Navigating the Expenses of Wedding Dresses & High Fashion
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Oakwood pieces people are spending like upwards of, like five hundred thousand dollars for one piece for themselves. What you and five thousand years of the house exactly, literally everything you just said like resonates so so much.

This is what you do when you've just found that statement handbag on ebay and you wanna build an entire wardrobe around IT, you start selling to keep mine, yes, on ebay over that all black everything face listed IT and buy all the color feeling more vintage than ever. It's out with the new and in with the preload. Next thing you know, you've refresh your wardle basically without spending a dime yeah ebay the place to buy and sell new preload vintage and rare fashion.

What's ever trans? Welcome to another episode of network and chill on your host living into A K york bf f. And your favorite wall street girly.

Today we are taking a look at a very special moment. My wedding, as many of you know, I tied the not in june in italy, and let us say I went all out. And I am still financially recovering.

Like, literally that tiger king me of like, oh, I will never financially recover from this. That's me. I had not one, not two, but three dresses for my special day. And I know I know it's a little excessive, but i'd been saving up for this moment.

And in particular, today, I want to talk a little about luxury fashion because I feel like it's one of the most hotly talked about topics among the the B, F. S. There are some people who pride themselves on getting the authentic stuff, some people who love dumps and inspired fashion.

And a lot of folks, myself included, do a little bit of both. And regardless, the global luxury fashion market is not going anywhere. In twenty, twenty three, IT was valued at nearly three hundred billion dollars, with designer labels leading the charge in setting trends.

And with the rise of social media, more people are seeing designer goods and custom goods as the norm rather than the exception. So today i've invited my personal friend and expert designer who even designed one of my stunning wedding dresses. Everyone, please welcome Andrew one.

Hi Andrew.

Thinking so much being here.

things for having me, i'm so excited.

okay. So before we get into IT, because you have a lot of really fantastical, beautiful language around your brand, i'm and asked you really simple question in your own words, what do you do for a .

living um I make pretty dresses that people like wearing and I don't know that there is space to make you feel good and yeah you know like to make like the dreams of women that are wearing IT. You become a reality sort of be a part of their life in some way um yeah and I am not like a doctor, something i'm not saving lives but this is my own little way .

of doing yeah I love that and what would you want to become a designer?

Well, I was not good out a few other things.

Well, okay, what are the other things?

So I did. I did architecture and interior design. I've never heard a professor say that I was good, not once.

No o and I I cried almost every night I to stay out and all my other friends would be like, so decided doing work and and be like, why you in the score doing this? Yeah and then one day professor was like, why don't you do fashion design? And like, I don't know and my I told my parents and they are also like you should do what you anna do so I somehow switched um but yeah even before that though before I you still want to be a fashion signer growing up but I think I I didn't say IT anymore because I was so scared and of all the stigma that comes around, you know being a guy that wants to be in fashion so I don't know at one point I said I want to be a thermal logic like you .

have great skin, by the way but .

yeah mean there are so many things that I said I would wanted to be fashioned. Design was always one that was in the back of that that I really .

wanted to talk like being a male fashion designer. Like, what did you mean exactly by that? Was that like, just like, you know the connotations of the designer itself or like you the work?

I would say that you know because it's depending on where you grew up. Um I grew up in the midwest for a big part of my life. So living in colorado and smaller towns, I think you know there was not a lot of guys that acted like me yeah looked like me and like things that I like.

So you know in the way of like like being L G B, T Q, whatever. And um so I think you know when I remember when they would ask you in school, what do you want to be when you grow up? And some people were like a football player, whatever else at that analyst influencer, I do you think youtube bear, but I would write fashion designer yeah. And I member later when I wrote that a lot of guys, that's something and they were like, oh, that's really girly yeah or they would be the they would use a lot of words surrounding what girly would .

mean to a guy.

And yes, yes, yes, all the time. And I think that's one of the biggest reasons why I stopped saying IT that I wanted to be a fashioned signer because I was so scared that guys, we're going to constant and be calling me that yeah but you know, that's something that i'm still proud of today. I'm like, yeah, honey, like so gay going be you actually come out I don't think .

I know this value you even we're from.

oh my god, we have more drinks to catch because it's a crazy story but you know I finally really came out like, I want to say three and half three years ago yeah but he was really out during high school .

to my class for sure yeah okay and you know you got into this design world um Normally when I talk to guess who are asian, we talk about the joke of you have three routes to go. You can either be a lawyer, a doctor or an engineer. And fashion designer doesn't fall into any of those categories. Like but you said your parent were supportive yeah.

my parents. I think that's why so many people are very, very surprised when their fellow asians and everyone's always telling me, oh my god, like C I would have loved to pursue the arts like something. But, you know, my mom was a piano growing up. My dad pursued socker growing up. So they weren't really like the conventional asian parents that you would think of.

