How I Built This with Guy Raz - Telfar: Telfar Clemens and Babak Radboy

Episode Date: February 14, 2022

As he started to gain a name as a New York fashion designer in the 2010s, Telfar Clemens often joked that he was "constantly emerging." At least, that's how the establishment fashion press saw him: a child of Liberian immigrants, building a small but devoted following with his deconstructed T-shirts and sandals made from hollowed-out Converse. But after Telfar partnered with Babak Radboy as his creative director in 2013, the brand began to reach a wider audience. There were splashy partnerships with K-Mart and White Castle; and in 2018, the wide release of the Telfar Bag, a vegan-leather shopping bag that became the "it"-accessory for everyone from A-list celebrities to the neighbors next door. Today, Telfar and Babak say they've succeeded by designing exactly what they want—and sidestepping a fashion system that was not always welcoming. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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made it feel less like a visit and more like we were actually living there. Plus, taking a trip is the perfect time to host your space on Airbnb. your place with all of its personal touches and its amazing location could make someone else's vacation even better. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca.ca. slash host. I would make a show and you try to get press people to cover it, they wouldn't. You try to get buyers to buy it. They wouldn't. So I'm like, damn, how am I going to do this next thing? Yeah. My experience of it was, to go to shows and then be mad, that that wasn't enough. And, you know, like fashion is like, it's like a more subjective form of, like, sport, let's say.

And if somebody's really good, then shouldn't they be on the team? And it's just not happening. Like, I go to a show and it's just us. Like, there's no press. There's no buyers. It's like as if it never happened. From NPR, it's how I built this. A show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movies.

movements they built. I'm Guy Raz, and on the show today how Telfar Clemens and Baba Gradboy came together to build Telfar, a fashion brand that started in the clubs and side streets of New York City and grew into a global phenomenon. A few years ago, celebrities started to be photographed with a particular handbag. It was shaped like a shopping bag, so think a Bloomingdale type bag, but with two sets of straps. One set to hang over your shoulders, the other to clutch in your hand. Embossed on the bag was the letter T artfully and symmetrically inserted inside the letter C. The Tee stands for Telfar, the C for Clemens. Telfar Clemens has become one of the hottest fashion designers in the U.S. over the past few years. His brand logo,

the T inside the sea, seems like it's everywhere. Look around. You'll see it on T-shirts, on sweatpants, on hats, even on the uniforms worn by employees at White Castle. It's almost as if Telfar appeared out of nowhere, except that Telfar Clemens has been designing and selling his apparel and accessories for more than 15 years. But for much of that time, Telfar's work was largely ignored by the tastemakers in the fashion industry. And a big part of the brand's success has come from a deliberate strategy of working outside and at times against the fashion industry. Telfar and his creative partner, Babak Gradboy, don't go to the Met Gala, they don't attend

the major fashion shows, and they don't price their products beyond the reach of most consumers. The designs are simple, genderless, and as Telfar's tagline says, not for you, for everyone. The story of how Telfar got to where he is is not a simple one to tell, as he and Bobbi's Reminded me during the interview, there's an easy version, basically young man, child of immigrants, struggles in the big city, eventually redefines the concept of luxury and then makes it big. And part of that interpretation is real. But there's another part of the story, a more complicated one. A story of two outsiders who were shut out of an industry with specific rules and codes, who then rejected the system that supported all of that and charted their own. own path on their own terms. Babak Radboy first met Tel-Far in the early 2000s, but he didn't start working with a designer until a few years later. We'll hear a lot more from Babak later in the interview,

but for now we'll be hearing a lot from Telfar. He spent much of his early life in Liberia, but his family eventually fled the Civil War there and moved to Gaithersburg, a suburb just outside Washington, D.C. I just remember taking ESOL classes and different language courses because people couldn't understand what I was saying because my accent was really thick at the time, you know?

Also, I used to have this, like, condition that my eyes would water. So people constantly thought I was lost in trouble. And then also, you know, like, when they like heard my accent, I was just like, so people are constantly trying to help me that I did not need help from

Yeah. Were most of your parents' friends when you were growing up in Gathersburg, Liberians as well? Yeah, it's like a huge community of Liberians. I think that's like one of the big reasons that we ended up relocating there. I was actually only allowed to hang out with Liberian kids. It's like my parents used to be like, oh, no, you can't hang out of American kids. They're evil. Yeah. What about religion? Were you guys religious? Oh yeah, that's like such a big part. I went to church every Sunday. Wow. The most boring church ever, but really sweet. You know, like the music was just not, it didn't move me.

But it was like a community of people that took care of each other. That's like where the food pantries were, you know, and I don't know, just like a lot of support. I find in my interviews that middle school is the first time when most of us start to find things in our lives that are more interesting, more sophisticated, music, and... Colored contacts. Whatever it's like going to the shopping mall, whatever it might be. What do you remember about the things that you were interested in in middle school? I feel like that's like what I really began to find myself, you know, because it was just

my parents were just like focused on you going to the best school possible. And so they were trying to get me into private school for years in Maryland. And every single placement test that I would take, I would mark A, A, A, A, A, A, A, A, A, A, all the way down to placement test so I wouldn't get in. You didn't want to go to private school. I did not want to go to private school. And I didn't want to go because you had to wear a uniform. Right. And my only thing that I was allowed to do was, like, I was allowed to dress how I wanted to dress for the most part, you know.

When did you first start to get into clothes? I think always, you know, like I wore a pair of Ashkosh, bagash, like overalls. I was really specific, like, about what I wanted to dress like, you know? And it's kind of like dressing like a toy or like the idea of like exactly like what you saw on TV, you know? Would you have both of the buckles buckled up or would you ever have one strap down? It began to begin to be one strap off as I progressed. But at first it was just like neat, tidy. you know, later in middle school before I went to high school, it's like only designer things.

It was like I wanted to wear Calvin Klein. I wanted to wear Iceberg. I wanted to wear Armani. I wanted to wear Doche and Gabana, you know. I used to want to go to like, like in D.C., particularly to go shopping because I was like, oh, Maryland. I wanted to see like real designer things and like things that I couldn't find in like the mall. How were you able to buy it? I mean, I'm assuming that your parents, they were.

middle class, right? Because your dad was an accountant. I had a job. I worked at a daycare center than my aunt actually ran, you know. That also my little brother went to. So I don't know how I afforded it, but I did. I saved money for diesel jeans. I save money for Doche and Go on and Sandals, you know. And as you kind of got more and more to fashion, did it create tension with your parents?

