Original subtitles

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome

to the Duke Cafe.

When you wake up in the morning and the world is

going round,

hide from drinking King Kong and

your troubles won't come down.

The one you love has left you cannot nowhere

be found.

You may hold up your head, Shaq, but

your heart is on the ground.

King Kong.

King Kong.

Never get high on King Kong.

Ding dong.

Ding dong.

So I was really looking only for this, that I couldn't get here today.

And now I have so many white flowers and I'm trying to see if there is something

with one color that would be so great in the middle of all that green and white.

Okay.

Just south of Little Tokyo.

Traction Avenue.

Still very attractive street of downtown.

Just before the river.

And you used to have a business there?

I mean sure.

805 Traction.

And it seemed everybody moved out, but everybody moved back.

Except that.

So we just go visit.

And what business were you doing there?

The rag business.

The clothing.

And how long were you there?

Ten years.

So we had a big business.

It was like a big dressing table in the middle and we had our shipping and we

had a big disco ball and there was always disco music.

Yeah. Yeah. And then that upstairs was the journey back and it was boxes,

of course, but also very big.

It's a wonderful house because the toilet, none of the front...

Hey. Yeah.

When college got to be 45,

then we moved.

Business was sick, so I bought a house.

But the cafeteria that was started was still here.

So the thing that happened is because cafeteria was fine, helped me to have

enough of it.

The Armando story.

And then Rick was starting to do his little marvelous thing.

One by one in a little corner.

So you met Rick when you were here?

I had him as a pattern maker.

That's the way we met.

My God, that's why it took a long time to entangle all those stories.

We started like...

Slowly, like, you know, I was going to an opening.

He was going with me.

I was married with Richard. We were planning to do a movie. He was not

there.

Then I had to go to France. So I was going, and then I said, oh, I've not

been in Paris. You know, I've been for one day.

Why don't we meet there to look at some fabric and stuff?

So one night...

I'm ready to go out, and then there is a bang, bang on the door. I open the door,

there is like drunk, like ten Polish guys, and sort of falling on the floor,

and saying, you have a crush on me, and I have a crush on you.

So I didn't go out, spent the night to explain to him how wrong all that was,

and I think the next day I was going to New York, and he was going back to L.A.

I don't have photographs of the show.

There is.

There's a video.

I'd love to see the video.

The show that was here?

No. The show in New York. The show in New York.

Oh, there's a couple of things.

Because we used to have like a... Oh, here they are.

We're going to look at the fashion show.

You want to see the one with Andre the Untally?

Who's Andre the Untally? That's the funnier one.

Yeah, that one's better.

Yeah, that's what we did.

She's doing her little documentary.

Yeah. It's a lifelong thing, don't worry. You won't sit till we're 70.

Bye.

No, I mean, today and tomorrow.

They're in the office on Saturday. Oh, I see.

Yeah,

I got it, but I did not read it. But I have to send it to you today.

Okay, but what do I have to do? I have to do a check for $2,500 today?

Sending a messenger today.

I

was

at Café des Artistes, as you know.

And then Rick...

who had a little design studio downtown, found a place just across the

street where we still are. At that time, it was only one store, another three

store we have.

And I was seeing, like, that little shack. It was all parking, but there was

a little shack in the front.

And I knew the landlord, they were coming for lunch at Café des Artistes.

So one time I thought, We'd like to do a party there.

So I went to see them, and I said, I want to rent this, destroy an empty

place for 10 years to do a party.

Because they normally say, why don't you move your restaurant?

seeing a whole old-fashioned way, and it's still

nice to see everybody we love coming here and having a good time.

No, but it is kind of that thing where people come and they create a little

world, and then they break camp and they leave.

Yeah, like nomads. I don't think in any other country, I mean, any other city

I've ever been to, it's been quite so much.

If it happens, it's like overnight.

I get this situation here. But it's the aesthetic of the city. Yeah. It's a main

chance for people to come here to, you know, throw their hat in the ring, see

what happens, you know.

Yeah. They leave in glory or they leave in shame. It's a tough town.

All right, Peter, the doorman extraordinaire.

Everybody's a little eccentric, I think, because of the name.

You know, they do a bit too.

I hear Michelle describing people as schizophrenic a lot.

She doesn't mean it in any kind of derogatory way.

You know, it's just human nature that we all have two sides. This is the heart of

Hollywood, basically.

I've seen everybody at some point in the last year or so. I've seen pretty much

every major star of our time here. I'm sure there's nothing else like it in the

rest of the world.

