So, lay-low Gosha Rubchinskiy has a new gig. Is Kanye West the beleaguered Russian designer's saviour?
Gosha Rubchinskiy's label in Russian
It is a name that is kind of lost in the wilderness of fashion's rejected and forgotten. Gosha Rubchinskiy was a major presence in the fashion firmament until he was not. A Demna Gvasalia—some say—at his height, Mr Rubchinskiy was hailed as the "tsar of streetwear". And then his star was totally dimmed. But now, he could be back twinkling. Kanye West has announced through X yesterday that he has hired the guy: "The arrival of this legendary Russian designer at Yeezy, the pre-eminent global brand in music and fashion, is a milestone in design history". Painful puffery aside, the news naturally generated immense debate, considering both men's controversial past (and for Mr West, present). And it is generally thought that a brand associating itself with a Russian may not presently be considered the epitome of wise. But Mr West, as we already know, does not prescribe to the wisdom of social/business conventions.
In 2021, shortly after pandemic restrictions were slowly lifted, we visited Dover Street Market at Dempsey. When we mentioned Mr Rubchinskiy's eponymous label, a staffer replied, "who's talking about that guy anymore?" This is surprising as Comme Des Garçons International had supported Gosha Rubchinskiy, both financially and in the production of his line. On the Russian brand's website now, only the following text is found: "We're delighted to introduce the new direction of the Gosha Rubchinskiy fashion brand as an independent creative powerhouse. Stepping away from the Comme des Garçons and Rassvet (a skateboarding clothing brand co-founded by Mr Rubchinskiy) family, our brand is forging its own path. Under Gosha's creative leadership we are set to embrace exciting new projects and collaborations that embody our spirit of independence and creative drive. We're thankful for the continuous support from our community that fuels our journey." Is he distancing himself from CDG and DSM, his once ardent supporters that were no more, at least commercially, in 2018, or thereabouts?
Gosha Rubchinskiy's second label GR Uniforma
Our DSM encounter came just two years after Mr Rubchinskiy was accused of sending "inappropriate" text messages to an underaged Russian boy. In December 2018, the lad—16 at the time—claimed that he was pressured by the designer to transmitting explicit photos of himself during what brand executives called a "casting call". Back then, Mr Rubchinskiy found his young and lithe models mostly through social media. That teenager shared supposed screen shots of the conversation between the man and the boy. According to press reports, Mr Rubchinskiy asked the fellow to go into the bathroom to take self-pics so that his parents would not know. Why parental unawareness was necessary, it was not established. It should also be said that the chats the boy showed was edited and not the entirety. After that, another youngster came out with similar accusations. Whether anything happened after those allegations were made or whether Mr Rubchinskiy, who denied them, was charged, is not clear. But the reputational damage to the designer was incurred, and that spelled the end of his brand, if not career.
Sort of. Even before the troubling allegations, Mr Rubchinskiy was beginning to reimagine his until-then leading label of the luxury streetwear scene. As he told GQ in April 2018, the "Gosha Rubchinskiy brand as you've known it" was no more. Five months later, DSM announced a "final delivery" of the line. From the founding of his brand in 2008, the Moscow-born Mr Rubchinskiy had single-handedly expounded the aesthetical uniqueness of his city's skate culture, adopted by the very young. And he was the earliest to employ the use of Cyrillic letters (his name on his labels sport the Russian Гоша Рубчинский) in his unabashedly Rossiyskiy brending. Mr Rubchinskiy had an affinity with the bald-headed (or close-cropped), skinny boys and their pallid countenances that he used with regularity on the runway and in his communication materials. These images of the rough-at-the-edges youngsters were highly influential then and, to a certain extent, remains so. But by the time of the GQ editorial, however, the post-Iron Curtain skate-grunge has lost its geeky-pasty edge.
The Gosha Rubchinskiy aesthetic remains influential till this day, as currently seen in this Levi's image on a store's exterior wall
While Gosha Rubchinskiy the brand was no more, the designer did not stay away from fashion. In fact, he birthed the somewhat underrated label GR Uniforma, based, as the name suggests, on uniforms more akin to military wear than, say, school kit. As Mr Rubchinskiy told WWD in 2019, "Gosha's world now… I think it's about uniforms. Not only in terms of clothing but also in terms of different forms to present yourself." Despite the line's conceptual heft, experimental leaning, and palpable design sense, GR Uniforma did not quite take off, as Mr Rubchinskiy's debut brand did. Although, GR Uniforma continued for a time to receive support from DSM as a stockist (as well as Milan's Mode and Hong Kong's I.T, among others), the clothes did not fly off the racks as expected. Some observers thought that the designs were not commercial enough and that, for fans of the previous brand, GR Uniforma was too distant from the skate looks that launch Mr Rubchinskiy's career.
Although Americans are generally suspicious of Russians (unless you are a certain Donald Trump), Gosha Rubchinskiy and Kanye West are a comfortable fit. The attraction is understandable. Both men are not exactly in the empyrean of the glorified and each has his own thinking about fashion and how to approach it, whether the direction is with accordance to anything that is known to be acceptable, lucrative, or even wearable. Yeezy is a label in doldrums—both the footwear (after Adidas clears all their stocks, what next?) and clothing (what was that last collection, really?). If there is anyone who might be able to save the Yeezy name, it is likely Gosha Rubchinskiy, even if his involvement may turn more consumers off than win more fans. Mr West's announcement of his new hire for the Yeezy men's collection (possibly the one worth saving since it has a larger and more loyal fan base) is also broadcast that he is not quite the designer he has made himself out to be. Perhaps the pairing is mutually beneficial, somehow. Question is, can Kanye West do for Gosha Rubchinskiy what CDG's Adrian Joffe did for the latter in the beginning?
File Photos: Jim Sim for SOTD
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