Were they? Yeah. How so? I would say like the sexier I wanted to dress or the more feminine influences that I had on dressing, they were completely against it. They're like used to like a world of like, oh, that man's suit is so beautiful. The cut of that suit, you know, that's what they consider it to be fashion. And I'm like, oh, wow, I want low-rise jeans that are really ripped and I want my shirt to say bitch on it and be three sizes too small. But it sounds like even though there was some tension between you and your parents that it,

It was a very loving relationship. Is that fair to say? Yeah, totally. Too loving. Too loving. It's like I'm looked after heavily, you know, and I needed to look after myself in the way that I needed to be looked after, you know, not like someone telling me what to do, but more like me knowing what I wanted to do and doing it on my own. Yeah. I'm just totally blown away at how confident you seemed to have been at such a young age to because what you know a lot of kids in in probably less so today but definitely then and when I was in high school and it was easier to just conform right to just wear jeans and a t-shirt and not to stand out but it sounds like you were really comfortable already at 14 15 expressing yourself through clothing and not I guess not being worried about what other kids said or or were you I think I probably was. That's why I finished school early and got out of there and got around people that I felt like I was more like. I don't know. Like also too, it's like I grew up very, I didn't know what I was going to be, but I was like, I'm not going to be hanging out in Maryland. It's like I had already seen New York. I used to go there every weekend. You know, I saw what people were up to. So I was just like, this shit is not for me, you know, like literally the day that I graduated high school was the day that I moved. Like the first chance that I got, I was out. So you knew, Telfar, you knew already in high school that you were going to get out of the

suburbs and go to a city and probably New York. And clothing was a way that you expressed yourself, but it doesn't sound like at that point in your life, you knew that you were going to go into the clothing world, right? I mean, you kind of had a, or am I wrong? I mean, was that something that already is a teenager you thought, I really liked this. I mean, okay, so right before I moved to Maryland, I would say like kind of... Right before you moved to New York, you mean? Right before I moved to New York, sorry, kind of senior year of high school, I met this group of, like, young designers. In D.C., one of them's name is Jonathan Nelson.

I forget what their line was called. They had me, because they're Liberian also, and I forget how I got hooked up with them, but, Like, they showed me like, t-shirt printing operation that they had. And, like, as I was going away to college, they gave me this entire bag of these Barb Marley T-shirts that they had heat-pressed. And he gave me a bunch of just, like, the prints. And I ended up cutting them up. And I made this collection of stuff that I sold on the street. Like, I just basically deconstructed these t-shirts to make this collection of clothes.

So you would literally take these T-shirts. shirts that you got from these guys in D.C. And just kind of very gently cut along the seams and you deconstruct the shirts to parts. Yeah. And then reconstruct them into different garments. Dresses, t-shirts, skirts, backpacks, motorcycle jackets, you know. Wow. Can I ask you, can I ask you kind of a sort of weird, I don't know, maybe it's not a dumb question.

How did you know how to sew? I got a machine like I guess like the first time that Black Friday ever happened. I was in New Jersey and we went to a Walmart there and I bought a machine for like $150. And it was like right after my grandmother had passed, who also, she had a sewing school in Liberia. She always wanted to sew our clothes and we were just like, can we go to the gap and get, you know, like whatever we want. She's like, if I had my way, I'll sew all of you guys this clothes, we were like, no. Oh, no. But, like, strangely, right after she died, I took up sewing. And my aunt Musu, she showed me how to sew. It was bad. Like, I was bad at it. But I knew how to, like, thread a bob in and put a thread in the machine. And I was deconstructing clothes by that time. So I was, like, seeing how they were put together. So I began to just, like, you know, put things back together. And I still didn't really know. And I still continued doing that all through college. How did you just, you just figured it out?

I mean, because sewing like any craft, carpentry or anything, anything, it's very complicated. And it's like anything. I mean, you said you were bad at it at the beginning. I was bad at it, and I'm still bad at it. Like, I can't sew for shit. And I wouldn't want to. That's when I, you know, I really like, you know, I'm blessed enough to have, like, great people that work with me that make things the way how they should be made. But I was like, you know, the roughness about what I was doing at that time, though, I really do appreciate.

Because I'm still like that to this point that I'm like, just rip that thing. And it needs to be bigger here and less there. And that's what I wanted to look like. You know, and I don't think you need any kind of formal training to do that or necessary. It's like sometimes ripping something and telling someone to do that thing that you just did is like the thing that you need to do, you know, to get what you want. It's not a refined thing. And I don't think my craft is such a refined craft. It's like it really comes from taking things apart and putting them back together in a non-traditional way.

So the story that I've read is that you went to New York because you were going to enroll at Pace University in the fall to study, actually study business and accounting. Yeah. And that you moved in with one of your aunts in Queens. But that summer before you started college, you started to sell your, the, the, the, you started. garments that you would make from these t-shirts on the on low east side on mulberry street you would just set up like a table on the street and so also too great advice from jonathan Nelson he was like go to the lower east side that's the bargain district he was like yo you can get like a lot of t-shirts there so i was walking down orchard street with like a bag of my stuff

because i would do that every single day you would go down i would go up and down i would go walking around to stores and ask for the buyer. Again, like, this was like, Jonathan Nelson was like, yeah, just go to a store and ask for the buyer. I was like, really? You just go there and ask for the buyer. He was like, yeah, just show them what you got, you know. You were 17, I think. I think I was 18, yeah. 18. It's quite amazing. I mean, were you nervous? I think of myself as an 18 year old, and I think I'd be so nervous to walk in and think, oh, are they going to like talk to me? I'm just a kid. Yeah. I mean, also, too, like, I had this whole thing that I wouldn't tell anyone how old I was. Like my best friends, they didn't know I was 18 until I was 21,

you know? Like, they thought I was 21 the whole time because I always just immediately would just feel like this amount of disrespect when you told someone that was 25 that you were 18, you know? So I just didn't tell anybody how old I was, especially people that are older to me. So when you were, when you got to New York and you started to, you know, to take your decision, to the Lower East Side, you're 18. What would you say when you would walk into the stores? You would say, hi, I'm Telvar Clemens. I'm a designer.

This is my line. But what was your pitch? I think it was bad. I'd mostly go to stores that they were doing consignment. At that time, it was like seven at a store called Funky Lala. The store was cool. Like, it had like all these like kind of ripped denim skirts and like vintage shoes. It was just like they just had all this cool vintage stuff.

And they were also selling designer stuff. So it was that store, funky, Lala. It was the Vice store. The Vice Magazine, they had a store initially, yeah. And how, where were you drawing your inspiration from? Because I think initially you really were working with like T-shirts, right? T-shirts, yeah, T-shirt and jeans. Because they were, I mean, they were basic, I'm trying to picture them.

I mean, they were Bob Marley T-shirts. No, no, no. This was like, those Bob Marley T-shirts only lasted me. I think I sold them all like the first month that I got to New York. It was just like anything that was like deconstructed vintage stuff, I would go vintage shopping. Like I would go all the way out to like places that you'll buy clothes by the pound and buy like a bunch of blue denim, you know. And a lot of the things that I would make did not exist. Like what do you remember?

Like one of the pieces that like was the thing that I was like, okay, this is a business. or it has potential to be financially beneficial to me. So I would buy these three X t-shirts and put them together into a triple t-shirt. And just to create an image in the mind's eye, when you describe a triple t-shirt, I think what you're describing is something that went down was like vertical, right? It had three holes. So you would take three t-shirts together. I would chop the right arm off of one, the left arm off of another,

and make a triangle with the third one and connect all of that together where your two arms would come out of the neck hole and you could wear them in multiple neck holes. Like I was making this all through college. That's like what I was making for people to wear. That's what I met some of my best friends wearing. And so it had multiple, like the neck hole was designed for the arms.