And yeah, I mean, i've remember my parents would always tell me that there was a school called persons growing up and so that always stuck in my head and when a google first became a thing I would constantly google that um and I think that always be consciously lived in my head even though I said I was gonna doing something else. And my brother ended up doing arrow space. And now he's in hedge fun private equity.

He full, he fulfilled that. And so maybe that a little part of, you know why my parents will like, do what you want to, what you love. But you know my parents friends as not as toxic as some asian parents may be, but you know how a lot of parents are very competitive or asking their friends, oh, like, what school is your kid going to? What are they studying? Like what was your gp? But they got on there.

S, A, T, A, C T, like every single thing you could think of. And people would always be asking about my parents, about my brother, could be because he was so smart. And they would always ask, what, what is gonna do? And I think at the time, you know, I think he's figuring that out.

Yeah and now the same parents are like reaching out to my parents being like, oh my god, we tell him on that. We saw him on that like so proud and like liar, liar, I don't know, but I am lucky to have parents that are so supportive. And you know, my mom got remarried so I stepped out is even more supportive but you know I know it's not a lot of people's situation, especially when you're asian, but you know, i'm lucky yeah.

that's amazing and i'm so happy to hear that because it's not the case for a lot. Um but let's actually talk a little bit about the money no, when IT comes to fashion, the folks at the very top of the and are making a cuatro dollars. But most people who are in fashion know i'm just picturing, even just like the devil wears praa, like being an assistant and like running around for little to know money. Like did you ever worry you going into the fashioned space that like you would not have money?

Well, so I think one of the big obstacles of what was sort of made as an obscure to me that made me not want to pursue fashion later around high school, I want to say is my dad would always tell me that people that are in fashion do not make a lot of money yeah. And it's really hard to make a lot of money in fashion. So that was one of the reasons why I also didn't want to do fashioned. And I entered in its architecture and into your design, graphic design, whatever IT was um because .

you thought there would be more money in dermatology .

or a thing else like but but I think even if it's like, oh, if you go and study architecture, you know architects also, it's it's hard to make a lot of money and you know just like anything in the arts. But you know I would say that. I when I was first getting experience, there's definitely a lot of internship persistant opportunities where it's unpaid paid. Is that legal?

I don't know anymore, but like people still .

do yeah but you know unpaid but you know when you're lucky enough to be in a position to get that experience and get those unpaid internship, I would even say the unpaid internships and fashions are the one that you probably learn the most from because you get very easy credit when you go to a much bigger corporate place like the ones that magine that are making billions and billions of dollars.

Those are the ones where it's so CoOperate to the point where you go on as an international system and you're only focused on one project in that project in that section. Whereas when you're at a company that if it's unpaid or little to no pay, then it's like you have to handle this. You're putting on this cap.

You're putting on this cap, your putting on this fast. So you're really getting that experience. And that's something that you know I did many, many times, I think about three or four places. Yeah.

how are you supporting yourself during that time when you were doing all these unpaid him turn ships? Was IT help from family? Was IT on the side you were waiting tables? Or like how you supporting yourself?

I would say that I did save money from high school and birthday, any Christmas and any graduation gift that I got.

Like, I want presents called hard cash, please.

Yes, I was like, olah, my god, thank you. And the money just drop the but no, but you know, I also, I think my first shop in high school, I was a butter here I will .

go .

waiter at a restaurant restaurant oh full restaurant and I think that's why when people see me now they're like, are you sure i'm like hh so you know anything that I did in those moments like I tried to try saving money yeah um but you know entering college, being in new york is not a cheap place yeah so I am really lucky that I was able to get support by my family and even like close family, friends and you know during those times it's like.

I know a lot of people that listen to hear this gonna say, you know, you're lucky to be in that situation or some people like, oh my god, just like the whole word of apple baby is so overused now um and i'm by no means A O baby at all not close but i'm just lucky that you know even during high school when all my friends were going on these vacations and like they're like, oh, have to disney world like every single year for the past sixteen years and the first flight I ever took was in middle school yeah um and that was at fourteen so that was the first plane I ever rode. And we never want on vacations. We never really had like the craziest cards of the crazy st houses. But my parents save every single thing that they had so that they can plan for when i'm in college and how to support because it's not just a tuition that I needed ah I need living expenses and for me to focus all my hard work and energy and time into school um because I knew that I wouldn't be able to double and like work in part time at the same time. Yeah um I think .

that's a very immigrant thing like growing up. We had the smallest house, yes, in the best school district so that I could go to the best public school so my parents wanted to spend on that. But also, like, I remember being like, why am I driving a beat up hda accord? We would like the paint chipping off, while other kids in the student lot had bmw and Mercedes and things like that.

