Growing up in Cyprus, Vasilis Loizides loved history and collecting “beautiful little chachkis." Later, he surprised himself by moving to New York and attending Parson’s, only two months after applying. After cutting his teeth as a designer at Marc Jacobs and Nicopanda, Vasilis launched his own brand fueled by his appreciation of Greek-Cypriot culture, and the love he holds for the New York City queer community. Vasilis sat down with i-D a week before his fall/winter 19 presentation to talk ancient artifacts, commercial viability, and the afterlife.
It’s the Tuesday night before the presentation. Run me through your day.
I’ve been working really hard this past week on finalizing the garments for next season. Since it’s the week before the show, everything is really intense. Tomorrow, I have casting. Today, I participated in a Fashion Week podcast. I have hair and makeup tests and fittings. Every single day has things that I have to accomplish on deadlines - all these other things you wouldn’t even imagine, like making the credit list for the show, and your guest list. I’m kind of chaotic but I think I’m coping okay with it [laughs].
What’s the concept for this upcoming season?
Kind of creating this allegory of a circus, but it actually serves as a symbolism of society, and how things are. It’s experimenting with the concept of performance and the relationship between the performer, the viewer, and the trainer, and how these roles interact with each other in society. It’s taking that and creating this fairytale of a retro circus, and playing with all of these roles together, and who holds agency over each other, or power - the power dynamics between all these figures.
Your casting is tomorrow. What are you looking for in your models?
There’s definitely a look that I’m usually going for. I really like to use people that haven’t been seen before, or haven’t been in other things so much. I would say the look is not so much a next-door kind of face, but more like a cinematic face - if you think of people that Wes Anderson would use or Pedro Almodóvar. These interesting faces that, with themselves, can tell a story and can really pull off the clothes. The clothes are very editorial, so that it makes sense for these kind of figures to be wearing them, so that they almost own the clothes, which I find beautiful. Of course, always, for the brand, queer visibility is very important for us. And diversity, obviously, which I think is a term that is used a lot nowadays. We try to really actually be honest and include a lot of people and convey a lot of stories that haven’t really been seen or heard through our casting.
Especially considering that your last collection was based off the inspiration from your home country Cyprus, a part of the world which is a meeting of continents.
Yes, that’s so true. It’s in the middle of three continents, which is why it’s always been invaded throughout history [laughs].
Is every collection inspired specifically by Cyprus in some way?
In general, as a designer - and an artist by extension - my living in Cyprus for so many years really influenced my references and, my - if you want to say - design vocabulary. But every season I pursue a different fairytale. The first season was a retro horror movie, the second season was a Floridian-environment crime noir story, and then the third season was about Cyprus. I wanted to do it because I really miss home and I love where I’m coming from. I guess because I was born and raised in Cyprus, my work must reflect that, even subconsciously. But not every collection is necessarily addressing Cyprus, or inspired by Cyprus.
Read the rest of the interview here