So it was different than just like an oversized single T-shirt because it sounds like when you would lift your arms up but almost would have this kind of flowing kind of profile? Yeah, but you could also wear it another way, too, that you would wear asymmetric, and you would have a T-shirt arm and a neck, and then a very long shape on one side. And you were just making clothing in your aunt's apartment,

like with your sewing machine? No, I was at a dorm room at that time. You were making it in your dorm room? Yeah. Wow. All right. So you are, I mean, you were like 18, 19. You're a student at Pace University, going to class and also designing clothing that was appearing in some small boutiques.

I'm just trying to imagine, like, if I knew you then, and I was like, hey, tell me a little bit by yourself, Telfar. And you would say, oh, yeah, I'm designing some clothing. And, yeah, some of it's in these boutiques in New York, I would have been, like, really impressed. I mean, that sounds like. Oh, yeah, I thought I was fab. Like, I did not talk to people at school. Like, I went to school at 6 in the morning and mind my business, you know. And also, too, at that time, I started to hang out at clubs and I noticed that you could get paid at night.

By? By DJing, by hosting a party, by just showing up. I mean, it seems to me like you also had real ambitions that you were really thinking about you and what you were going to do with your life and that you were creating something bigger. Is that true or were you not quite, was it not quite formed? No, I, like, at a certain point, I was like, I want to do this and I want to begin to, it began with like, oh, making seasonal collections and doing a show to be able to achieve getting respect from people that were in the fashion industry and that do do this. So it's like after I had started making things out of, like, fabric and I had account advice. Vice Magazine. Vice Magazine and the Vice Store, which was like my main account at that time.

Yeah. Vice and Funky Lala. Were you making money off of it? Serious money or? Um, enough to eat. Enough to buy dumplings, dollar dumplings, you know. How much were they selling your shirts for? Do you remember?

I was selling sweatshirts and stuff for maybe like $150. Right. $170. It was on consignment, too. I was probably getting all of that. These were sweatshress that you were creating, that you were stitching together and you were designing. Each one was handmade. Yeah, they were handmade.

And then I met a brother and sister company. They were called PVR menswear. And they had clothes that were at the Marbury Street Market. And I was like, wow, their clothes are cool. And I bought like a shirt one time and like we became friends. And then I was like, hey, what do you guys think about, you know, sewing these triple T-shirt? and these sweatshirts for like these vice orders that are beginning to sell.

And they were just like the sweetest people. So they began to do all of the, you know, sewing and things just from there improved. What kept you at it and going? Because it sounds like you were really grinding and just, I mean, you're making clothing. You've got stuff in consignment shops. You're DJing.

You're designing. I mean, but you weren't. quite breaking through yet. What was it in your mind that enabled you to continue to just kind of push through that? I kind of, I would look at what was going on around me and realize that even more I needed to do this. You know what I mean? Because, you know, I had people around me, like in my close circle that I were ready for what was going on. And then everybody else in the fashion industry, that was completely not, you know?

Yeah. It was specifically like I was making, you know, it was like split pants. You know, it was like really like post-apocalyptic in this way. It was converse sneakers that the toe was cut out. So I was called them the mandel. It was like the toe and the tongue was cut out. Wait, so were your toes pointing out from the front? Yeah, your toes were pointing out from the front and the back your heel was out.

So it's like sandals. So it was like a sandal made out of converse sneakers. It was just cut really raw. You know, so it was like really, like, I'm so inspired by a certain look that's almost like, you can't tell if the person's cleaning the house or if they own the house, you know. I've looked at so many images of your designs. And as you know, Norma Kamali was a guest in our show a year ago and is, I think, somebody whose work you really respect. And one of the things that I think is very similar about the clothing that you both produce is that comfort is a huge part. of your design aesthetic.

Yeah. I think that that's like kind of, that's when I can draw the distinction between what I think is fashion and what fashion is, you know. It's like I'm usually on the opposite side. It's like what you're wearing before you got dressed. It's like the thing that you're wearing every single day because you just know that that's, it's like, damn, I look good. That's like your actual person.

And then fashion is like, oh yeah, red carpet. My feet are bleeding. My zipper's caught. I tripped over my train. You know. All of that. Meanwhile, while you're still in college, I think you start doing a few small shows around the city, right? Yeah, I basically started making clothes and doing runway shows two times a year.

And, you know, it was like small interactions. Sometimes there were videos. I would have a club night where people would come and see this video of a collection that I made. And I was like, you know, there's no line that was. was unisex at that time that was coming from the place that mine was. Everything was like, oh, a dress on a man meant unisex. It's like... But it was important for you from the beginning not to be limited by gender-specific clothing. Specifically because, yeah, I was just limited by it in every way. You know, it's like there's so many things you can't do because you're not this person or this thing or that thing. You know, I just wanted a thing that you make your mind up about what you're going to be. And making things that did not exist, you know?

It's like, at that time, I would go to the fashion archives every single day. In Manhattan. In Manhattan, like Gallagher's. I would be there every single day in between classes just looking at magazines and stuff. So I was determined on also not repeating some shit that I just saw in a magazine. You know, it's like, oh, he did that. He did that. That's like when I got to know every single designer.

That's like, you were doing like some pretty serious sort of, scholarly kind of, right, I mean, you were going there looking for, because this is a very serious, this is like where people who write books about fashion go and great designers go. You were serious. You were really serious about this. If there's one thing that I do love, I think I love fashion, and that's why I never went to fashion school, because I knew once it was a task that I had to do with a certain grade that it would get from someone based on doing something that they liked me doing, I was like, no,

I would have figured it out by old. I want to do it wrong. Because at that time, my aunt, she was like, you should really go to FIT. And she was trying to get me into FIT. I was like, no, I think I'm just going to finish that page. She was like, you're not going to learn anything. I was like, yeah, I don't want to learn anything from there either, you know.

It's like I wanted to get it wrong because I was already making money getting it wrong. When we come back in just a moment, how Telfar finds a creative partner who not only loves, and admires his work, but who knows how to get it seen and sold. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This from NPR. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This. I'm Guy Raz. So it's 2004, and Telfar is designing and showing some of his fashions in New York while still going to college. And this is right around the time he meets the guy who will become his creative director, Baba Kradboy. Now, just a bit of background about Boba Krad.

before we get into it. He's the son of Iranian immigrants, and as a teenager, he was into computers and art and design. And he grew up in Seattle, a place where he was actually pretty unhappy. I knew that I was not employable in Seattle. You know, Seattle is...

Stay with me at Gatorsburg. I never agreed to growing up there to begin with, you know? I was born... You know, I mean, my earliest memories are from there, and the whole time I was like, this can't be it. This cannot possibly be it because I didn't have any space there. I always wanted to get out and I just didn't have any money or any prospects.

And then I remember I did, you know, I was good at art. And I think I did an album cover and I had $600 and I bought a one-way ticket to New York. Can you say to what the album cover was? It was an album cover to a modest mouse album. Wow. A Portland based band. right? Yeah.

