Horror Vacuo Curates Fashion’s Most Cerebral Designs

Until my young adulthood, I thought that fashion was kind of superficial. I didn't really pay much attention to it and I saw it more as a commercial scheme. My parents sent me to Payless Shoes; I didn’t even know what Air Force 1s were. I started getting into shoes around the time I started skating. I’m 29, so Abercrombie & Fitch was big, and I didn’t really know about designers—except for Rick Owens, because I was an edgy, dark kid. I was like, These clothes are sick. 

I come from tech, which helps explain my very weird, prosaic view of fashion. I used to work for a credit card processing company and we would buy old processing machines for our R&D [on an online marketplace] and my friend and I wrote a bot to buy stuff. I wanted nice things, but didn’t have a ton of money at the time, so I used the bot to buy clothes. I realized I could sell them for, like, 15-20% profit margin. I’d buy Junya flannels or I’d get Rick tees—I’d find them for $60 or $80! 

Around this time, I started to dive into the brands and learn about their history. That’s when I started to really appreciate what they were offering. The one that really sticks out to me is Margiela. Then my worldview totally changed from a very money-driven point-of-view. It’s not like that now. Now, I buy things because I like them, and the money comes second. 

Everything I read about him was so amazing. It was conceptual, based on deconstruction, but he didn’t call himself a deconstructionist. And when he deconstructed something, it was really a commentary on clothing itself. He would break things down to their essence. He was anonymous and he refers to the brand as “we” as opposed to “I,” focusing on the collaborative aspect. And he’s inspired a lot of designers, like Raf. 

When I opened an Instagram shop, I noticed that other people would show an item with no information about it. Some of these items need a placard to explain their historical or aesthetic significance. So I started writing these long… almost dissertations on an item and the collection. Everyone does this now, but at the time, it was a way for me to market an item, but also it would force me to do research on a designer and find runway pictures. That’s how I accumulated a following. Because people could see the item and why it’s important and what it meant. Like, why is one sweater that’s beat up and has one graphic on it $800? 

There [was already an established community] of people online who are, basically, nerds and into archive fashion. They're very online and very knowledgeable. But a lot of designers, collections and their meanings are so obscure, and so hard to find. The stuff that I write is through me buying a book or scanning a stupid-expensive book. There’s a lot of gatekeeping online, but that community existed already. What I think happened [with Horror Vacuo] was that I was able to cultivate some kind of interest among young people and people that wouldn't be into that thing to begin with. 

I try to curate things that nobody else has, or try to curate things that are at the forefront of something new. But that can be very difficult. So another portion of my collection focuses on items that can sell, pieces that you're probably familiar with. So for [this Fall Exhibit] collection, I have Rick Owens’s Aircuts pants, which are a very popular piece. But I also have weird stuff like a Margiela wooden wallet that I’m pretty sure no one has seen when it was released in 2011. I like having those extremes. 

A lot of my clients are in the entertainment industry—more specifically, rappers. I deal with their stylists or deal with them on a personal level. Like for Travis [Scott], I deal with his stylist, I’ve never talked to him. But with Lil Yachty and Goldlink, I’ve worked directly with them. They’re more interested in developing their style, and I can almost act as a personal shopper for them. They’re not just interested in what a piece looks like, but also its historical value. I think it helps them feel like they’re a part of its history. I was surprised because when I first opened the store, I thought it was just for nerds like me, who are interested in this stuff. I didn’t think rappers would come in. 

Oh yeah, there's definitely some top brands—that I can't name—who come by for inspiration. If I told you, I’d be giving away certain future collabs. 

From my time doing this, I’ve learned that Margiela has always kept its value. Forever. It's steady like a rock. Margiela has always been sought out, even now. It’s hard to find cool pieces, especially from before [Martin Margiela] left the house, because people keep them. I hate to say the word investment, but it is a safe investment. Rick Owens had a huge popularity surge this year and last, but that may be waning now because it’s a little oversaturated. Then there are these small Japanese brands that are starting to get bigger, like Beauty: Beast and 20471120. Helmut is pretty cheap right now, that’s something that people could invest in. 

But for the most part, you should be investing in what you like. When I go to people’s houses [to do buys], it’ll be some guy like, ‘Yeah, I saw this Raf jacket at a store in Antwerp and I bought it and now it’s worth $20,000!’ Generally they like the thing they bought. People who follow their heart and buy things that are unique to an era, things that are outlandish or a little different, they’re usually rewarded in the long run.

Well, as I said, Margiela—pretty much anything from 1999 to 2009. There’s a lot of Raf that I really enjoy—this may sound cliché, but SS04 and AW02, the Virginia Creeper and May the Circle Be Unbroken collections. During his heyday, in 2001 to 2006, 2007, every single collection was wildly different from one another and he really captured that youth, iconoclasm, and that angsty nature of rebellion and post-punk era. It not only resonated with me aesthetically, but also because I like the music. 

Another one that people may not be familiar with is Hussein Chalayan, who was known for his women’s collections in the ‘90s, but he has some really cool menswear. He's a little pretentious, because his labels have this weird, esoteric, verbose explanation—something a weird professor would say, like some weird postmodern philosophy.

Kiko Kostadinov is pretty big for me. Craig Green fell off a little bit, but I think a lot of his older pieces are still worth checking after. Outside of that, it's really, really difficult to say. Maybe Rick Owens; the pieces he’s putting on the runway are amazing, every season. 

There are a lot of factors that go into this—stuff that I think about before I go to sleep [laughs]. A lot of things came into play and the stars aligned. First off, there’s an overall cultural shift in regards to men’s dress as a byproduct of modern social reform, like the milestones made by the LGBTQI+ movement which paved way for more men to feel comfortable in dressing expressively. The second is about the ecological impacts of clothing—buying used clothing has a net positive ecological impact. We have so many clothes today that sometimes affluent people would rather buy something that not only has a smaller environmental footprint but will increase in value over time. The third, I think, is that the resale culture, especially from brands like Supreme, leaked into the archive market. With these factors combined, the vintage market has become a cyclical, self-perpetuating movement. 

I really liked this concept of horror vacui, which, in Latin, means “Fear the void,” but that domain name wasn’t available so I changed it to Horror Vacuo. 

We have these Helmut Lang pants from FW99 that I’ve never seen before in leather, and none of my friends have either. There are some Raf pieces—the one I’m excited about is the ‘Closer’ hoodie. He was able to go to [legendary graphic designer] Peter Saville’s archive and use graphics from New Order and Joy Division. There’s a Vivienne Westwood suit which is really cool. Remember when TVs, a long time ago, if they didn’t have a channel, they’d have this pattern? Red, blue, yellow… the suit has that colorway. I’m excited about the Yohji pieces, from [collection] 6.1, the only one he did with Comme des Garcons. It’s an orange leather jacket, an iconic piece.