But then those same kids didn't get any help from their parents for college or for school. And they, you know, even if they got into the school that they wanted to go to, they may have to have done two years the community college or gone to our state school just because the tuition was cheaper. Wherefrom me the conversation with my parents, if you can get in, we're going to help you pay for IT. Even though, to your point, we didn't go on a lot of vacations, we didn't go out to eat, we didn't do any of that. Like education, I feel like is such a immigrant dream that I think our parents were willing to invest in IT that is.

So I can believe we've never talked about this before. Buggy, literally everything you're just said like resonates so so much so obviously that's why you and I like we get along so so in our energy because too um but yeah, I mean, I felt like I was just talking when you were saying that because I absolutely I want to that same thing you know just like i've seen a lot of my other friends when I was going up.

It's like, okay, the parents were like, okay here's maybe like ten thousand years for school yeah maybe many seven no okay. But then i'm like U S. Had the nicest things growing up in the nicest house, the nice fiction, the homes, the card, whatever IT was.

But it's like OK seven thousand may be five thousand for college year. Here you go. But i'm like, I I can never understand because this is obviously like, you know, everyone, every family, every person has their own different values. And I think just maybe a lot of immigrant parents, maybe you just her parents, whatever IT is, were so focused on, if you can get into the school, I will do what I can to put you through IT, financially, whatever.

And specifically that school, you were so obsessed with parsons where you ended up getting in yeah so talk me about that. Like was that the only school you applied to? Like how much does persons cost a year?

I believe persons a year my own says two questions. IT is a private school um so I I want to say it's maybe like forty six thousand year yeah and just to and to live in .

new york to .

live in new york. I live in A S I believe that you do in summer um and I think storms were twenty one thousand dollars yeah twenty one k and that's .

when you went.

Yeah so now yeah, it's probably more instead of like forty six here, whatever .

vertuous.

But persons was the only school applied for, the only one I did not tell my parents and I and like I remember when my brother did his college obser, whatever yeah, I would see him day in and day out.

applying out.

watching all this and do that. But you know that I I went to some college art fair for art schools, and another persons was there. But I just told my parents that I was applying to multiple schools, and I only applied there.

And got you, got IT. I know god, can you imagine what be doing right now? But yeah, I remember when the male came in and I opened dead and my mom was home.

SHE was like, what is the new school? And I like its person. She's like, no, I remember its part since school of design. What is parson's the new school for design? And I was like that I go to in school. I like a different version something or like not that, but the new school actually bought person yeah and now has a lot of divisions under the new school, parsons being the art division. Man has been music playing, whatever.

no. Well, uh, so that education did end up paying off you because you were able to parlay IT do some incredible .

paid or unpaid .

internships. We want name names, but you've worked for people like viewing Chloe, marchesa, like all of these massive luxury fashion labels. What do you think is like the biggest hot tip or thing that you learned while doing that?

You know, I think they were all very different. Chloe, I remember for assisting with a lot of their market weeks, which is essentially one stylist m buyers are coming and seeing preventing the new collections and seeing what they you don't want to feature and their magazines are what they're buying for stores.

And um you know some of the people that were working with you, the people that were like VP and one od would be like bring style like V C zero zero seven eight. The one would like the black stripe that would run back there. I was like .

I need style VC zero zero eight .

with a black. So you know learning to quickly be on your fee. But I loved, I really loved Chloe when clare rate color was there at the time for creative or director.

And i'd loved the way that he did this bohol feminism into her pieces, and how everything was still flowing in like a tonal color. That's what I love there a lot. And you know, is a prison fashion house.

And yeah, that's what I learned there. You just speak very, very, very quick on my feet. Mm, but I don't know what. What is my cassa? My gaza was amazing. Working with you some of the most iconically a thereof beautiful yes red carpet moments yeah and you know hollywood in history and um being able to touch and sew those guns.

And I remember right before the runway show there was a government that we just had to so all together so we had ten people working on IT and women's, where daily was filming us. Georgina, they are saying something, should they come back later? But in the most posh, elegant accent, the way that SHE Carried herself, the way that, you know, cocreate drag, or at the time Karen crag Carried our self, is something that I looked at in women were, I was like, oh my gosh.