Yeah. You did a modest mouse cover. That's pretty cool. It was the moon in Antarctica, I think. Wow. But I basically, yeah, I bought a one-way ticket over here. I was dating a girl who had moved out here. And then within two weeks, three weeks, I got a job making concept art for TV commercials.

I had my whole plan of how I was going to do New York, which was like not going exactly how I thought. Because I just thought my whole mind was about like I was going to do commercial art direction because I was really good at it. I was going to make a lot of money doing boring shit and then use that money to do the things I want to do. Sure. It never occurred to me that doing the things that I wanted to do were the same thing directly. Could make money. Yeah. And so the first couple months I just remember going to work every day having no money.

I was like Canada Tuna did her waiting for the first. paycheck and then you get the paycheck and you don't have a bank account. And how about you tell far? How are you making a living at that time? Like after you graduated from college, how are you earning money? I was DJing and I had my consignment. And, you know, I was living in an apartment that was what, I think, like $7 or $800 a month that had no heat.

So that was what, and I could pay at the end of the month instead of the beginning because I no heat, and that's how I did it. You know, it was, like, really just tough and, like, extremely tough. Was Telfar at this point still you, just you? Yeah, yeah. You were doing everything. Jason Ferrer also, too, was helping me style stuff at that time. It was like I would work with people after I was kind of done making the clothes.

But you were also the sales rep. Yeah. You were the sales guy. Yeah. You were the marketing guy. You were the CEO, the designer. Yeah. All those things.

Yeah, I wouldn't tell anyone who they were speaking to, so I would just sign everything, capital, all capital telfar, that just sounded like. It was somebody from this huge warehouse of designers. Right, artists? At that time, too, it was like really hard to make production of anything that I made. Yeah. You know, because I was getting the fabric as a gift from Supima. You know, I couldn't even afford the fabric that they were giving me.

They would gift it to you just like samples of it? Yeah, I would go to a Supima apartment and they would give me one role of like this striped fabric to make. It was enough to make a sample out of, but it wasn't enough for me to, oh yeah, a store came and ordered 60 units of it. It's like, no, I couldn't do that with like certain collections. And I really wanted to push each collection. So, you know, sometimes the idea would sacrifice me being able to actually make it, you know. Do you remember Tel Far, I mean, you have such a bright and. sunny disposition.

But I wonder if at that time, because I'm trying to channel back to that time in my life, and there's a lot of uncertainty in your 20s and early 30s when you're trying to kind of build your career and it's scary. And I wonder if you ever experienced anxiety or sadness about your future. I mean, completely, it was like a thing that I would make a show and do all the things that would go into a show. And, you know, you try to get press people to cover it. They wouldn't.

You try to get buyers to buy it. They wouldn't. So I'm like, damn, how am I going to do this next thing? So I was, like, kind of in this way, waiting for someone to, like, some investor to come in or, like, some store to give me a check to make this thing. And I'm just like, I'm going to make these things. And if nobody buys it, I'm going to wear it.

You know? I love that. And literally, I would make that shit in my size. And I would have those clothes. I still do. I think the two of you met. for the first time around 2004, 2005, just in, and from what I gather, you don't even remember when you first met. Is that right?

No. Well, we used to hang out a lot with each other on the street and like hang out in Tompkins Square Park on a number like of times. If it's a group of people who are looking for something different, period, right? I want to hear some music, but it's something different. Right. I want to hang out with some people, but not like people I see. seen before. Right.

I didn't think of the world in terms of like a fashion industry. Yeah. Or starting a business. What was real to us was like this, the context that we were in and how people looked. Yeah. It's like his haircuts really cool. And I feel like that's my memory of Tel-Far is like, this particular person looks ways that I can't describe.

You know, I don't know where the coordinate is. of this look are. And I think around this time, like Telfar, you were still doing small fashion shows around New York. And I guess you were also hanging out with a stylist named Avina Gallagher. And this is somebody who would become an incredibly important partner to both of you, because Babak, you wound up marrying her. And Telfar, I think Avina eventually became the stylist for the brand, right?

Yeah. Like, literally, she was around and I would see her. around a lot. I didn't even know what a stylist was until I met her. I didn't know what they did. You know, and like one time I remember looking in a magazine and it had her name on it. But I was just like, oh shit, Avina saw that. Like that's what she does. And you were working with her. She was working with you as your stylist. But from what I understand, like she wasn't, because you didn't have any money, right? No. Like she wasn't, she wasn't charging you anything, right? She was kind of a friend. Yes. This was like my one friend. I was like, y'all.

doing a show. Yeah. So it was more of a casual, like, yeah, I can help you. No problem. Yeah. Yes. It was just a bunch of friends getting together to do something cool. Bobbick, what did you, when you said, you know, I think I want to work with this guy.

What in your mind did you think that you could do? Well, my experience of it was to go to shows, see this thing, and then be mad. Because? I was just mad that that wasn't enough to get the record. ignition to get some kind of support. You would basically be going to doing these fashion shows, and it was like a tree falling on a forest and nobody was around to hear it. Yes. Like that was amazing.

Okay. Let's go. People were saying, how is this not getting attention? This is such interesting clothing. Yeah. And this is, you know, like fashion is like, it's like a more subjective form of like sport, let's say. And if somebody's really good, then shouldn't they be on the team? It's like, this is the one, right?

and it's just not happening. The press art. Like, I go to a show and it's just us. Like, there's no press. There's no buyers. You know? It's like as if it never happened. And you're trying to get the attention of like the famous fashion writers like Robin

Javan of The Washington Post or. We would go for the unfamous ones. You have to understand that when people, you know, you have these institutions like vogue and style.com and they're like the Library of Congress of fashion. Yeah. So they, your entry means that you happened. So when they refer. to even record that you had a show, they are saying that you don't exist.

You don't exist. So it's really the gatekeepers in that world at that time and maybe even today were pretty powerful. Yeah. But at the same time, we probably were completely misunderstanding what was happening, right? Because we're thinking, oh, this brand is so popular because of how cool this show was. Right. So if we do a show that's even cooler. But it's not that way.

We're going to get it too. And that is not, you know. So clearly you were, Babak, you were frustrated because you knew that there was something here that wasn't getting the attention it deserved. And you thought maybe you could help. Yeah. I just thought that it was about communication because that's what I did. Right. Right.

I mean, when I came on to Tel Far, his logo was like written with a Sharpie. Yeah. And his press kit was designed by a DJ. And like there wasn't any of that basic infrastructure that could help you navigate within our scene. Yeah. And so I really, the first show we did together was, yeah, we started in 2013. We did the SS 2014 collection. And it seemed like a really big show, right?

