Masahiro Lamarsh: Peaking Shimmers Under a Dark Ethos

January 31, 2022

Meet the day-to-night enigma floating around the streets of New York City - Masahiro LaMarsh, a genius in his own right and a certified visionary who’s always dripped out in his bizarre creations. He's the embodiment of standing out by not fitting in 一 on most days he’s rushing to bookings and on others, he’s fusing his unmistakable identity with innovative designs. His forward-thinking mindset coupled with his laser-eye precision has blasted him into a realm where he’s disconnected from all things traditional.

The visionary unveils himself through meticulous jewelry designs and peculiar sculptures, opening up the mind to untapped territory 一 all while providing his clients with an experiential journey that personifies the outer shell. His upcoming era exhibits his artistic meshing abilities 一 from his jaw-dropping Grillz to his eclectic sets of rings and bands, he embodies all facets in this category.

Interview by Ronald Kahihikolo
Photography by Phi Vu

More recently, he’s become that of a muse after going viral on Watching New York’s Tik Tok and Instagram. Since then, he’s caught the eye of the masses and has been carefully constructing his upcoming capsule collection that's set to drop in the fall.

office caught up with the designer to talk about his most recent designs, his upcoming collection, his journey, and more.

Check out the interview below.

You’re like this day-to-night enigma floating around the streets of NYC. How would you introduce yourself to anyone that hasn’t found their way to you yet?

I suppose, my ethos and beliefs seep into all aspects of my life. For example, fashion has always been a huge component of my identity. Maybe that explains that whole blow-up, I guess. But across all art forms, I try to capture that same personality and look. So I’m a very intense and cohesive creator and that's what I would say.

Speaking of going viral, some people blow up for some pretty ridiculous things but your vibe and energy were the catalysts that propelled that video. Tell me, what was going on in your head when you suddenly went viral for all of the right reasons?

We live in a generation where there are so many ways you can get viral and it's just a chance thing, perhaps. I blame it on chance and I feel very grateful for what happened.

I was a little bit shell-shocked, I had taken some time to get off of social media because I didn't want to let it change anything about myself. I was so grateful, but at the same time I had to take a step back and be like, ‘well, I guess this is happening,’. But at the end of the day, I was super grateful for the amount of people who resonated with me. Also, the amount of positivity that came through was insane, so many people were messaging me being like, ‘I've been trying to find myself, you make me wanna shake my depression and make me want to strive to be who I am.’ I was just like, these were the nicest things anybody could ever tell you.

Yeah, when that video started circulating, that's all me and my friends could talk about. We were like ‘this guy's so f*cking cool!’

That's crazy! Thanks for the kind words. Yeah, being hooked into the New York scene and its communities have benefited me a lot. But with that said it seems everyone I know here has seen it and been sending love!

Love it. Walk me through the creation of your first design and what was the initial spark behind your creations – where did it all begin? Did you think you’d still be designing?

When I moved to New York City, I had goals of becoming a designer and I thought fashion was where it was gonna be, but I realized that fashion has kind of changed across the board. Looking to do it more as a hobby, I kind of just let life take me in weird places since nothing ever goes the way you plan in life. My first creations would be some clothes and bags, but I started doing jewelry stuff a few years ago and like many things, it stumbled into my lap and I just kinda fell in love with it. I realized that when you consciously know your voice and you're very aware of that, you can move laterally in between different fields and don't let anybody tell you otherwise. You're gonna pick up on things that you love about certain things and things that you don't love, which is part of your artist's voice.

I established my artist's voice during my time in fashion and I knew who I wanted my leaders to be and who my gods were. So I just took that and moved into jewelry and now I've done that same thing and a little bit with sculpture work too. My ethos is contained across all facets, but it's just acknowledging what you like and what you don't like, which I think has helped me with a lot of my designs. Chasing that curiosity keeps me still designing. Also, I was super fortunate to meet Brian Weissman of Brooklyn Metal Works who took me into his studio, nurtured my creativity, and became a mentor of mine.

Yeah, for sure. Your designs have a mixture of playfulness and innovation to them 一 it's a peculiar type of chic glittered over with a forward-thinking mindset. What makes this such an irresistible combination for you and the consumer?