Look at the boys that they have, the way that they speak about, the clothes of their creative direction and how they work along side each other. That was inspirational. And vera is someone that you know, you bore vera for one of your winning. And so it's know via to a lot of us and a lot of it's not just asians either. I think people that have that dream of one day ginning married everyone the first vital designer or what designer you think of is vira yeah um and so see someone that have always, always wanted to work under in turn under um that was interesting because you know SHE has not just her bridal collection SHE has her ready to wear line um which is such a different side from brito for her it's a lot more dark it's a lot more it's mood is very is very good so seeing the me of how SHE explores the world of her bride but still try to reinvented for her modern vision of IT and then what he does is ready to wear um I think it's like a very call way of herself expression and you know everything she's early hieing and what she's really .

amazing when you go on a luxury website and just pretend I don't know anything. Like why are the clothes called ready to wear instead of just clothes? Because I if you go on like a regular website, like the gap, right, you can to be like shirts, pants, but like you go on a luxury site, it's a accessory, fine leather goods ready to wear is what does that mean? It's just like fancy wave saying .

IT that's so funny say that I think now that I think of IT, yeah because when you go on like gap, it's not going to say ready to wear. But yeah I think and there's nothing .

wrong with shopping at the gap. By the way, I do .

sponsorship .

just .

cutting, but I would say, you know, I think it's because when you are in luxury fashion, there's different divisions as you what you're going into. So for instance, you know with my queen, you're go on the queen's website, you'll see that he says ready to wear. Ready to wear would mean the pieces that are in stock on the share within their stores, in any of their stock cus, whether it's Better door slim and sax, you know.

So that's what that means where a bar will come in right after the fashion show a week after, and say, high, I I love all the jackets in this, let's do like twenty pieces of each for the store. And you know, Scott still at something when I D is and then, okay, they write this down, the writing the order they're saying, what's delivery day put in the order they get in in that's ready to where. Whereas, you know, then they have their oats and okata a catatonic is really something where you have to be accepted by the there's a special group in france that really approve if you go on this calendar and okata really isn't off the shelf and everything is really made to order, made too much custom.

And you know some of those pieces, especially when you're that type of a legacy fashioned house designer, you okar pieces. People are spending like upwards of like five hundred thousand dollars for one piece for themselves. Yes, and five .

hundred thousand is a .

house exactly. And people, you know like and these are people that.

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dot 点 com love fashion obviously have the money to be spending that much on IT but it's not like everything in okawa thousand dollars know some people spend seventy thousand， eighty thousand also it's a lot of for one peace. But I think people treated as almost as like art join some some so yeah I think that's why you know there's a different why people use that terminology of ready to wear, especially in the luxury industry.

Yeah okay. So now that we've talked about what a can cost, I want your pov on designer dupes, knock offs and people like who are essentially like shining and timing, like actual designers designs. What are your thoughts on that?

嗯。

You guys, this is so funny because you're getting such a press trained version of Andrew. This is not what he's like when we are out of a bar but like give us your real thoughts like what .

like what do you your actual thoughts? I mean, I guess if it's not .

hurting anybody .

really but god, I mean, I personally wouldn't do IT yeah I personally wouldn't do IT, that's my decision yeah. And if you want to do IT, then you should. But you know when people are you know buying these, like when you say tubes, you mean a counter fit or like a .

like I think I want your opinion on both like your what is your opinion on people being able to buy something that looks similar or inspired by verses, buying something that's counter fit?

Oh, what I mean, something that's like a dupe and IT sort looks like, you know it's it's fine as long it's not like a direct copy yeah when you are buying a direct copyright counter fit. I mean, I I feel like IT is a little sad because you people are doing that because they want to to fit within. I'm and I like. I just I I don't I wouldn't buy a counter fact and I just like, but if it's a due, i'm like, okay, like if it's like similar, what I really like, you know, i've seen speakers that I would like. I don't feel like spending fourteen hundred dollars and thinkers and if I see a dupe.

i'm like, OK yeah I only those ugly of socks sneakers like you what .

we're not naming names.

but I don't want to spend money on ugly socks neck ers. But if they're ugly socky kers that are twenty dollars, you can still get a couple good users out of and you feel good .

about IT like that's that's cool, yes. But I mean, the whole I mean, when i'm on take talk and scoring through, I didn't even know what people meant by when they go. I'm gonna you.

what? I gone on the gate and I was like, what is the eight dh? G, yes.

And I and I didn't even know what dh gate was at the time. So you and then really pretty girl was pulling out zippy. And that sounds just like the real one now is, oh my god.

So that must be a website. So I went on this website and I mean, they they can even show the locals on the Adams. It's imagine the LV von monogram logo, but it's like missing all the shapes and like all twisted in weird ways ago.

And I was like, what is all about? Like who's gonna to buy that? But I read the reviews in people's comments, wrote, don't worry about the images that they're using.

IT shows up just like the real one. So there's a whole world out there of counter of goods. But do you .

think counterfeit goods, like counterfeit goods, are hurting the industry or potentially helping IT up even more?