We entered into this new phase of like, how do you get the free space? How do you get a 20-foot LED screen for free? shipped to you. How do you get a video for free? Okay, we're going to reach out to the Museum of Contemporary Art, L.A., and you're going to write a paragraph around why this is important and why you have to support it and what it means, like all that communication. So, in other words, it wasn't about having a press strategy to reach out to reporters

and the fashion press, but it was about actually reaching out to people outside the industry to support the work that Telfar was doing. It was all of those things. things. It was all of those things, you know, because you just got to understand, like, Telfar is already doing everything that makes it what it is and then has to do the job of explaining to someone who should be able to clearly see it in front of them what it is. What it is that they're already looking at. And, you know, you're dealing with an all-white industry. Yeah. Right? And who know it? Yeah. And you symbolize something specific that's

useful up into a point, you know? And if you have no choice, you can't choose your industry. So, you know, like I thought that there was enough wiggle room in communication to find a way through that gauntlet. But that wasn't enough. What we ended up doing is like almost operating like a festival because we would make money from doing shows. And you would make money by getting sponsors to sponsor your shows. We were basically the absolute like premier artists of sponsor voodoo. So, all right. So the two of you are working together and you're working obviously on a new strategy. And I guess I think 2014 was a pretty important and pivotal moment because that year you approached Kmart to sponsor one of your shows. Kmart.

which is the furthest brand from like London or from Paris and Milan, right? The furthest brand you think of when you think of like a Paris and Milan runway show, Kmart to sponsor your fall 2014 collection. First of all, tell me about the idea of even approaching Kmart. Did they reach out to us? They, I think we might have reached out to them. What happened was in those days specifically, hair and makeup sponsors paid for your show.

So like hair, like makeup brands like Bobby Brown or, you know, whatever. Like Mac. Mac. Mac. Okay. Shesedo. Okay. And that was not an option for us, arguably, because people in our shows had the wrong hair and skin.

And it was genderless. And, you know, for all the many reasons, it wasn't giving the type of thing they were selling. Right. Right. So as a reaction to that constraint, we just. you know, started reaching out to the exact opposite end of the spectrum. So we started, we kind of like systematically reached out to like the worst possible sponsors from a fashion perspective.

I mean, so you end up working with Kmart. This is for the fall 2014 fashion show. And I think you put it up at the new museum in New York. And I want to describe this for people to just walk me into that show. Because from what I understand it was like a mock Kmart. Like you kind of had a mock Kmart as you walked in. It was the introduction of the Tel-Far shopping bag, first off. We had, you know, like, some tiny statues of every model in the show,

T-shirts of every model in the show, a seven-foot Tel-Far at the end. Yeah, yeah. There was a statue of me. Because the collection was kind of based on size and proportions, too. So, like, this whole idea of small, medium-large, we applied it to the clothes as well. And the clothing that you were designing for this show, did any of it have, did you try to kind of create a Kmart aesthetic in any way? I mean, and the fabrics that were using kind of like, I think the closest thing was like polar fleece, you know. That would be like a lot of a target.

Right. And then we had produced the Tel-FAR bag, the shopping bag, and we put the entire production in the store. So it's like hundreds and hundreds of this. bag, you know, for a brand that had never sold more than maybe a dozen, a couple dozen of anything. Right. I think we sold gift cards. Uh-huh.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. We sold gift cards. Yeah. That didn't actually buy anything. It was literally a card you could give us a gift, but, you know. It was $10, but it did nothing. And then the shopping bag was supposed to be the thing that you were going to put all of

these gifts that you would buy at the gift shop in. Right. Hmm. And so after you did that show, with Kmart, what happened? Like, what kind of reaction did it get? I think that one show at the New Museum was the first time we got on Style.com.

Yeah. That was the first time ever. The first time you got sort of, quote, mainstream press coverage. Yeah, it was like some glowing review from like the Style.com, whoever that person was at that time. That was just like,

I can't believe that we've never featured this person before. He's constantly emerging. Right. And, you know, all the reporting started to get really, like, you know, evangelical at that point. But what I'm trying to get at is what did you, and you may not know, right? Because as somebody listening to this who's trying to figure out how to do something similar, it's going to want to know, like, what was the turn? Was it, I mean, was it a convergence of things? Was it just that there were more websites coming online that were, see, there were more places where you could get?

coverage? Was it luck? Well, first off, it wasn't just me anymore. I had other people that were, we were doing it the quote or quote, right way that we have to do it. And this is the thing, if you're trying to make an argument around the

listener, right? Like, how did you build it? I would pause before saying that this is how you build it. Because that stuff worked and that stuff got us somewhere else, but it almost got us in the wrong place. It was a better place.

Yeah. Also, too, we owed, we were tremendously in debt after doing that, you know. We didn't get that space for free. We had to pay for that. We, you know, it was like, and we knew what we didn't want to have to do. Like, we didn't want to have to have an experience that was just overwhelmingly expensive for us to, you know, recoup from, and we didn't really sell anything, you know? Yeah. I mean, so that's the thing. So, okay, lesson one, should you start a company without any capital,

even enough to just pay your own rent? Right. You know, like the things we were doing in terms of communication with potential sponsors ended up becoming a revenue stream that let us do things at the absolute minimum of possibility. I mean, that's as much as I could say about it. It made it as impossible as it was for Telfar to do the, the collection before, it was a little less impossible, right? Because now we had at least these budgets for shows and I could hire a producer and we could

have, you know, it wasn't just our friends. Yeah, and people doing favors. And even then it still was favors. Yeah. But, you know, I would get this money from a museum. Yeah. This money from this brand. This money from that brand.

People said that we could pay later, you know. Like, at some point we were bringing in over a million dollars just from doing shows. So what you would consider. marketing is actually, it wasn't an expense, it was our income. Yeah. And then the press is able to see what it would be like if you were allowed to do something. This, from what I gather, this partnership with Kmart would lead to bold sort of a sponsorship and partnerships that you embarked on. The next one was with White Castle, the hamburger restaurant.

That's the first burger place that I ate when I came to America. Before I had McDonald's, I had White Castle because it was cheaper. Yeah, we reached out to White Castle. In fact, we called their 1-800 line. They had a 1-800 line. And you said what? Well, we were having a fashion show in New York City for a genderless line. But you just got some customer service rep on the other line.

Yeah. And so you called the 1-800 number and you told the service for the customer agent, like, hey, we want to, we're doing a fashion show, we're looking for sponsorship? Yes. And then the next call, well, we got a call from the vice president after that. From the vice president of like marketing or something? Yeah. And the vice president of White Castle is an unusual person, like a kind of patron saint of our.

This is Jamie Richardson. Exactly. Jamie Richardson. And after that point, he's pretty much the only person we talked to. I mean, he got very personally involved. I think, you know, we were writing, we had really good press kits where we would explain what this brand, what the proposition of this project is. And he responded to it. I'm just curious, you guys contact White Castle and say, hey, we're doing a fashion show.

We'd love for you to sponsor it. You were not at that point a hugely well-known brand. What was it that prompted Jamie Richardson, the vice. Vice President White Castle to call you back intrigued to talk more. Mind you, they funded the Harold and Kumar movie from the same 1-800 movie. Oh, they did? They funded that movie? They had never made a film before.

And the person that did it was Jamie. So we're dealing with an unusual. So Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, they had sponsored that film. Yeah. Okay. So they had already done some wild things. Yeah. Wild.

Yeah. He's a really cool person. You end up doing your spring summer 2016 collection. You end up doing that show sponsored by White Castle. And you had your after party, the fashion after party at White Castle in Times Square. Which was Jamie's idea, by the way. Jamie Richardson's idea. I was the one saying, do you have permits for this?

