Subterranean, Cyber Warfare Hair at VFiles
Are you working with Sean?
Mischa: We’re both co-leading. At first, Bumble and bumble was supposed to mentor the hairdresser, but Sean is my friend, so we were just like, "Let’s split up the designers."
Can you tell me what the contest is?
Sean: Okay, mira. The challenge is for young, up-and-coming people who want to get into the fashion world and want to do something substantial. Within the fashion world, you’re either really young or you’re broke or you’re fucking rich and doing everything, so they wanted to raise that middle ground between the low and the high and give the young up-and-coming people a platform to exhibit their ideas and creativity. That’s probably not the case for me, but me and Mischa have been friends for a long time, and we’re always on the same shows. We’re cut from the same fucked up cloth.
Where did you two meet?
S: Oh my God, backstage at the first Yeezy show. I took a photo of her. She was in front of Anna Wintour. They were sitting there, and that was our first time meeting each other. It was serendiptious, and we have lots of mutual friends and stuff like that.
M: I found out he was doing it and said, "You don’t need no mentoring." We decided to collab a little bit, and I took the one designer that wasn’t a contest winner and we split it up like that.
What’s the best hair product for when you go raving?
M: Interesting you say that—hair product—because I’ve been using Manic Panic hard gels for all the people with colored hair. A few of their colors are blacklight-sensitive, and I haven’t been to a rave in a while, but I assume there are blacklights there. So, Manic Panic hard gels are cool. There are also metallic ones, there’s a silver one so it looks like aluminum foil, which is pretty rad. Also, LED battery pack lights are pretty cool, I guess. Do kids do lights now?
Best thing about New York?
M: Best thing about NY.. Leaving it. No just kidding. Best thing about NY: being able to eat any kind of food at any time, and people watching on the subway. And Sean Bennett.
S: Best thing about New York. Ummm. Young faggots.
M: Yesss!
S: Young faggotry, faggotness, everything about being a faggot in New York is my favorite thing.
M: Oh my God, Doug has ‘Sissy Faggot’ tattooed on his knees.
S: I just love being out and a raging homo and being able to be that raging homo. Like that’s the best thing about New York.
That’s a pretty good one. What’s the inspiration for the show?
M: There are four different designers, so four different inspirations.
S: Four different total views on fashion.
M: Totally different.
Was that a mind-fuck for you when you’re working?
S: Oh God no, I’m so ADD. I’m doing three different shows in one. There are the three different designers that won, there’s kid named Junji who’s like this rich Asian kid that wears head-to-toe Balenciaga, it’s insane. But he was very clean and organic. All the boys were clean. We used all the grooming products from Bumble and Bumble for a better version of themselves, clean hairlines, more dapper like they just got the fade and they’re gonna go hang out with their girlfriends at Russ and Daughters or some shit [laughter]. I’m painting a visual portrait.
M: I am seeing it!
S: There’s this other boy named Louis who’s amazing, Chicago boy so obviously dark deep down. [flags down a model] Hi can you talk about your hair for a second? So this is one of Loui’s models. Loui’s inspiration was something subtarreanean, grungy. Anything gutteral was an inspiration—anything ripped out of the gutter, that is. Obviously, something being malformed was a big inspiration, basically your intestines turned inside out. Various materials, wigs, everything kind of fake, something that’s not real, something to kind of fuck with your head. Then the other designer Christian Stone was a lot more avant garde in the sense that everything is very couture, there’s a lot of story behind each piece, so we’ve been kind of picking out different elements from each outfit and bringing it into the hair. I think cyber warfare is a really good way to describe it. So lots of fabrics instead of actual hair, like interlocked hair pieces to make it different, lots of different things going on. It’s interesting because using this platform and having it, why not take it to the tenth degree, why not piss on it so much that it drowns, and it just smells like my pee?
M: Like that Rick Owens video, 'Butt Muscle.'
S: LIke it literally smells like pee. Bumble is pissing all over everything.
M: That’s gonna go really well with PR. [laughs] So I did Inx’s and they sent me a bunch of images of African body painting, and literally like, dicks. I said, "Cool, where’s the hair?" That was the hair reference, so they wanted a bunch of paint. So some of the girls are painterly going back, and then they wanted to do a bunch of bright colors that didn’t really match the collection at all.
So is this her afro?
M: It’s still her afro. The kids have the pink painted in the front and white painted in the front, so we kind of want it to look painterly like clay but still with a lot of color.
What’s the worst thing about hair?
M: When people don’t wash it for a really really long time and then apologize for not washing it. People are like, "I didn’t wash it, I’m sorry," and I say, "It’s cool, at least you own up to it."
S: The worst thing about hair is… expectations.
M: I was gonna say something like that, but it felt too deep for me.
S: That might be a little too metaphorical for me, but something like, what you think you should have.
M: Yeah, expectations vs. reality.
What is the cartoon with the best hair?
M: Oh, this is a good question! I just came from a shoot this morning with Print All Over Me, and it was a collab with Cartoon Network and Powerpuff Girls. So I’m gonna say the Powerpuff Girls have the best hair right now because they’re relaunching and they have a different avatar for every person, so I would say Powerpuff Girls and.. every Sailor Moon character ever.
S: Oh wow! I watch a lot of anime, I was raised on a lot of Cowboy Bebop, like really intense. With Christian there was one where you can see I was trying to do anime. There’s always something phosphorescent. But Marge Simpson is obviously a good one, anti gravity. So good. That’s one of my favorite questions ever. We talked about this earlier, our inspirations are cut from the same cloth.
M: And myself, I think of myself as a cartoon character.
S: Yeah, I always dress like a toddler. It’s always something like kidwear, oversized. I just want to be like a kid, but it’s fun.
Well thank you so much.
S: Thank you. We’re so silly together… I think we’re terrifying.