I would say hoping IT up even more because keyless seeing IT more and more all around them. And you know I think but I guess it's different with one who is buying those kind of that gods.

Wait, talking me about that. I mean.

if it's you know someone that lives in twenty five thirty million dollar home and drive the nicer cars and you know they have a lot of actual luxury good island and they threw some of those kind of the goods in, how what do you know unless like you know unless you're like a Tiffany moon where you're like, I know that stitches off on the right side by about meters from the video, but a lot of people not, oh god, I know you were you know I think sometimes when you are walking on the streets and you see something that looks like you're like like.

you know what I mean yeah like that bags .

just off exactly but i'm like those shoes are also off and that hair and make up is off today too. But i'm not i'm just joking in no but i'm just I think i'm asking so much about this question because I .

am I have recently been like rethinking my own consumption yeah because I certainly owe a lot of authentic designer goods and I love to buy them abroad so I can get a discount with the exchange and get the vat refund. But also like for more like season all things. I don't like spending that much money on something that I don't feel like I can wear all the time.

So i'm like there's nothing wrong, in my opinion, with buying a similar item that isn't exactly the same because who cares like people know i've got the cash to do IT. It's just like I want to buy what I want and I don't feel the need to prove anything, anyone anymore. I only buy things that I really, really, personally like now, right? But I don't think that was always the case. I mean, I definitely add like fake stuff, like IT straight up, just counterfeit goods, like at some point, like especially like end of college, early career, because that I thought I needed to be wearing.

That's the whole thing where I am going back to, like when people have this pressure almost to. Fit in fit in but you know I mean as long as it's not hurting anyone like yeah you have such .

like free attitude. I love that um but I want to pik IT I want us to talk a little about about your name sake brand. You started your label Andrew qin in twenty twenty one um how do you get a label off of the ground?

Like how does like I can't wake up to me be like going to start a fashion house? Vivian two. Like how do you do that?

Um you just get your favorite ite sweater and you cut out the brand name and you put your own and off. No fuck K, I spend all of twenty twenty. I will see twenty twenty part of twenty, no part of twenty nineteen in twenty twenty developing this business plan.

Why are you quoting when you like making air quotes? When you say business plan?

I've never been to, I never want to business school. yeah. Owning a business is not what I exactly thought I was gonna be like. yeah. So when I say business .

with big air quotes.

finger quotes, huge airports, you know. So I graduated from school from university in in nineteen. I was not sure if I was going to go work somewhere, if I was going to start my own business. And I think a lot of my closest mentors to me were always telling me, you know, if you're getting this attention from some of the work you did in your final year arts uni, why wouldn't you sort of write that left and just go for IT? Yeah so I went to my parents and I was talking to them a lot and um you know my mom is a business owner and my step dad is still a business owner and he told me, listen, I want you to follow your dreams, but I don't want to get sucked into IT I said I retired for a reason is .

i'm not cosigning .

anything is like, know I want to spend my free time with your mom not looking over your business and worrying about IT okay and but you know, lord and be hold he started started getting sucked in to IT every time I ran into like an obscure a bump, I was calling him asking for advice. And he's been one of my greatest mentors and one of my heroes and someone that I look up to.

And so that you have that kind of relationship with him.

And I keeping business plan because what I learned from when he stopped that is he would always tell me, listen, don't think about IT in a crazy. This, this stopped this mode, this module way right now.

Why don't you write your life out as a movie script? And in this movie script, what's happening? What's the beginning? What's the midnight? What's the end? What's between those three and how are we getting there? What are you gonna face when you're run in to? And just because you're writing IT out doesn't mean that I have to stay that way.

And what is like writing as if it's a movie script? I like a dream movie script. And so that's what he did.

I kept typing in the typing on my computer and I was ongoing um google 的 document。 And somehow, you know I enter a pivoting in a instead of doing evening, where is what I thought I would be doing? I went to bright all and I started seeing.

And as, okay, warm, there's not gona be a lot of events happening. There's not gna be a lot of red carpet happening. There's not going to be gala's. But I think girls are still going to want to get married .

somehow cause .

this when I grain twenty, twenty, twenty, twenty that was like what was in march, february yeah, one of those. And so I just start writing out that little movie script at home every day and you are gonna .

come a wedding .

designer yeah and okay, now I i'll see. So I roll IT out like, but what special to me, other than red carpet, whatever. And my the first waiting at once, he was my mom. yeah. Remember when I saw her walking on the I O SHE SHE had these tears coming down her face, and something about that moment really touched to me.

And I remember when I talk to my mom after that, I said, where are you're crying and he goes, I feel so guilty, he, that I want to be happy and start a new chapter. And IT doesn't feel fear to you and your brother and you're dad. And you know, something about that moment made me always think that I wanted to be there for other women in that important moment of their life, whether the first marriage or the second marriage or whatever IT was, and have that type of emotional impact on how beautiful they're feeling when they're walking on the island.