I think all the fostering I've done to become that individual and know the artist's voice 一 I think that's what kind of makes it charismatic. You can be ugly if you want to be ugly and as long as you rock that shit, then people are like, wow, I fuck with ugly. I think a lot of my jewelry looks like something that's been dug out of the earth, but that can be charismatic even though it's not mainstream, there is some honesty and modesty to that.

Amazing. How do you come up with these ideas and how long does one design usually take?

I look towards a lot of textures is what I would say. I love textures and the illusions that go into making textures that are recognized by the eye. I also look towards a lot of deconstruction work. One of my favorite things ever is the anti-fashion movement in the nineties, so I embraced a lot of their gospels, which promotes uniqueness and designing against the grain. I think what goes into a lot of my designs is presenting something different or at least I hope so. Then of course always looking towards heritage. I just finished a piece with somebody who's part Columbian and emeralds are a huge part of their culture. We researched a lot of the indigenous community that his descendants had come from and used that as the base design, and then we had a mutual love for anti-fashion. So we went with an even more unique design.

In general, projects are about two weeks to two months.

How have your designs helped you morph your vision into a living, breathing reality? In other words, when you first started the brand, what was Masahiro LaMarsh thinking?

My designs and my visions are just an extension of myself. Feeling blessed for the reality I’ve worked for. I suppose what I'm fighting for is to have my keep in the design world and introduce my ethos so that my designs and my success go hand in hand. Like, when I create something for the world to see I've won my battle.

I can’t predict how well it’s appraised or received, but it feels like creation is the success. It's the same thing I'd imagine, for when you write. You can't choose who's gonna receive or see what you write, but you're winning because you're pursuing what you want.

Do you see your designs as a way to embody different identities or is it something you want people to wear to encapsulate the outer shell?

So this is an interesting topic because of this whole viral thing. I kind of realized that maybe it is a different identity. I think my designs are the most honest form of myself. They are the purest form of me that exists today. But then I don't think I can keep up with the other identities that are acquired. I was thinking about this last night, I don't think I'm meant to be anything other than the weird creator making those designs. I can't keep up with the idea of being a digital celebrity or If I'm put on this pedestal I have to kind of isolate myself or not be on social media as a face.

You have a lot of designers who like to do a lot of media and can be that public rockstar figure. Unfortunately, I don't think I can be that, I think like I love who I am as a creator and I just l don't have that trait to be so open space. So that's the two personalities that I've been battling with, one that's honest, quiet in the studio, and creating weird things, and then the person that’s being egged on to be more out there to help influence people. It's hard because the whole viral thing was the nicest and I feel so incredibly blessed, but it can put you in this position where you feel pressured to be a certain way to please others.

On the bright side, there are a lot of great designers, especially in the anti-fashion movement that did the least public-facing stuff other than their creations. So they let the creation speak for themselves. That way you only got that honesty. I fuck with that right now, that's like been my closing thoughts on this whole viral thing. I can't change anything about me because then I've lost the reason why it ended up going so well in the first place.

And of course, incredibly honored if anyone out there is wearing my pieces and is identifying with the ethos I’m creating!

Yeah, you have an upcoming capsule collection coming up for fashion week in the fall of this year, what can we expect to see and where are you in the process of each piece?

It's gonna be all of my wildest dreams come true. I do a lot of one-off pieces, so I'd like to consistently do one-off pieces forever, but I would also like to do something that's more publicly available for other people. There's a trick to be said with accessibility because, in my mind, it's immoral to sell a shit ton of the world's resources without being conscious of what you're doing. I think that's how our generation is going to be better is by designers realizing that. So I'm going to do a limited capsule collection. I'm also going to show some of the sculptures that I've been working on. I did a marble sculpting residency in Italy this past year and I learned so much about sculpture work which just pairs nicely with jewelry creation. I'll be displaying sculptures there with this really interesting conceptual brand that I have all mapped out. It should twist everybody's arms appropriately.

So that’s what you gotta look forward to in September. If I can figure out the finances and if I can figure out a space, where it's going to be, it's going to be giving so much. A big thing about this show is going to be the after-party - since it’s all about having fun anyways. I'm working with some of the key figures who run a lot of the club scenes and RA scenes in New York. So I’m hoping for an iconic after-party as well.

Who is the person behind the designs? Give us a little scoop into who you are and where you are when you’re not designing.

