..”