Michelle, I think, is a genius.

I mean, I've never had the honor to be around her and see her at work. The fact

that she considers this place a theater, more so than a business, is really, and

that it's successful on that premise. It's astounding that it could go on this

long, this show, and it shows no sign of stopping.

Rick is cool. He's just a bit of a mystery to me. I don't really know him

too well.

So where's Rick?

In the studio.

Well, he's not answering the door.

So you've achieved a lot in your life. When you come here, do you feel that

there's a community here that you fit into at this restaurant?

Kind of intellectual?

Well,

my name is Kimbra. I live in New York City, but I'm here quite often. Just did

a Halloween show with Lou Reed and the real Karen Black.

And we did a tribute to Edgar Allan Poe.

When I first met Rick Owens a few years ago, he came to a show that I did.

And then I was in one of his fashion shows in New York.

It was a morning fashion show, and it was like breakfast with the voluptuous

horror of Karen Black.

And I got to stand on a stage, and he had big piles of clothes.

And I just, you know, continually changed outfits.

And I was in my monster costume that day.

We've been friends since.

I saw the last show in New York. It was really, utterly beautiful.

And I thought that the last show reminded me of a cross between the bride

of Frankenthal and Aubrey Beardsley.

I think the atmosphere is, like, ancient here.

And then also there is the group of people that understand from all over the

world, international, that understand that this is a very unusual environment.

You have old, you have new, you have, you know.

the outside, the inside, the garden, the California vibe,

but also the Capri vibe.

I mean, you know, you have people from all over the world who just look at the

architectural elements that are here.

Is that right? Because we came here very early and they had that house was like

all blocked off.

Somebody was still living in that house. Yeah.

And they... No, they carted the house from downtown. So he bought this

downtown. Oh, yeah. And carted it on a truck.

This whole craftsman house? And just stuck it here in the middle of... Stuck

it in the middle of this signing lot, you know?

Yeah. I was so confident that everything would be happening

exactly the way I wanted to.

And it started this way because to...

Plant trees in the parking lot is sort of easy.

And building walls is easy, and starting something is easy.

Then that house that was down the street became for sale. That was another

easy thing. It started to be easy with the city.

Some people don't understand it, why somebody wants to move it.

Oh, you know, I was not really looking for it. It just became for sale down the

street. It was 1902.

And behind this house, it was not a garage, it was a table.

And how did you manage to wheel it over? It must have been quite a... Oh, you

know, that was an easy part.

It's very easy to move a house. The car coming is like changing wheels on your

car. What took a long time was to convince building and safety that there

was a reason to move that house

They looked at it like somebody old. They only believe in Formica and new

whatever.

Hey.

Carla, you look wonderful.

Hi, how are you?

Is your mom here?

Yes, she's right on the patio.

What? What did you say?

So,

Michelle and I, we think that if we have to give up our young people, we really

love the Japanese students.

This weekend is perhaps even going to change more what life is about

because if they really want to do A house with them. Yeah.

Perhaps they are going to be more like LMVH when they offer him like a house or

something, meaning like he has to live in Europe most of the time. Yeah.

In which case, I don't know what I'm going to do.

Well, no, we don't want this to happen.

I mean, it's wonderful for him.

Yeah. But I don't know. I don't want to change.

It's not like I would go and live in Europe and do what.

I could go, like, in a few years if I thought about doing something.

But otherwise, I'm so stuck here. I've been here. I did not move my feet from

last five months.

Yeah.

We've spun such a marvelous little web.

I think the thing with your mother is that she likes to create things and then

just kind of create something else. Right, exactly.

And I think it's time.

Yeah, and so do I. I mean, she's got to the point now that she's become a cage,

really. And it's repetitive and it's not the same kind of creativity involved. It

really is. I mean, obviously, people do it.

the whole life and make it wonderful. But she's been, you know, she's done so

many things, you know, being a lawyer, striptease, making clothes, running a

restaurant, wanting to produce movies.

Yeah.

So it's a way out.

Yeah, we can't say one thing about her, and that is that she's gone.

Very good.

I think the main purpose was to be the seat of socialism during Mitterrand.

Oh, it's quite a big meeting room sort of place.

Yeah, it's about five stories, I believe.

And they all have, like, large rooms and bathrooms. So it's five stories that

needs to be renovated. Yeah. Oh, my God.

And the stairs.

Oh, my God. But at least there's an elevator.