That dress um but yeah I mean, other than that moment, I would say that in the business perspective, at a lot of bad apple friends, that word like meaning my friends were bad apples during the pandemic where they would meet up with each other when everybody was dying outside and they would be sticking up to each other, other's houses and groups of like fifteen people, they would just be staying home. I just thought, well, i'm sure that people are you gonna have weddings in year four months yeah there's millions of people were engaged yeah and then london B O like you start seeing people posting, had to like a backyard wedding. Backyard weddings.

Like still IT wasn't like ten, like some people to ten people or some couples to ten people and some people did like fifty people. yes. So you know, I developed for a year that's .

actually incredibly smart.

So I started thus. Why I was was social media was the best thing ever, because I was looking at was going on. And the news can only say so much, but like social media is real people and real time yeah in a lot of things um so i'm like watching all of this and that's what is click to me honestly. So took about a year and the night launched through in in twenty twenty one, a business, you know, brito, a bride collection and then involved into evening. But that's a little bit of how that business started.

Now I have the big question because I learned this first hand a couple months ago. So I walk in to your italia. I'm like, I want a dress.

Now, what the fuck happens? What do we do? How long does IT take to make IT? How do you figure out what we're doing? Walk, everybody listening through step by step.

I, so the story line is, you, you not, you email, email your D. M. Some people like calling on that phone number on the website, which you which I always like you you never know if it's been or something anymore unless you it's a designated.

So for business owners that have this hype business, you must have like a designated phone and a phone number, not something that's redirecting those numbers to your phone because you're not gonna know. Yeah okay um but anyways, you get the appointment sometimes. I mean all our brights now in all our clients, we're getting like october, november of twenty twenty five right now.

Ah yeah .

but even with you too, I think that was like about a year out. Yeah, but I never at one point in the beginning, people would be doing six months out. K, eight months out.

Now it's twelve months out. yeah. So you come in, you look through the collection.

We always make sure to ask, we have like my team has a questioner form, like where do you live? Where's the wedding venue or event venue? What's the date? You know, we have to know like those details. So we conserve .

ather and weather .

exactly if there's a budget applicable to this. Are you looking for like veil with the gown or like, you know what, we just like to know as much of these house so we can be prepared yeah and make people feel like they're comfortable and we want to learn more because we we need to know more about them so they come in. I usually like sitting down with whoever comes in and with my team and just get to know everybody. And I I spent a good twenty twenty five minutes doing that, whether, you know, I would say a little bit different when you go to some of the designers that have been here since already, like the fifty, sixty, seventy, eighty, you're not going to exactly to the designer. A lot of moments you're going to one of their raps yeah and it's like, I like we're even .

going to like a bride studio or something when you go to like client files and try on a zild yeah and it's like.

okay like they're going to write down some information and be like let me take you to the room of a thousand designers and dresses and you're just picking whether I wanted you know it's about how you're making people feel really special and genuinely making them feel special like you don't want to make them feel like they just want to get a sale yeah for me, connecting with people some of the most powerful things, especially to do in new york yeah because that leads to amazing, beautiful friendships that last so many years.

Um but you know when girls come in and we talk for twenty, twenty five, thirty minutes, then i'm like OK so I get a Better idea of sort of who you are and what you're comfortable with, what you may be not comfortable with. So why don't we look through all the collections? And let's see, and if you have anything from instrument with the website that is let us know and many times everyone that comes in us, I have the safe and the safe and the same.

I think you even like, I have these saves, I want to show you, which is really helpful because then we're like, okay, you like this silly at, you like this sort of structure, you like these little details, you like this type of fabric. So we go and we look through everything. Great try on you.

Could some girls try on to some girls try on twelve? okay? Appointments last anywhere from, you know, an hour to two hours. Yeah, from then if they place order, they downtown to order. Really, we have a timeline of eighty twelve months with you eighty.

twenty and order than what happens.

Basically, you're getting deposit. We ask for a deposit once you get that deposit is how we secure your spare. We secure your spot in our time yeah and our sketches and because it's you have to think about in a way where it's not just the sketch le of one of the dresses are being made for any other clients.

Yeah, it's how many fashion shows are you having a year? How many trunk shows are you traveling for a year? Is at two, is at thirty.

Are you doing two shows year, doing six shows a year? And along that it's like, you know that takes four to six months sometimes to build one collection. So while their designers are building that collection, unless here a team that has one hundred people or two, three, four hundred people.

And you're working with a hotter, Younger, whatever designer, then that's why it's important to know. Okay, IT takes a elf months and so you put the deposit in that way, they're securing you in their timeline OK. We need at least four fittings, at least four visits.