Completely. So you had like fashion models and, you know, just beautiful people at White Castle in Times Square? I mean, our entire cast and crew, we allowed the public that was just there to come in. Yeah. And it just ended up being like the best party. Like the workers there got the party with us. Jamie was doing the light show. By turning them off and on.

Yeah, the workers were all dancing behind the counter. Were you, did you have champagne inside the White Castle? Were you popping champagne course? It was champagne and orange soda at the soda fountain. So you could serve yourself your own drink. In the cups that they have. And just, and what goes better with a few glass of champagne than a few white castles cheeseburgers?

Yeah. Champagne and sliders. But I have to explain, like, that party, you know, that became like the kind of signature where it just felt like your TV was broken. You know, like it really felt like this, how does this happen? It didn't feel completely planned. You know what I mean? It's the type of thing that, like, this is where things kind of changed.

When we come back in just a moment, how the collaboration with White Castle and with Kmart led to two iconic new looks for Telfar, including one item that suddenly everyone seemed to want the Telfar bag. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This from NPR. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This. I'm Guy Raz. So it's 2017, and after collaborating on shows with Kmart and White Castle, Telfar is starting to get more attention in the fashion world.

And as a brand, it's still pretty small. But after that show at White Castle, something kind of unexpected happens. That led White Castle to then ask you to redesign their employee uniforms. Yes. So like kind of like after it, we did such a beautiful party. they were like, what do you think about making the uniform? And this was just for the employees. This was not going to be something.

I know a limited number were sold, but this was not made to be sold to the general public. Yeah, I think this was just for the employees at first. You can buy on the secondary market a Telfar White Castle hoodie for more than $100. What? More than $100? Yeah. Wow.

You hear that, Jamie? And, you know, so I would say the thing that people really heard about was that we designed the uniform. But what started to kind of form our approach to these collaborations is that we produced the uniform. That is the difference, you know. Why is that to explain that to me? Instead of somebody else producing them, you yourself finance the production of them? Well, think, you know, these things are usually for show. They're for press.

It's just you want a press release. that happened. Yeah. And then you get a little check and then you move on. And then you move on. The way that we approached it was, you know,

we were a brand. I think that that season, we maybe had $60,000 in orders, you know. So you were small. Oh my God. We were making like maybe 200 garments, right?

So with White Castle, we had the opportunity to make unisex clothes for a 20,000 unit order. In multiple sizes, men and women. So you went and found the factory to make them and to produce them.

We made it in our factory that made our collection in China. So we became a supplier to White Castle and they're renewing them every six months

and like that became a revenue stream not just a kind of press release. Right. Because normally what happened as a designer would just send the design

in and walk away and then they would handle it the customer would just they would get it made for them. But this way you not only had the design but you control the production.

Which in those days was, you know, That was a lifeline. Yeah. So one thing that we kind of, I think, alluded to, but it didn't really go into in depth was at your Kmart show in 2014, one of the things that you guys had on display were shopping bags. Yes. And you really just had them there. I think as part of the show, you hadn't started making them to sell them.

And I guess for a variety of reasons, including just the financing of it. But in 2017, you won a prestigious award for your work. This was the CFDA Vogue Fashion Fund. And that came with a $400,000 prize. And I guess you decided to use that money to finance what would become probably your most famous product today, the Telfar shopping bag. Tell me about the genesis of that product. Well, this idea totally came from like the holiday season. Like I was like walking in Soho and just seeing everybody consuming like their lives dependent on that.

So it's like men and women walking with like six shopping bags of all different sizes. I was like, wow, they look so beautiful. They look so rich. They look so wealthy. They look so like careless. And like just seeing this person smiling with a lot of bags and a big fur coat was like, you know, it's like, ooh, fab. You know, like, and I was like, wow, I wish people were carrying a shopping bag that have my name on it and what people had, like, these shopping bags. So, I was like, yeah, it's like the one bag that just everybody looks so good with.

A shopping bag, like the Bloomingdale shopping bag. Specifically, the Bloomingdale's one. Okay. Because they had a big brown bag, little brown bag. So they had all these sizes of bags. And everybody looks good to carry. Even like a man that's carrying his wife's bag looks so good. A baby looks so good.

carrying that bag. And for people who don't know what this bag looks like, obviously you can Google it, but it's a very simple bag. It's a very simple, functional handbag with two straps, a small strap to carry it by it with your hands, and then a larger strap if you want to put it over your shoulder, and it has your logo embossed in the center of it. It's a fair description?

Yep. Absolutely. Yeah. And these were made out of leather initially, right? No. Vegan leather. They were always made out of, A vegan leather or polyurethage.

Okay. And when you relaunched this or really launched this in a big way, they sold out. It was like a... And by the way, they weren't crazy expensive, right? I mean, I think they ranged from $140 to $240, something like that. That was a big part of it is that Telfar wanted to base the price on how much you would make in a night DJ. Right. And that absolutely didn't square up with how much it cost to make back.

Like at all, but it's like the price of the bag was part of the concept and design of the bag, even though we weren't making money on that. And you had them manufactured in China? Mm-hmm. All right. I think it's fair to say the bag really was kind of like a stratospheric leap for your brand. I know you were selling them in small quantities for a few years, but you really launched it in a much bigger way in 2018. Is it fair to say that that year was sort of a turning point in your public profile of the brand that Telfar really became a much, much bigger brand around 2018 through the relaunch of the bag? A much more accessible brand, yeah.

I mean, it's, I don't, it didn't feel like that's how it happened. Okay. Right. Because it took time. Like, you know, it doesn't fly off the shelves. We're still only making, like, a few thousand dollars a month. through 2018 and into 2019. So do you know what I mean?

What was the turning point? What was the thing? I mean, obviously, we, not obviously, I should say, Oprah eventually named it as one of her favorite things. But that wasn't until 2020. But what was the thing that made this bag become such a huge, like, you know, Beyonce, you know, Alexandra, Cascio-Cortez and all these amazingly famous people. who had this bag and talking about it? What was it? Do you even know? I think a lot of people is a viral motion to how the bag grew

because people took a picture with it online and that met a thing to them and the people that carry it and the people that see each other carrying it. Or there will be completely different people that have nothing to do of each other carrying a bag and they look at each other and they're like, oh, wow, everybody has it. It's this kind of conversation. it wasn't an overnight like, oh, everything's sold out.

It's like, bags were around. We gave bags two people, you know? Like, and that was the thing, too, the power of gifting. It's like, if it means something to you, you give it to that person. You know what I mean? And we gifted a lot of things to our friends that they just actually became a staple. They're like, I want a black one now after you gave me this brown one, you know, or someone gave them their first half our bag.

They didn't buy it. But it's the exact moments when we were getting the most recognition. is when it felt like the environment was like more hostile. Now we were like, our success just meant that we were exploitable, right? And we were navigating that world. You know, if we want to tell the story about the bag, it's all wrapped up in these types of things. And there is a very specific kind of like narrative to that.