It seems to be like she's undertaking exactly what she did with the cafe, the

empty parking lot.

Mm-hmm. And then all these opponents.

And, you know, just this... And then this huge kind of...

fantasy of bringing this house.

It's always overcoming momentous odds all the time. The challenge of creating

something.

Once it's already created, then she gets bored.

She doesn't like to maintain.

Even if the light's so hot here, is that the way it is? I love it so much. And

I'm sure that will happen if we stay a little longer.

We'll stick somebody who has a little dog just on an English sign, and you

will see the dog eating on the plate of that person.

And nobody will say anything.

But if you answer your cell phone, they will tell you to go outside.

And the other day, there were some Americans next to us, and...

They told me as soon as they saw I was putting the cigarette on the table that

they had medicine on the table and they had asthma and nobody could smoke

around.

So I tried to move a little far away and the waiter saw that and said, what are

you doing? I said, well, people are disturbed by the smoking.

And they went on a rage, telling them they could not say that to me because I

was an obituary and this was still a smoking restaurant.

And there was nothing they can do about it. And they should have been upstairs.

And the woman was really bad and showing her medicine.

It was, that's why I like clips.

It's like they have their homes and they are not other people's homes.

We're trying to get also that little collection together of the fur.

That will be the first one on the Reco and new Palais Royal label and not a

Revillon collection.

Oh, so it's in Palais Royal.

That's where he found the name when we said, oh, enough of this thing, but how

can we do anything?

with the address, you know, like it was... Yeah, perfect, yeah.

Yeah,

yeah. So it was so perfect, then we said, okay, we do that.

Yeah.

There is the most incredible complexity

incredible, incredibly strict austerity that Rick achieves in his clothes.

The detail is quite extraordinary, I mean, and sort of invisible.

I mean, in the finished product, it is mysterious.

But yeah, so in fact, people always write about him to say that he's like

the grunge guy because he's sort of grunge and chic at the same time.

But what he does is use, especially in the fur, like very old techniques that

were made like to save some of the price of the skin, you know, like that thing

that is called allongé.

I don't know if I can show you something. And it's what she's working

on now.

So, you know, you cut a skin in those little pieces and then you put it back

together. So instead of having like a mink that is like this, the way it comes

naturally, everything has been shot.

And instead of the sweat, you have a very long mink that is also less

wider. And then you get this kind of effect.

In fact, even nicer from the inside when you can see the craft of that.

We did it in different ways so it could still have body and like it could still

hold a shape.

Now here it's super light and there's that structure in it that it's almost

kind of like hoop skirts because there's a stiffness in it, like a little bit of

stiffness gives it body so it kind of does stick out in good ways.

And he is the king of knowing all the eight paths.

You know, and he cannot take

whatever it is to be covered in fur. It's like saving a little piece.

So you think this is a fantastic brush?

Yes. That would be there. And where is the pen thing?

La petite boîte de pain. La petite boîte, mais elle doit être par là, sur

le manteau. Ah oui.

Danny, you have a little carton box. Danny, with two desks.

Vous n'avez pas vos... des trucs dans les jaquettes aujourd'hui?

Ah, non, j'ai juste une petite peau de lapin, là. Oui, bah, faites-moi la

peinture. Ah.

C'est pas la plus belle.

Yeah, it won't be.

But so at the same time, you know, we have been doing this.

Because there is this company here that is called Le Marier, that have all those

old feathers, and only one they have left.

Because what Rick did is, first they had to dye those feathers to give a little

more dust, and they are naturally, because they are a little more white.

And then they glued three together to make them longer, because those ostrich

feathers, they are not that long.

So they had to tie them, and it was at their window you could have a screen,

and you could see, like, all those dust feathers glued and dyed, hanging by the

window.

And then they were putting them, like, by hand, but they sort of got tired, so

they did not build up enough.

So Rick had to send it to his mother that she'd do that fabulous... In

Porterville, you know, she... Yeah? In Porterville, that is next to

Bakersfield, where Rick is from. Oh, she's up there.

She's up there. How fascinating, really. What a lovely idea of her doing that

there.

But, you know, she is the one where I've always been showing that. Yeah. That's

why Rick...

Nick seems to get purer and purer.

It's like he has this kind of, you know, incredible strictness or

discipline. And he loves, you know...

I sort of feel like he is, and I'm asking this as a question, I'm not

making a statement.

I feel that he has this incredible kind of purist thing where he's always

constantly going to the purer, purer line. Like Mies van der Rohe or Louis

Kahn or any of those architects, going like that. And you come in and kind of

provide the sensual, the further, more flamboyant...

