THE DYNAMICS OF CODY ROSS PHILOSOPHY
Interview Irina Romashevskaya
ID magazine editor at large, contributing writer to various international publications, the multitalented Cody Ross is also a designer behind the dynamic New York based label, Priestess NYC. Juggling between his projects at ID, Chinese Vogue among a few others, Cody is a designer with a taste for artisanal, conceptual and scientific. His brand has been featured in numerous publications such as Nylon, Teen Vogue, Dazed and Confused, WWD and I-D. I had the pleasure of meeting with Cody just a few weeks before NY Fashion week to get a peak at his new collection, and to ask him a few questions on everything that had to do with fashion, art, philosophy and fractal theory.
Irina Romashevskaya: Tell us a little bit about yourself and your background.
Cody Ross:I’m an editor at large at a lot of different publications and media outlets. I get invited to edit certain issues, submit things that have to do with culture, certain commentaries on different subjects. Sometimes I do concrete assignments for publications, but usually I just take my own point of view to whatever is happening and give my voice to it. I review art, interview artists and other fashion designers. I also write about things that deal with the business side of fashion and art. I’m interested in all aspects of art, because art gives rise to fashion and underpins everything else; it’s very important to somehow formulate an aesthetic point of view.
IR: How did you start your transition into clothing design? What led to development of you brand, Priestess, NYC?
CR: I have always been creative, from the early age I’ve been sketching and drawing. I started applying different concepts to my sketches and drawings, to something real, which happened to be a vehicle that delivered my ideas into life. In 2008 our label got off the ground, it gained a ton of momentum right of the back: all these cool girls endorsing it and wearing it. Since then we’ve been doing special collections for stores or clients and developing our brand.
IR: What is the inspiration behind your clothing brand?
CR: The label is about the avant-garde and artisanal design. It takes inspiration from loads of things: chaos theory, number theories – it’s very diverse. There is punk rock in this, heavy metal, death metal, aliens, new wave, rave, the occult. There are a lot of themes that got incorporated into these collections. We are science and reason-based inspiration applied to garments. It’s all scientific and pseudoscientific. We study chaos theory for example, Laurent Praly’s work from the 80’s with double inverted pendulum… We like to apply philosophy to fashion, and we like to do that with art. We do our own prints and a lot of them are crazy, like this fractal sperm print, which is a bit freaky, but we are all about freakiness. We like clean silhouettes, so it’s a combination of dirty and clean. We also do fun style jewelry, like stuffed snake belts, for example, – a lot of different fun things. It’s a fun label filled with energy.
IR: What is your favorite color?
CR: I’m into silver right now, into metallic surfaces, reflectors, really intense monochromes. But I’m also into neons.
IR: What is your brand’s demographic?
CR: We are catering to a very urban, cool girl, that’s into underground fashion. Continue Reading...