AIREI FW22 collection, interview with designer Drew Curry

Almost every day, you can encounter Drew Curry working at Dover Street Market LA, where his burgeoning brand AIREI shares shelves with thoughtful designers like John Alexander Skelton, Elena Dawsonand Evan Kinori. Hard to believe that about two years ago he didn’t think anyone would ever store his clothes.

“I designed my first collection during the pandemic and had no idea I would be stocked or even branded,” Curry said. “Now I’m definitely in the middle of those two lives that I’ve lived. The first life is working somewhere and being like, ‘I want my thing to happen, nothing happens,’ and then ‘ Oh shoot, there’s something going on. I really feel like I’m living in a dream state right now.”

It’s the start of a life-affirming journey that Curry has already come a long way to begin.

“It took 10 years – and I’m happy about that – for what’s happening right now. I would have waited another 10 years,” he continued.

AIREI is just getting started, but the Curry brand is already available in almost every outpost of the Dover Street World Market and will soon be stocked at taste retailers like H.LORENZO and SSENSE. His first offer was carried by household names like Bad Bunny, Kendrick Lamar, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and SZA.

Big changes for someone who never planned to get into the fashion world.

“I grew up in Tacoma, Washington in a blue-collar family,” Curry said. “But I’ve always been creative and wanted to do things.”

After dropping plans to go to architecture school (“too much math”), Curry began to tap into his fascination with fashion, channeling inspiration from Pharrell and Ye into a new love for giant polo shirts and pink Ice Cream sneakers.

After school, Curry moved to Los Angeles, developing her own brand while working with denim-focused labels like John Elliott and Joe’s Jeans and LA staples like James Perse and Tom Ford.

“I thought, ‘I can be a designer,'” Curry recalled. “Even though I was working for someone else. But things weren’t going well commercially and Dover Street Market LA had just opened.”

“I was a fan of Rei Kawakubo and COMME des GARÇONS so I was like, ‘If I’m going to work in retail, I’m going to Dover Street Market.’ I had no idea how much of an impact an experiment would have. At Dover Street Market, I realized you can sell something really weird for $4,000, and there’s a customer for it. And not only there’s a client for that, but they’re coming for that specific piece.”

It shook the foundation of everything Curry knew about clothing.

“The first brand I worked on, I had pure intentions but I really wanted to do something for other people and I wanted to do a business,” he said. “I wanted to create something that people liked and I think nobody liked it because it was too broad. It was too much of what people had already seen.”

AIREI is a world apart from the T-shirts that Curry designed and sold to stores like KITH and Harvey Nichols, which apparently becomes when you just look at his meticulous work.

This distinction was also clear to Adrian Joffe, the chairman of COMME des GARÇONS and Dover Street who stumbled across AIREI in the makeshift Paris Fashion Week showroom that Curry designed in an Airbnb.

Before Joffe even knew Curry was working at a DSM store, he offered to support AIREI through Dover Street Market Paris, the company’s confusingly named incubator arm (not to be confused with Dover Street Small Marketthe Paris store that sells brands managed by DSM or 3537).

Although Curry doesn’t earn enough from the partnership to afford anything (he still works at DSM LA, after all), it’s a pleasure to have the support of one of his heroes. And it’s easy to see what drew Joffe to AIREI: garments assiduously regarded as made to exquisite standards against the grit of the fashion industry.

“I’ve always loved the human touch and really felt it was lacking in contemporary fashion,” Curry said. “Everything felt machine-made in this era of ultimate connectivity and iPhones; clothes should tell a story. For example, when I was experimenting with things, I found that the most exciting things I did contained Drew. I was like, ‘Oh, interesting. If I do it like that, I can’t replicate it. But that’s cool.'”

“The first collection was born from my study of cotton, the plant itself and the reflection: ‘what does it mean to be fashionable with the history of cotton and workwear? ‘ Thinking of the migrant or prison workers who have picked cotton in the United States for a long history, but also workwear and workwear designed to last for hundreds of years.”

“I wanted to do something that felt really flimsy, more fleeting. Like, it’s a chore coat but that chore coat is going to crumble in your hands.”

There aren’t many other young brands that create their clothes with ethical craftsmanship while struggling with institutional racism rooted in the cotton industry but, again, AIREI is unique.

“It’s all made in LA, which I’m really proud of,” Curry continued. “I have this chip on my shoulder about how I really want to do something that’s my own version of high fashion; I want to do something that comes from LA that makes you think differently about what’s going on here. “

For AIREI’s first collection, Curry came up with a new solution to combat cotton’s stained heritage: he would replace fabric entirely with indian khadi.

The textile reminds Curry of the impact India had on him after a visit as a teenager. He eventually spent two months living there after college to better appreciate the culture. It was then that Curry began to really appreciate khadi.

“Khadi cloth rose to prominence when Gandhi encouraged people to make their own clothes in a peaceful protest against British colonialism,” Curry said. “It’s woven by hand, so there’s no electricity, no gas, anything. They literally have to push the loom back and forth and move the shuttle with their hand. And that adds to that imperfection, which I think makes it perfect, in a way.”

“Khadi is still AIREI’s staple. I even use it as a pocket fabric – usually pocket bags are made with, like, two dollar a yard poplin. But we use hand woven khadi. hand. We even use it for the hang tag.”

“So I’m looking for the best possible fabric in the world but I still want to make clothes here in LA and I want to know the artisans who can do the hand sewing. And the person who finished each piece signs it, like a work of art. There are no shortcuts. Even though it’s raw and I purposely show you some imperfections, I strive for perfection when it comes to lines and stitching.

These “imperfections”, the raw hems, dangling seams and blindstitching, are that human touch that Curry refers to. They are an essential part of AIREI’s work as they remind the wearer that a human being produced every element of the garment they wear.

Each piece of AIREI clothing is unique, even those that adopt the same silhouette: it’s just the nature of clothing that is woven and sewn by hand. A reflection of the impermanence of clothing, of industry, of life.