With tailored clothing, you can really see where the money went. How it's constructed, how it fits your body - this becomes very apparent in tailored clothing.
Michael Bastian
I'm a big believer in small, dark, cozy bedrooms. I would describe myself as introspective - I feel things first, and then I think them through - and I need the enveloping comfort of a little squirrel's nest when I have to retreat from the world to recharge.
When you think mid-seventies, you think of Studio 54, but there was a whole other thing going on. Where I was, it was more deep-woods preppy. Real-guy preppy.
Everyone looks better and more alive in a pink shirt.
I seem to go through phases with collecting stuff: vintage Japanese men's magazines, coconut monkey carvings, '70s belt buckles.
Most guys open their closet and tend to wear about 10% of what they own - and they wear that 10% over and over again. So the trick is to be honest with yourself and figure out what that 10% is.
I'd like to think my brand shares some of those characteristics we like to think of as classically American - a certain straightforwardness, honesty, a sense of humor, inclusiveness, practicality - all those great Yankee traits. And I don't mean the baseball team.
Boston's such a unique city. I feel like 50 percent of its DNA turns over every semester.
I kind of have a uniform for office parties and Christmas parties. What I do is put on a basic tuxedo shirt with a solid navy or black tie, a tweed jacket, a red pocket square, and some sort of fancy shoe or velvet slipper.
If everything is a little baggy, then everything will look sloppy when you layer one piece on top of another. Your sport coat should easily fit over a shirt and a fine-gauge sweater.
Designer pricing should hurt, but it shouldn't kill you. You wince when you hand over your AmEx, but once you get it home, you never regret it. You divide it by how many days you're using it, and suddenly it becomes affordable.
I think women are much more open to new ideas but approach a line more from a more personal and skeptical place - you need to seduce them into your clothes, whereas most men just like to be told what they should be wearing. Women are a bit like cats and men like dogs in that respect when it comes to clothes.
The minute you see a guy doing one of those Naomi Campbell catwalk-action kind of things, it falls apart. A lot of hips and the scissor walk? No! Men always need to be men.
You get to a certain age, and you learn what looks good on you.
Celebrities, the beach, and Coachella, that's what everyone thinks about when they think of Los Angeles. Then you see these people living in Bel-Air and Beverly Hills, and they're so chic and have so much style.
My favorite animal on the Galapagos is the Galapagos Marine Iguana. The first rule of iguana-dom is that iguanas hate the water, yet somehow, these poor iguanas landed there and had to figure it out.
I once had this idea that I wanted to make the perfect boxer short that's not too long, not too short, with pearl buttons, made from real shirting fabric. They were coming in at $215. Well, not even the richest guy in the world is going to pay more than $125 for his underwear.
You can have a real ongoing dialogue through social media that wasn't possible before.
When you buy a new suit, take the time to get it tailored, and you'll thank yourself every time you put it on.
Preppy never goes away. It just has its moment every 15 years, and then it goes back underground.
One of the weird things about being a designer is guessing what the world will want about a year in advance of when they will want it. It becomes almost a psychological test in a way - how do I feel now and how do I want to feel then.
Women are more open to trying on a new personality every season; they can go from goth to bombshell to librarian, whatever.
Swedish winters are not for the faint of heart.
I personally would rather layer up than put on a big, heavy coat.
A shirt's not just a shirt. It's the experience of what goes into that shirt.
My big mission in life is to get guys out of those big, baggy board shorts down to their knees. It always looks like they're trying to hide something, like skinny legs.
What I know of Hawaii is from watching the 'Brady Bunch' shows from the seventies.
I never doubted my place in the world.
Even if it's a polo shirt and chinos, they should be the best possible quality and fit perfectly.
As a group, the fashion industry has been one of the strongest in the effort to fight HIV and AIDS. There are many groups dedicated to fighting this disease; GMHC's Fashion Forward is just one of them. But I think everyone in this industry fights it in their own way.
I'm a New Yorker, so I don't own a car, but I rent a lot of cars.
It's easy to get wrapped up in the season-to-season business, but to have real longevity in this field, you've got to always maintain your point of view and what makes your brand unique. Your business is always going to have ups and downs, but there needs to be a certain consistency.
People talk to me about celebrities all the time and which ones do I admire, and it's so hard because you can't tell who's doing it for themselves and who hired a stylist.
I've always had this idea that I would love to do a Boston-inspired collection, whether it's for my own line or whether it's for Gant.
I've always had this thing for swimming pools - I think they're much sexier and far more glamorous than the beach, in a way. You dress differently when you're spending a day at an amazing pool than you would dress for the beach.
I stay in a lot of hotels, and the best part of travel is getting back to my own bed.
The beauty of men's shoppers is that they're super loyal.
At a certain point, this is a brand. It's got to be bigger than me as one little person. We have a lane - and it's a good lane - and want to drive faster down that lane.
A cheap suit is a cheap suit; there's nothing you can do about it.
The easiest thing is to create something no one has ever seen before. There's a reason no one's ever seen it - because someone tried it, and it didn't work in the real world.
Michael Bastian is a designer line and priced a certain way because of where it's made and the materials we use, and Gant is the more accessible version of that: more sports-inspired, more branding. It has the same DNA; it's just a different time and place.
Good clothes are good clothes, and they don't need whales and tricks and too many jokes. Sometimes you just need something to wear.
I'm a designer with a little 'd' as opposed to a big 'd.' It's a job; I'm more about contributing to a man's wardrobe, offering the things that I look for myself.
I think the secret of my brand is that I speak to the guys who just get it. They don't want something all logo'd and tricked out. But they go to the gym. They still go out; they want to look hot. And they want an upgrade, but they don't want to look like their dad.
Flip-flops are a privilege, not a right.
I feel like everyone should buy less but buy better.
There's nothin' wrong with the way men dress in New York!
My goal is to elevate the whole casual end of the guy's wardrobe.
I still don't think I'm a fashion guy. I think I'm a clothes guy. I'm a little obsessive.
You don't want to have a boring runway presentation, but you don't want to show stuff nobody is going to wear.