As a designer I'm a reflection, or as any artist, I am just a reflection of my upbringing and things that I've been inspired by. So I enjoy the love of dark art, horror, fashion movements, or even these things that are really philosophically and intellectually intriguing. Then I also have a very serious upbringing as a person who's raised by a minority mom, grew up in a very poor environment and to present that, I know I don't really do too many cultural pieces per se, not yet at least, but there's a huge part of me that understands that I am fighting for a lot of biracial people out there who kind of have this like identity journey. It's not so easy, but I can see beauty. Then as a minority in the United States, I'm also fighting for people on the same team, so that's how I view it as a designer. That's what I would like to achieve success across the board and bring everybody up.

When I’m not designing, I’m usually doing activities that reflect these views, like spending time with friends, researching, or partying with a plethora of wonderful communities in the NYC underground.

Where do you hope to take your designs in the near future? What can you tell us about any future collections that you have coming out?

I think I’m gonna have a healthy design house for jewelry and also a great art-house for some of the sculpture work that I wanna do, one day. In the next 10 years, I'll be dedicating my life and my blood and soul to upcoming collections. It's gonna be so good. It's gonna be limited just to be conscious of the world of course, but in the next 10 years, I'm hoping to alter the way that we understand jewelry and consume it, as individuals.

That was sort of my last question unless you wanted to talk about anything else.

Well, if anybody can help with the show, I need a gallery space. That'd be great. Please feel free to reach out. The other thing that I wanna promote is the power of kindness and the pursuit of your own existence and individuality.

Fashion

Happy 424 Day!

Simon Rasmussen — What's going on?

Guillermo Andrade — Right now we're just setting everything up.

So, what are you doing, is it a party?

Well, I kind of felt universally forced, right? Because 4/24/24, I was just like, I don’t really have a choice here. The stars also just kind of aligned, so to be honest, I got this settlement that came with a bunch of clothes so I had this idea to give back to the kids who fuck with us by allowing them to buy our shit first. Not handing stuff out for free, but to do it in a way where we could skip the middleman of the industry, so to speak, and not allow clothes to disappear into the abyss of Farfetch or whatever else. So what we’re going to do is a sort of warehouse sale, which we’ve never done before so that was really exciting for me. I didn’t want to do just another warehouse sale, so it’s like a sample sale turns rager. We teamed up with Adidas and a couple of other sponsors, then drinks, DJs, and a performance.

Sick, I love it.

Yeah. My dream sample sale. Also, it’s not just hoodies and t-shirts here in there, it’s proper collections from the past three seasons. I’m also not picking and choosing, trying to make it accessible, like this was the only way I could afford to buy shit when I was a kid, bro. Sample sales were the thing I looked forward to the most.

I feel you. In New York, there's the annual CDG sale, which is when I used to cop all my CDG.

The only time I could afford Rick. I flew to New York once for a Rick sample sale and I was like, Wow, I can't believe I got invited. And it was mental. I still have those pieces. I will never sell them. Not even because I got 'em cheap. It was also just really fun. Even on the flight to New York, I was like, I can't believe I'm going to New York for a sample sale, what a fucking loser I am. But it was like the adult version of when I was a kid and I was like, Wow, I can't believe I'm 20-something and I'm still doing the thing I was doing in high school. So I hope we can create moments like that for kids here in LA.

Yeah. I love that. It’s important to connect with them; they’re essentially creating the brand. If you don't have them, good luck.

I mean, yeah. Fuck, bro. It's cool that we've been around for this long. I mean, it got a little rocky there for a second I think, for all of us. So coming out of it, tomorrow is a celebration. And it’s like an odd day of the week. It's a Wednesday, super random. And now that we've set it up, the homies are all like, Yo, I'm coming. I'm coming. Let me jump on stage, let me do this, and that's really what it's always been about. It's not some other strategy to get likes on the internet.

That’s how the best things happen, you just couldn’t help yourself. It was intuitive.

Yeah, it all came together in a really nice way.

