Designer Guillermo Andrade first opened his shop FourTwoFour on Fairfax Avenue in L.A. in 2010. He followed it up with 424, the clothing brand, first as a series of capsule collections. In 2015, 424 grew into a full line and has since become one of the most forward-thinking brands out of L.A. Celebrities like Tyga, Kylie Jenner, and Washington Wizards point guard John Wall are all fans.
For Andrade, it's important to design a collection that says something worth hearing. "I've been given a voice and have the luxury of free speech in America (sort of)," he said over e-mail. "So, instead of regurgitating the same content as everyone else, I choose to focus on other things."
It's a theme we've seen in previous collections. Last year, 424 released a collection that took on police brutality and militarized police forces. The Fall/Winter 2016 is no different. For the upcoming season, Andrade addresses oil spills in the U.S., and the lack of clean up effort from the government. It's a problem he wanted to tackle because it "mostly affects poor people in a negative way and the rich in a positive way."
"Fracking in Flint Michigan has poisoned all the drinking water, and talking about it has become uncomfortable," he explains. "It's so strange to me that bringing up shit that really affects all of us is not something people wanna talk about. But, someone like Trump, spewing hate, could potentially be our president. If he can say 'Ban all Muslims,' I should be able to bring up police brutality or corporate greed and not be uncomfortable about it."
The oil spill is represented through a collage of graphics of the spill in the Gulf of Mexico and oil drilling explosions. 424 also developed what it call the "oil money" wash on denim—its take on what happens when a drop of oil gets in the water. "The idea was to have a more interesting wash for the denim to follow up on our previous styles," Andrade says. "How to continue the storyline with textures, colors, and fabrics. In this case, I'm using denim to represent the dirty ocean left behind after reckless oil spills."
424's Fall/Winter 2016 collection will be available at FourTwoFour on Fairfax in early July.
