By all accounts, Umit Benan is a pretty cool dude and one of the more "real" designers working today. His clothes carry a very distinct and occasionally peculiar look to them and his somewhat brash nature comes as a refreshing change from the too often bottled-up personalities that run the fashion industry. Being the cool dude that he is, Benan sat down with Carson Street to chat.
He dishes on his life's journey, which includes his travels from Germany to Istanbul to Boston to London to New York to Milan, making him a true globetrotter. But if you've been following Benan's career for a minute, you'd know how interesting his shows are and how important his model choices can be to the story. Early on, he says that he was designing his clothes around who his models were, more focused on a sort of Umit Benan "attitude." That philosophy springs to life in the fact that for F/W 15 he used actual fisherman to model the collection. He sums it up very succinctly: "There's a fine line [for me] between trash and elegance. I never like a super elegant guy and i never like a super trashy guy."
Depending on the designer and brand, model choices can be surprisingly vital to a runway show. We see so many of the same faces during fashion week as they get passed around from designer to designer, show to show, that fresh, unique and unexpected castings can make a collection that much more memorable and really play up certain themes when executed properly. The latter is clearly on the mind of Umit Benan who, again, is one of the realest out.
