Interview: Siki Im

June 28th, 2010

Siki Im is becoming a household name. The recipient of this year’s prestigious Ecco Domani Fashion Fund, whose previous winners include Alexander Wang, Patrick Ervell, Rodarte, Proenza Schouler, and Zac Posen, Siki Im has proven his years as senior designer at Karl Lagerfeld and Helmut Lang have finally paid off.

With a second collection under his belt, the German-born architect (Im studied at London’s Oxford School of Architecture) turned menswear designer impresses us with his literary inspirations.

The Block: Did you always know you’d be in fashion?

Siki Im: No, it was really pure accident. It fell on my lap. I tried to be open about it and went with the flow.

TB: Fall/Winter 2010 was inspired by American Psycho, can you explain the inspiration?

SI: Well, before and while developing my Fall/Winter 2010 Collection, we were in the midst of a crisis – maybe even the lowest point. Reading the paper every day, the media really knew how to ignite fear. So I thought how could I use this notion of fear and destruction and turn it into something more poetic and hopeful. In American Psycho the main protagonist is a metaphor of the elite, the vain, the non-individual coping with reality and surreality. It’s almost, also, a metaphor for the fall of Wall Street. This theme provoked the thought of what the new financier would look and feel like.

TB: Can you tell us a bit about your collaboration with accessories designer Made By Eugene (also featured in your F/W 10 campaign)?

SI: We have been friends and I always liked his stuff. Out of the blue he asked me to do a collaboration, and that’s when it all started.

TB: Spring 2010 was also inspired by a novel, Lord of the Flies; which novel will inspire your 2011 Spring collection?

SI: Several. And I can tell you that the theme will be about immigrant youths in European cities.

TB: On the topic of novels, what are you currently reading?

SI: The Cultures of Globalization by Fredric Jameson, In Praise of Shadows by Junichiro Tanizaki, and Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

TB: What’s next for the brand?

SI: At the end of June we are going to Paris for Men’s Market. Making great shoes out of Italy. And some great collaborations to come.

Interview Carmen Lam

A New Era – Siki Im F/W 2010
Directed by Robert Hamada