Yeah, I think, I feel like you say that he's getting pure. What I say

is, like, he's really on top. I see now.

He's on top because he's, like, secure and not too secure. I mean, he knows

what he does, but he also thinks, like, how he fits.

Rick is always, you know, he gets up, he works, he goes to the gym, he eats, he

takes his nap, he gets up, he works, he goes to eat again, and then he goes to

bed.

That's his life.

So he doesn't really travel much outside of like a half an hour radio?

Yeah, basically.

I mean, you know, and then every so often he has to go to Italy and he's

there for a while.

And then, you know, but even there he keeps a very similar routine.

Because they have a gym. Even though it's in the tiny village of Concordia,

there is a gym in the hotel.

I think he had another background.

He would have been an architect.

And I think it's coming slowly to this.

You know, like, it's kind of just...

On the other side of him, he's very humble and thinking that I have to make

a living and it's what I can do. He does not like to always jump to something,

but I know he's going this direction.

You can live with anybody if you have the same aesthetic values.

But, you know, even if you don't have the same political values, the moral

values and everything, you cannot deal with it. But if you don't have the same

aesthetic values, it's impossible to be, like, free-talking. You know, I say,

this is great, so I know what it means.

I think it goes back and forth, and I'm the one who reports things.

have no lining that everything is dragging on the floor because he had

when he started first because he was so young imagine now when i think when i

started to be with him he was carlos age now and lucia's age and it's only now

that i feel like wow

i

don't have the craft of the salmon like somebody who bring a mood or i think

we collaborate well and of course on my part it's a little more intensive

because it will be uh at the same time very sensitive because

that would be the one to say about all this world the way it is it has to

replace the caliber and finding the thing we are finding a very

great balance together but it's Yeah, you know, sometimes a little thing make

it up.

Like the fact that we came here and then we have those Italian partners and, you

know, everybody will say something. So then, you know, balance, we have to say,

like, who is doing what.

But we always talk about it. Sometimes I can be sort of loud about it. Of

course, now this is that.

But we are very...

We express it a lot.

Well, on Earth, could you believe that this guy from Porterville with that

fabulous mixed-tech look?

Yeah, I think I have this relationship with this guy that is pretty

extraordinary and so tender and so delicate and he's a

pain in the neck for a lot of things, but like delicacy in life that

is so real.

You know, the collection has to be ready in two weeks, so... Even though if it

was not, I don't think... We are not that paranoiac.

Oh, look what I just got. This is my most exciting new thing in the class.

Uh-huh.

My goodness.

So

how big

is the actual rooster that grows it?

Oh, I see. So it's really a most staggering extravagance. You know, isn't

that wonderful?

My goodness.

I didn't realize it was, I thought when you were photographing the model that it

was something manufactured.

It's amazing.

Imagine extruding that. It's fantastic, isn't it?

They're really, really rare.

Yeah.

They're beautiful.

It didn't take me a long time. It didn't take Maya a long time to find them.

But even like the mess of pointing on the floor and everything, I think you

need that because otherwise it would be too... Not that I'm doing it on purpose.

No.

And then I always think, okay, so now this is all established and everything,

so I should find myself another little niche now.

You two look like brother and sister, you know.

So you don't have the same great-grandfather or anything like that?

I have to do the search.

And

what

about Rick and Michelle?

The last time I talked to Michelle on camera, she was saying that she felt she

had reached the point in her collaboration with Rick where he was

now... had arrived where he was going, and it was time for her to look for

something to do for herself.

Well, she did find Gareth Pugh, and they have been working with him,

and it has sort of developed. But in that process, or in between the time of

her going and starting a new project with Gareth...

I think she fell in love again with Rick's work and the whole world, and now

she's like, I mean, she's so engrossed and enthralled with it, and it's just

growing non-stop, and because it's growing, she's getting to get new

spaces for showrooms or this or that, so she's really excited about that.

Hello, Charlie.

I love you. I love you.

Okay.

All right. Thank you.

You know, I love New York.

She's from L.A.

I love New York, you know. No.

No, no. I love New York.

But.

But I live in LA

Michelle and I are in New York, in Starlet, and we're installing a

furniture exhibit called Pavane for a Dead Princess.

And that name comes from when I was a kid, my parents used to play a lot of

classical music, and Pavane for a Dead Princess was, besides being a haunting

piece,

The name was, I was always kind of fascinated with the name because it was

kind of morbid and romantic and mysterious.

