Lost Appeal Interview (July 2019)
INTERVIEW TWO: Andrew, owner and creator of Lost Appeal.
(July 12th, 2019)
To open this interview, you just had a pop-up in Durham, NC this weekend. How did that go and what was a standout moment during the event? It was sick man, I just did the first day of it today, still got tomorrow to go. People really showed love. Some of my homies I've never met in real life before drove over an hour to it and copped a bunch of clothes. Shit like that is why I keep going.
When did you start Lost Appeal and what was your inspiration to take the direction of clothing design? Well, Lost Appeal started out in 2011 as the name of my experimental/noise music project when I was a freshman in high school. I made music under that name for like 2 years and then stopped. When I was in high school, I used to run a blog and label called Operation Grindcore which was primarily focused on grind core/power-violence/extreme music in general. Around 2014-2015, I wanted to make a clothing brand and kept the Lost Appeal name. I got into "streetwear" in 9th grade when I discovered Fuct and Mishka. As far as the inspiration for the graphic style of Lost Appeal, it's basically just a culmination of different shit I'm into. The first couple drops under Lost Appeal were designed by tattoo artists. Tattoos have always been an inspiration to me, but around 2016, I just started doing basically all designs myself and wanted to take a more DIY approach to everything. Noise music definitely is a big inspiration to my whole design process, as well as movies.
In my previous interview with Jaecob from Vienna, I asked him how NC has influenced him as a person and a brand. What impact has North Carolina had on you as a designer and a person? I don't really know if NC has influenced me that much either to be honest. There really isn't any other brands out here that I fuck with (Vienna is fire though, and we may or may not have a collab in the works). I was born in Raleigh, but basically grew up after age 6 in the country, about 30 minutes away from Raleigh. There really wasn't anyone else out here that was into the same music/clothes/art that I am. I was pretty much a loner until I graduated from high school. I guess I still am in many ways too.
Aside from Vienna, is there any other brands you have your eye on that you would want to collab with or any brands that you have loved lately? I really wanna steer away from collabs with other brands honestly. Only brands other than Vienna that I would collab with are Mishka, Cav Empt, or Braindead. I'm honestly not fucking with 99% of the brands I've been seeing recently.
What's a turn off for you when it comes to designs/brands? I think a lot of brands lately are just using imagery/references for shit they know absolutely nothing about and feel like many brands have no substance at all. I still have a long way to go with what I'm doing with Lost Appeal and am not where I wanna be at all right now but I'm working on it. I wanna start doing more cut and sew and conceptual collections in the future. As cliche as it might sound, making clothes/designs is my outlet to express my emotions and shit, and probably the main reason I'm not dead yet.
Honestly the same to be honest with you. It helps to express my ideas and as Cole Bennett puts it, helps to "let the creative juices flow." To run off your previous comment, where do you see the future of Lost Appeal? I wanna be able to survive and pay my bills just off selling clothes. I'm doing my first fashion show next month and have some really cool shit planned for it, so I would love to do some runway shows/art installations. I'm also working on some cut and sew pieces. I'm planning on booking shows more regularly too. I have a crazy show planned in September that I set up with Live Nation in Raleigh. The lineup will be announced August 18th I believe.
Big big things bro. Hope to hear how it maps out. Those were all the questions I really had. You were able to expand on a lot, so I appreciate you taking the time to express yourself and your brand. Thank you bro! I'm releasing my first 'full' collection next month too, so I'm super excited for that to drop.
You can keep up with Lost Appeal's next journey on their social media and website below.