Would you say that’s how 424 started as well? I remember we met in like 2010 on Fairfax and I was visiting with Rasmus…

Oh bro, it’s probably the time when I started the branch… do you remember Cecilia from Black Dakini? She’s the one that introduced me to CIFF and honestly, I didn’t even care what she was doing, I was just like, I’m coming, I’ll go with you. She said she’d give me half of her booth and I said, Awesome count me in. At the time, I had just gotten my green card and I wasn't allowed to ever leave America, so Copenhagen was one of the first cities I went to when I could finally travel. I mean, you see what we did at CIFF bro? It became our fucking hub for half a decade.

That was a moment for sure.

I remember the first account I got was Antonioli, and he came super gangster, being like, You're going to sell me these clothes. And I was like, bro, I didn't come to sell clothes. I'm just kind of catching a vibe with my homie and I made these things. And he's like, No, you're going to sell it to me. And then I was like, Oh my god that’s Claudio Antonioli. So then I went home, I googled wholesale, and figured that shit out. [laughs]

[Laughs]

Like you said, I couldn't help myself, but I didn't just make t-shirts and hoodies either. I was really on my Rick wave, so I made my version of the Rick things. It was that meets like The Boondock Saints, because I'm still a little bit of a Cali bro, sort of rock kid, but not really. I like hip-hop, but I like the way the rock stars look. I like the contrast. I thought it was cool. After that, I just never stopped.

It was clear to me when I first met you that you were onto your own thing in LA. It made a lot of sense, and it was so cool. It was before 424 was its own brand; you just had the store and this really cool curation.

It was all my shit, bro. I was very, very invested in sharing all of these things that I was finding from all over the world, like Astrid Anderson. She was one of those designers at the time, so important to 424. The connection to Copenhagen specifically for me was huge. I had a big fan base there. It was incredible. And then here in LA, we were sharing the things that we were a part of and finding; it was still the early days of Fear of God, Rhude, Martine Rose. A lot of these brands, we were the first store to ever sell it — we were selling Hood By Air on the West Coast.

You had Rick as well, I remember.

Oh yeah. It took me a long time. But I got Rick, bro. By the time I had to close the store on Fairfax, I already had a Raf Simons account. I had reached my ultimate dream. It was really all the stuff I wanted to wear at the time. It was dope. The best of the best.

We had an office magazine newsstand in there as well.

Oh yeah, we did! I came to visit the one you had, and I was like, Yo, I got to bring this whole fucking thing over here. But yeah, in LA, after two days people forget you exist, but everyone’s been super supportive. We’re all 10 years older now. We've been around forever at this point.

It can be dangerous to take those breaks when you’re figuring shit out, but there’s something very genuine to this comeback you’re having.

Thank you, thank you. We’ve been in and out of those fucking showrooms in Paris for long enough. I've been in and out of these factories for the past 10 years of my life. We had to figure something out. And I think now really diving in, being in Italy full time and being there to develop these products over time, I think that the whole thing just really shows the suppliers respect you more. The people who are making your goods understand why you're making them. And I think now I finally got to the place where I'm not making Italian things, I’m making my clothes, I'm making Cali-centric shit, but with that European technicality and execution. With this Fall / Winter collection, it clicked.

So what’s the vision for the next year? What are you manifesting?

I'm just fucking relentless, bro. This is the way I want to live my life. Now that we are more aligned, more prepared, and have more experience, moving forward it is just more of becoming a fully functioning company that can provide and create opportunities for all of the people around me. We’ve been operating just on instinct for a long time.

Sustaining a business is scary, trust me I know.

Scary as fuck, dog. I just opened a store next to Bottega, bro, and it’s like what am I even doing? You have to just believe in the thing you're doing more than anybody else.

100%, and it seems like that’s what you’re doing.

And fashion’s kind of a competitive sport, as much as people don’t think it is. We can reach a certain level without losing ourselves. My biggest ambition at the moment is to create something that, when you leave one of our neighbors you come into our place you don’t feel that the level has been sacrificed at all. And it’s not easy.

Definitely. I wish I could be there tomorrow.

Thank you, bro. 10 years now. You’ve always shown me so much love. We have to do a booth or have the office part of the next 424 day. Shit let’s do a 424 day in New York.

That would be sick. Let's do it. I'm here. Let’s catch up soon.

Next season’s right around the corner so I’ll see you in Paris.

Yes, see you in Paris and Happy 424 day!

Fashion

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Words and photos by Izzy Capulong

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The Puta collection will be available exclusively on emcee.

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