LUAR USA DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

“I was born and raised in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. When Dominican immigrants arrived they would work at a factory, so everybody I knew – my mum, grandmother, aunts and cousins – all had an industrial background. Everywhere I went there was a sewing machine and everybody made clothes. I grew up around fashion and it’s the only thing that’s ever interested me. I wouldn’t know how to do anything else even if you asked me,” says Raul Lopez, who was formerly the designer at Hood By Air with Shayne Oliver. “I met Shayne on Christopher Street in the West Village when I was around 17 years old. We were teenagers, and that was the only place where you could be gay in New York without getting bashed. He came up to me and suggested we work on something. But Hood By Air hasn’t been part of my life for years now. Shayne and I are two di erent people, doing two di erent things, even though we have similarities because we’re cut from the same cloth. We appreciate, glorify and live for the same things.” Now Lopez is focused on Luar: “I launched it in 2010, and I should bring back everything I made then because it’s so relevant now. Before, everyone said it was too crazy. I did my rst show renegade style in 2011 at a park on the Lower East Side. It’s still one of my favourite collections.” For this designer, the creative process is rooted in a rendition of reality: “Every season I’m inspired by something I’ve lived through.” •