But tell me the narrative. What is that narrative? I'll say this, that we won the CFD. Fashion Fund a year to the day that Donald Trump was elected president. There was a need for a certain type of performance of, you know, inclusivity. And so there had to be the production of platforms and opportunities to get the right people to say the things that needed to be said for people to feel like progressive. You know, maybe they feel like they're part of some kind of resistance

or that there is at least dignity to being at this place. But in any case, you know, it had a considerable effect on what you ended up seeing. If you look at a magazine before 2016, it's very easy to see an all-white issue of any fashion magazine. Yeah. That wasn't even a question. No one was there to question it. So just to clarify, it sounds like what you're saying is there was a very much a sort of a performative kind of aspect to

trying to increase racial awareness and to examine the absence of diversity in mainstream institutions and as a result of that so this is one factor that's at play

right? And when you really look at the term inclusion it means that ownership doesn't change. Now you're just being allowed in included in it. Right. Gotcha. Right. So that was the context of what was happening when you won the award. Yeah. Yeah. And previous to that, the context was like, it was like hostile. You know what I mean? It was hostile on kind of every level. It was really, really difficult to do things. People didn't really want to work with you. The opportunities

weren't really there. And then when things kind of changed over, it was kind of the same thing, but in a different way. Like now you were exploitable. So someone would want to sign a contract with you where it's a 90-10 split, you know. And that's supposed to be success, right? So then you're in a position where you're no longer trying to explain yourself. You're trying to say, how do I get, how do I stop talking to these people at all? And how do I talk to a different group of people? Like, is it possible to not go through these gates at all? So there were all of these, I mean, these things that were happening and sort of explained from your perspective. perspective, how you responded to that or maybe didn't respond to that with what you were doing.

We had to look at what we have that other people don't have. And part of that was just like the ability to take risks. So like, you know, in January 2019, we wanted to kind of make our business practices reflect the creative practices that we've been developing. And in order to do that, We wanted to, and at that time, you know, our wholesale accounts were doubling every season. And that was your primary distribution channel. You were doing wholesale, sales, and then retailers would sell your stuff. Absolutely.

Okay. But we made the decision January 2019 that by January 2020, we would be completely out, which was a very difficult thing to do. Out of the wholesale business, you would be directly selling to your customers. Yes. So you wouldn't be in stores anymore. You would not be in, right. Okay. So we did that on a principle, but the way that that set of decisions lined up with COVID,

it was exactly at the same time. Because with COVID, because you decided to go direct to consumer, you actually didn't have to rely on these stores that were essentially shut. Yeah. It's as if we'd prepared for it. And not only that, other brands had already invested millions into their next collection, and we had already not been doing it. Wow.

And just, I think just before the pandemic, like 2019 into 2020, you guys were doing pretty well. I think you hit about $2 million in sales. And then something happened that got a lot of attention in the fashion world because you had entered into a relationship with the gap. You were talking with them about like creating a line for them. And I think you got to the point where you both, you signed the agreement and the gap, the gap, Door in Paris even showed photos of a Telfar show and they plastered the windows with them. And the head of Gap was like, oh, he was talking about Telfar and this is the future and blah, blah, blah. And then I think you had delivered like 30 designs to Gap by the time the pandemic had hit and many retailers that shut their stores.

Is that more or less true? We did the collection, yeah. All right. And you weren't hearing back from Gap. and because you had this collaboration, this design collaboration, and you didn't hear back from them. And the person that you'd done the deal with was fired or was, I don't know, what was let go. And so you had to be paid. So you sent them an invoice.

And they. Well, there wasn't a reply. There wasn't even a reply. Yeah. No reply. It was in the middle of, I mean, everybody was shut down, right? Yeah. Yeah, and also, too, the team that we were working with was completely dismissed as that happened.

So everybody that we were writing, we didn't have a point of contact. I think someone from Gap actually wrote us to tell us, like, a little bit later that they had been let go if we needed any help getting in contact with someone. They could put us in the direction. So no, right, no contact from Gap and GD be paid. Well, yeah. But this is like the month of March, like New York has shut down. 2020, yeah. This is when it was really crazy.

China is shut down, so we have nothing to sell. And then we're not getting paid this thing, and it doesn't seem like it's going to happen. You know, it was like a really scary moment for us. But that is the exact moment. It was the end of March where finally China opened up. We got a shipment of bags. We post a bag drop in the middle of this crazy. A bag drop, meaning that they're available on the website.

Yeah. Right. Okay. And those bag drops would usually last, we'd put them up. I mean, they weren't really drops. Like, they would last for like a month, you know? But in the middle of lockdown, we're all holding our breath after this drop. And they sold out in seconds.

Were you just like totally stunned? We were like, what's going on? We were stunned. It's bananas. So in March of 2020, you what, like on your social media account, you just said, hey, we have a bag drop. Yeah. Like they're available. And then somebody, I don't know, like you look at your website and you're like, we're sold out.

They're gone. Like a few hours later? No, they're gone in like seconds. In like seconds. Seconds. I think it was like one minute. And how many bags were available? I don't know at that time.

Thousands? Hundreds? Well, it might have been like 1,000 or something. Yeah. And then, so then we started air shipping the bags because we couldn't wait for the boat. And then that one would sell out. And the next, and it just kind of continued like that for a few. few months.

All through the pandemic. So, you know, the context of us getting the bad news, we were kind of okay. Because the bags were selling. So meantime, you're selling bags. You're not hearing anything back from Gap, which you had a design deal with. And then I don't remember exactly when, but in 2020 in the middle of the year, I think, they announced a collaboration with Kanye West. Did that take you by surprise?

Literally, like, when the world found out, we found out. And then people were on our timeline being like, wait, what happened to the Telfar one? Twitter just went. They went bananas because they were like, wait a minute, what's going on with Telfar collaboration? Yeah, the TC people got to the bottom of it. Your stands on Twitter. But at the same time, we hated that because they made it about competition. It's not...

Really vicious and just like completely... Like the Yeezy versus Tel-Far kind of thing, which is not what you wanted. Completely and completely couldn't be a more opposite. But in the meantime, you hadn't been paid. Gap didn't pay you. Yeah. So from my research that the Tel-Far fans online, when they found out that you had not been paid by Gap, they mounted a social media campaign and Gap did actually pay you for your work.

Yeah, we were paid. And did you just leave that relationship like, okay, whatever, that's fine, no hard feelings? Yeah. Yeah, we were not stressed about it, to be honest. I thought that that was a bigger lose for them. And also, too, just seeing how things unfolded, I wanted nothing to do with that situation. But I was happy. That's what Kanye's gig.

It was like, for me, once I saw how they operated within that, I'm really glad things just turned not the way how they did. It's the best possible case scenario. Did that change the way you think about working with a big brand? Yeah, completely. It taught us so much. We also no longer needed to, right? The whole reason why we collaborate changed because of our material position. Like, we're not looking for that check, actually. We're looking to develop a product that somebody is better at making or that would take us two years to do. So when, so essentially it was like a blessing in disguise.

Yeah. I mean, like everything I think that has happened to us has been that case, you know? I mean, because 2020 was a catastrophe for the fashion industry, but, and I'm sure this is not easy or fun for you to say, but it was a record year for Telfar for your brand. Yeah. And I'm proud of that. Yeah. And I'm proud that we exited the fashion industry.

