The name for the brand comes from the owner's shared love of good food, and The brand's founders are Greg Lucci, Greg Johnassen and Jon Buscemi. They all have a shared love of good food (which is where the brand's name comes from) and they kindly served me up this tasty IV.
Hey guys, thanks for your time. Tell us a little about yourself and how you came to fall in love with the wonderful world of sneakers and urban style?
Growing up in early 80’s New York you were engulfed in changing ideas, new music, unseen fashion and all the rest. We lived when the Air revolution first dropped and when Adi shell toes dropped. Influences like this change things and I think the entire movement from the time to the music to the shoes/clothes drew us in.
What’s your definition of & approach to style?
Style comes down to attitude. Yeah its’ about the simple things and classic elements like the right jeans or boot or sneaker or the way you wear the cuff of your trouser and all that bullshit. But I know way too many guys that study GQ.com or ACL blog and have the right button down with the perfect collar and belt and shoulder bag and hand made boots etc, that couldn’t hold a conversation worth a fuck. The attitude is the style.
What led you to start Gourmet?
We were throwing around the idea to start a brand together, we were all at certain cross roads in our careers. We all had and still been working at huge corporate brands and were, to be frank, sick of making millions and millions of dollars for strangers and unappreciative people. It was time to start something fresh and new.
Your products seem to focus on key features from some classic shoes, where did this idea come from, and how do you apply this idea into your brand?
The mantra in our processes is to keep design familiar but with a touch of gourmet. Meaning, no one here wants to re-invent the way you wear a shoe/sneaker. We like to take an inspiration, reinterpret it and add a spin. That’s what we want to wear. The shoes we make invoke a certain thought of nostalgia. The statement made is that the design is famailar with a new attitude or feel.That’s what keeps us hungry and makes us step the game up each season.
There have been some incredible innovations in the sneaker world, how far will you go to harness these innovations within Gourmet’s work?
This is thing we love about our industry and what we embrace and try and add to. We like to use ideas from the past and make them better and use ideas from the present and implement them into our current designs. We have plans for taking current technologies and “flipping” them into classic pieces.
Who is your product range designed for; you, or for others?
This is a great question and asked of us quite often. We design and produce shoes for us to wear. We do not think of the consumer at any point in the concept and design. Each season we set out to create a seasonal wardrobe for our feet. Period.
What are you wearing on your feet right now?
It’s raining today in NYC and I threw on our Quadici model in neon yellow. It is water resistant and perfect for a drizzle in NY. We did the neon yellow colour as an ode to late 80’s colorways and the neon era.
Finally, what’s next for Gourmet?
We are currently working/designing on our fall 2012 collection and will be previewing our spring 2012 in the coming months. There will be many surprises in the next few months. Stay tuned…
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