We need to have at least two calls in between some of those visits, so we can just keep each other updated. You you have remember uren, whether it's two, White is four, whether it's six and. IT is important that you know we're able to schedule people and even if it's for twenty minutes.

but then what happens like we have to pick a fabric, right? We pick fabric. And then once we have the fabrics picked, you send IT. Do you saw everything yourself?

I think when you're going the round of doing something more custom, it's really choosing the fabric and getting into the really needy I of, okay, let's choose the fabric. What shape like broke up your super comfortable with? What neckline are we doing?

What type of clinton and petty coat are we doing? How long we want to train? How like what details do we do? We want to be part .

was incredibly overwhelming for me, guys. Yeah, because you would say these words and I wouldn't know what any of them meant.

Like, well, do you want IT like like a hard tool as the overly or do you want a bob in net?

And I can't spell tool.

It's tool. The thing that looks like a cloud on top and like that that that's tool. Yeah, that's different from a kino land because the queen is the heart.

Yes, I would like .

clinton would be what's structuring the skirt and sort of gives IT that shape. But you know when you're going customer out, there is a lot more details, which is why i'd be like twelve months you need IT. Yeah we still say eighty twelve months for styles existing in the collection with minimal to no changes.

So what you come in and you see you again and you, okay, I love this one. That's what i'm ordering. We're to mean exactly like that then you know it's you yeah, it's faster, but we still say eight to twelve months, whatever IT is.

Then they put IT in and then we do at least minimum of two fittings I like to do at least for, but I know my team is like we need to cut IT down and get IT to too. But I want to make sure that everything looks and feels perfect because if I see one little theme off and my serious, like its fine. Like like none now, like I am gonna have to see those photos yeah and I like.

no.

and it's literally my name yeah so .

by the way, you guys, this fun little secret is that if you get a dress from and requin, he shows your name into the dress. I don't know this is actually the case with everybody, but IT was for me in my dress, IT said for Vivian, it's really sweet.

So that's some cases. So so that was .

just the friends and family. Sorry, I should say that allowed. But IT was beautiful and I was like in like your rich bf f Green and like IT didn't make me feel so special. And I mean, I just I look back on my camera all and we have photos of us pretending to dancing. The stress for me to test out what I D dancing would be like in IT.

And like there is one where like pinning something on my chest and I like pretending to, like, look your forehead and like, I was just being a minute, but like, I have so many really positive memories. And this was like a very special dress for me. And I want to take second to talk about very special dresses for very special people. You've dressed folks from Lucy u to regino hall um and you know a big part of being in the fashion space is working with P R. And i'm curious when stylists reach out to designers to help make these dresses for these red carpet moments or four big sueb talent like how does that work and I do you get .

paid for that? Well, i'm very honor to be dressing women that loved watching grown up. Um but you know I think P R always tRicky yeah because it's not just let's see and you know this very well the talent the talent has their publicist.

The stylist also has their own agency, absolutely separate from the talent the talent meaning you know the celebrity who are whatever whoever IT is. So there are moments where you know brands are pain. Sometimes just a stylist oh.

brands will actually pay the stylist to have the talent wear the dress, not the other .

way around and the other way around as well. O okay, so IT works both ways, but now it's the whole conversation of OK wall. If the brand is paying the stylist, then shouldn't the talent also get some of what they're .

getting Better paid?

And so I think it's it's a conversation that's just beginning. Yeah and that's just really starting to be a explored more more because .

the talents probably paying the stylist, then the brand might pay the styles, right.

But you know and sometimes and sometimes that the styles are not paid as much as people think. Yeah and unless you know it's like the top, top, top, top, not everybody's .

delist is law roach.

So um you know I think it's a this is very interesting conversation with when i'm listening to all of this with working with stylists and telling the celebrities but not .

but especially a stylists are becoming celebrities now like I know who law roaches and like I don't work .

in fashion and so I think this is so interesting how like the careers that have blossomed out of all these industries. But um I I think with P R P R because we were the questions was about yeah sort of my thoughts on P R. And um I do love publican. They do help a lot and they have crazy jobs with crazy hours and crazy needs. Um but there are also some of the most stressful people that I have ready emails from yeah and I unsurprising .

yeah and like .

my my heart has like things at times that i've read texture emails. P R people because they can some some P R people are so nice and some P R people could be really not nice at all yeah when they are not happy about something little dramatic sometimes yeah but you know it's this industry is an easy like our industries are not easy, especially when you're working with people with very big personalities um same things that they are not afraid to say. But I think money is a huge driver of IT.