And it always stuck with me.

And it seemed appropriate for this show, which is of an alabaster bed and an

alabaster daybed.

It was supposed to be based on our house, our bedroom.

In Paris, there's a duplicate of the bedroom in Hollywood that you remember,

so you would be really familiar with these safes and these pieces.

Now they were translated into Alabaster, and the shipping was challenging, and

the installation was challenging, and I

understand engineers were consulted.

because of the weight 1.5 tons i almost like how i like how it has almost

a disposable feeling but you know in monolithic pieces

and also the thing about all of that art deco furniture it's just small

and being the true american i am i oversized everything

So it's kind of like, it's very Jean Harlow, like the clothes, like an Art

Deco set, but in black primer and oversized.

And recently, I wanted to get a little bit more

opulent, and so I started using marble, and after

the marble came the alabaster, just because.

It was softer.

And there was something a little bit more mythological about the alabaster

and almost biblical.

And I liked those references.

I liked how it was kind of ancient feeling and in this great modern shape.

And when I think about furniture and clothes, you know,

I get asked sometimes about what the inspiration is.

I think it's just an accumulation of things.

I think every creative person just draws on their memories of their favorite

things and you just kind of make your own collage of it. And I always think of

it kind of like haiku. You take a couple of elements and you try with the fewest

elements possible to create a whole new composition that is your personal

expression.

Sometimes it works, and when it works, it can kind of create this whole world

out of the fewest elements possible.

That's what I try to do with the clothes, and that's what I try to do

with the furniture.

I'm trying to make kind of a straight line from point A to point B and make

it as pure and graceful as possible.

I've always said, even with the clothing design,

Being a designer is like 5% inspiration and 95% execution.

I think anybody can be a designer. I think it's just the tenacity and the

commitment and the determination.

If you could customize your environment, I think anybody would.

And when I do that, I have a selection of stuff, and then Michelle kind of

edits. And we do this in a really organic way. It's not as if we kind of

thought up this project and we kind of formally sat down and decided who would

do what. My part is that I just make proposals, and Michelle responds.

And, you know, some things make it through that process and some things are

eliminated in a very kind of organic way.

The furniture, you know, it's not particularly witty. It's not

conceptual.

I was kind of trying to go for beauty

in a kind of earnest way.

An earnest search for beauty I don't think is probably very cool, which makes

it even cooler.

I think that this installation, probably even though I'm getting all the credit,

is really a triumph for Michelle.

The furniture is a really different thing from the clothes.

I started the furniture just because we needed the stuff in the house when we

moved to that house.

And so, you know, we needed a couple of things, and I started making a couch

here, a chair there, and before we knew it, we had a whole bunch of stuff that I

showed as an exhibit to kind of just to, as a

one-shot deal, to give extra energy to one of our men's showrooms.

season but it was supposed to be a one-shot deal and it just kind of

developed a life of its own and the reason that it did partly at the

beginning is because Michelle took an interest in it and she started

developing it

I can be a little bit dictatorial.

I'm probably fairly cold in that department.

And she has, I mean, we all know she has that warmth and she has that magic

spirit that just, that kind of pulls things out of people.

And I know that this is a project that she's really enjoyed.

I mean, I see her excitement when she's making progress with these artists.

And when there's an emergency and she has to run across town

to go deal with one of these guys, that's her favorite thing in the world.

I like it.

to the airport.

kind of a way.

And, you know, it was a struggle.

And the world is going round.

Hide from drinking tin corn.

And your trouble dawn won't come down.

The one you love has left you.

Cannot.

Define.

No.

a couple of weeks ago, wasn't it?

Yeah, it was a couple of weeks ago. It was in a new space, beautiful Art Deco.

And the show, I actually cried. I mean, literally tears were dripping down my

face.

Rick played this song by Freddie Mercury, which is a beautiful, soft love

song.

And it just, I mean, I was crying because I just felt like this show was

such a declaration of love to Michelle.

And even to the point where the girls were all wearing, or had, their outfits

were very similar to what Michelle wears on a daily basis.

And, you know, it just, you know, and it just went on and on, the song, and then

it just ended with three beautiful, long, I love you, I love you, I love

you, and, oh, it just, yeah, it was, like, takes my breath away.

From your mouth to God's ear.

I'm feeling ugly.

And you're my boy.

See every night.

They send you destination.

I'm too tired.

You're my daddy.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Using I