That's why. You exited the fashion industry. That is how you. It's not the fashion system, system, I would say. That was our plan. Right. It was like, we need to get out of here. It's just like, this is not safe.

Yeah, it's not safe. It's just also not in your best interests. My interests are to make really cool things, get them to people that want them, and continue to do this throughout my life and continue to make my own money. Yeah. And not give my money to someone else that didn't help me do this. So instead of being in a system that where you are. totally at the mercy of distributors and retailers and the fashion press, et cetera,

you said, forget about all that. Let's not even be involved. Let's not engage with that. Let's just do our own thing. We will make the bricks. We will build the building. We will own the land. We will sell the products.

And also take our time to do it because the fashion industry imposes this really strange time where you're supposed to be successful when no one, you know, it's just like no one's even see this thing. Overproducing by design, right? Two collections, like, you know, 400 items every six months. Right. Right. And wasteful. Absolutely wasteful. And you end up, when you have to make like that, that's why you're selling a pair of jeans for $1,000 is because you didn't figure out the supply chain at all for that, right? It takes a year to figure that out. One of the really interesting things that you did was, and I don't mean this in a pejorative way, so I hope it doesn't come out that way, but you kind of used the sort of the machinery of the fashion industry to build yourself up to a certain level. And once you were able to make the choice to completely reject it and move away and start your own thing, and that may have been that $400,000 grant in 2017, that kind of helped you to jumpstart it, you were able to do it, right? Because you kind of got to the point as far as you could get with the fashion industry.

And you knew that in order to grow and to thrive, you had to leave it. Is that a fair interpretation? Yeah, that's fair. Absolutely. That was the approach is how do we get out of this? Telfare, I'm curious. I mean, you came to New York, is a 17-year-old. selling t-shirts that you recreated on Mulberry Street, right?

And your handbags are worn by some of the most famous people on the planet, some of the most influential tastemakers. When you see them holding your bag with your logo on it, I don't know. Do you think, my God, that's just, that's wild? It makes me smile. It makes me smile. I'm really, really, really, really happy. about that part of it, you know, because that's how I meant it to be.

That's, in my view, that's what I think is successful. Like, when I turn my head three times when I leave my house and I see one each time I turn my head into a different person, that's like, oh, yeah, cool. I'm smiling constantly, you know, because it's literally like a reminder that I did something in culture. That is fab. It's like you literally did that. You changed how someone dressed, and that's the only thing that I wanted to do.

I mean, we appreciate, you know, the well-known people who buy the bag. But that wasn't our trajectory. Like, they bought the bag afterwards, which is great. But we always joke like they saw their assistant had it, you know. It's like, damn, my assistant looks good. That's that bag that they have. It's like, you know, like, it's like, uh. But let's talk about what you want to be in 10 years from now.

Because what do you think this brand will be? It will be handbags. There will be clothing that people will. What else? I mean, tell me, what's your vision? I definitely do, I already do have a 360 brand. I want it to be accessible. Like you can go to a store and get the things that you want to get, you know.

And it's going to be a Telfar store. A Telfar store. And what's going to be in that store? Definitely clothes. Definitely accessories. And definitely in experience. Like candles, home, like housewear, things like that. Candles, pianos.

Pianas. Backbombs. I mean, it's interesting because in fashion, there are very few intergenerational iconic brands. Like, I think of Converse is an example, Converse High Tops, or Wayfair sunglasses. But it's very hard to produce an intergenerational brand in fashion. And necessary. Like, that's what we love to see, you know, when it's like three generations in the same day. Of someone.

Yeah, yeah. It's like your grandma has the bag and then your brother and then your mom. You know, it's like intergenerational, multi-gendered, like multi-race, different economic statuses. It's like love it so much. When you think about this journey because it's been a long time, I mean, you started this brand in 2005 Telfar and have, you know, for most of it, most of its time until very recently, we're working. Without massive recognition, without, you know, the kind of awareness that you have now, how much of that do you think has to do with just how hard you worked and how much you put into it and how much do you think has to do with luck? I worked hard, you know. I've had to do some shit that other people would not, could not, should not. Should not. Should not, you know. It's like you don't need to ride bikes in the way.

winter with your collection on your bike in the snow to get it home. You know, like, it's like people wouldn't do certain things that I did to do this. I did it and I'm proud of what I've done, you know, but I wouldn't, I got what I got out of it. Definitely hard work pays off, but I wouldn't be like, oh yeah, you need to do that to be successful. It's like, there's lots of people that are successful doing not that. Don't let this be a lesson. Yeah, it's just what I had to do. How about you, Bobbick?

The work versus luck? it wasn't work or luck because there's a lot of ways in which it was very specifically what we did and what we worked on that made it successful and that those decisions seem to fly in the face of the pursuit of success and it's not going to work for everybody right but if we're talking specifically to somebody like us then I would say that you can't be in a position where you're binding your success or your survival to your exploitation. And that's the position that we're put in in the creative industries in general. Like we need the platform, we need the budget, we need the distribution. And in order to change that situation, you literally have to change a situation.

You have to change your environment, not just adapt to it all the time. And you need community to do that. You need to do it with other people. What is the thing that most excites you about where your business is headed? The freedom of us being in charge of that. Yeah. And not being owned by anyone else that's going to impose anything that we don't want to do on us. I mean, definitely that is the actual process of it, that it's enjoyable to do this now.

And it doesn't feel like work or translation or gymnastics. Or you're going to get in trouble if you don't do this thing for someone else. And, you know, we're trying to create a place where we can share this relationship that we have with our community, I guess is the word for it, or conspiracy, with other people. You know, we love to have a record label. Yeah. I mean, there's so many things that we want to do within, like, just like our general relationships with our friends and collaborators that actually are benefiting them. And they're getting their work heard and seen without. censorship or, you know, like, anyone telling them, you know, they need to do something in order to do that.

Yeah, the process. You know, we actually are doing what we want to do. And I feel like that that is the message. That's what people are responding to. The underlying reality of the thing. Yeah. Not just the image. That's Babak Radboy, creative director of Telfar, along with the brand's founder, Telfar Clemens.

And by the way, for one. last year's Summer Olympics, Telfar sponsored the Liberian Olympic team and design the uniforms, which you can see on the Telfer website. Hey, thanks so much for listening to the show this week. Please do follow us on your podcast app, so you always have the latest episode downloaded. If you want to contact us, our email address is H-I-B-T at npr.org. If you want to follow us on Twitter, our account is at How I Built This, and mine is at Guy Raz. And on Instagram, we're at How I Built This NPR, and mine is at guy.org. This episode was produced by J.C. Howard with music composed by Rumtin Arablui. It was edited by Neva Grant with research help from Farah Safari. Our audio engineer was Stu Rushfield.

Our production staff includes Casey Herman, Julia Carney, Elaine Coates, Liz Metzger, Carrie Thompson, and Alex Chun. Our intern is Margaret Serino. Jeff Rogers is our executive producer. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to how I built this. This is NPR.