Whether it's how long how much longer is a retainer left on four? I was at three weeks. Are you extending? Are you not extending? If you're not extending and we have three weeks last, well, IT takes about three weeks for us. This sort of I set out yeah on board. So yeah so it's A I think money drives so much of the industries that we're in yeah and how people are feeling at the end of the day and how they're going to when they're sort of exciting out or what whatever is going on. And I don't know that's a good thing or a bad thing.

but IT feels like those who have the pockets to pay to play are gonna get more play yeah, just because they can afford to. And you talk about, you know, people who are in nice, people who aren't nice, I have to ask, and I ask all my guess, what do you feel like the biggest money mistake you've made, whether IT be in your life for building this business.

has been I can only choose one or like a couple.

You have so many years like I won .

to share them on, tell me OK. So I think one would definitely be wasting time, wasting time because everybody y's time is super valuable, is especially your own when you own your own business. Yeah and you have other people weighing on you know their time and their money that they're listed in you you have to be considered that. So when you're lying down in bed because you're sad about something that didn't go right and you stay in bed all of monday, you just waste in a whole day that could done something. Yeah, those are still moments that I looked back where i'm like.

oh my god.

the time is money. exactly. I think other mistakes that I have made before were when I I was really a team of one for a very long time and then I had someone helping out a little bit and then turn a little bit more full time that didn't work for that much which I am so you know thinking for and we had the best friendship that losses from that um but there was someone that I hired at one point and I think you know having them say they wanted be on the retainer.

Is that okay? And I go, I trust you so much that i'm going to put you on twelve months and I think, but I forgot what even offer. But IT wasn't twelve months.

I was lower than that. I go less to do for two months gonna amazing. And IT wasn't like five hundred dollars if you know how much retainers with you know, the people like sales directors or P R.

Directors or whatever IT is, it's like three, seven thousand a month. Yeah and you have to I have to be more on top of IT, but I wasn't. And when they said that they would commit four days a week to me, where was four days a week with the work? There wasn't.

And you can't let people tell you that are working for you. You can call IT with you or for you whatever. But you know, when I would say when you're working for me, you know, I was corrected by that person to say, I wanna say work for you, I work with you. We work with each other I go, honey, I pay you yeah so while i'm paying you, i'm not saying IT in a demeaning manner. I'm saying i'm painting when I want the time out of IT and the work out of IT.

Yeah so I don't want to the very .

minimum exactly. So i'm like i'm not don't tell me that it's oh, we're just waiting to hear back on an email. Oh.

we're waiting to hear back. What are you doing?

Waiting exactly something like what are you doing? What you're waiting, let me see the other list of the reach out side we're doing in your contacts and then they go, what do you want me to do if i'm waiting? I go year, year.

The person in the industry that had forty years plus experience. So you ask me what I think you should do. That's why I hired you. That was a mistake. And that was a mistake for me getting too excited and putting way too much in IT to say, oh my god, no, no, I don't do six months or twelve yeah.

So that was a mistake. I like you, got excited because the first employee was so good. You thought everyone was gonna so good. And that's not.

But you, I think what that these types of people do very well, as they show much more interest in the beginning, and they are an amazing talker. They can sell anything that point because they know that they are going to be able to if they are able to talk their way through IT, it's sort of sell what they're saying, yeah and then it's going tie to that contract. Um so if you want to go and take crazy speech courses and trick people just can was in tricking. But yeah seriously, I think that was a huge lesson that I talking about right now because that was a big like financial downfall for me at a starting point where I thought I god eight nine months went by and I spent that much and I had to let that person go because um knows insane .

and um they didn't do IT yeah um even though you have those money mistakes, you've clearly continued to thrive. I want to know what's next to .

one what's. Next for Andrew quan, I mean, I love frequently.

Interesting really. Well, I know you do, because every time I come over to the apartment, you got like five empty bottles. So exactly.

So you know, I love, love, love frequently. yeah. I would say free, granted, is something that I love.

I love hotels. I love like butch. I love a lot of just luxury items.

Look at this kid from colorado talking about how much he .

loves luxury. Seriously, I love cars. I love hotel.

But are these all things you are going to try and get into.

you know, whether it's like a collaboration or a partnership of something? I think really I always seem like the sky limit. It's not I can be like, oh, Andrew quane car, but if you could be a partnership with the interior like .

something deciding that I may be amazing.

I mean, how exciting would that be and making IT more cool and more relatable to like our generation. Yeah um but fragrance is something that I do love um I know people come on about my freking skin .

yeah again, clean.

good but I do love cosmetics and skin and care so these explore .

I ve o well, thank you so much for being here. Tell everyone .

where they can find you in Vivian's living room potato chips just kidding. And you can find me in C M. Andrei underscore official or is that com?

Thank you so much for .

coming to things we're having.

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