Please introduce yourself and your brand
My name is Jake Leone : owner, creator, fabricator, and all other titles of Buckethead Productions. As a recent graduate from Connecticut College majoring in Architecture, Studio Art, and Art History, Buckethead Productions is a culmination of differential interests that somehow come together into informative pieces of what I believe in through manifestations of form and narrative. Buckethead Productions focuses on the production of handmade crochetwear mixing masculine and feminine moments, continuously confusing the associative archtypes of each of these terms. A variety of textured and colored fibers are used in the fabrication of crocheting each piece by hand.
What inspired you to start your brand?
I knew I was going to school for architecture to never build buildings, for studio art to continue my understanding of form and pose questions of materiality, and art history to understand context and theory. Every class I took catered to an understanding that I wanted to be in fashion and could be informative to the creations sitting in my mind. Materials found on construction sites while working with my father had always been uniquely inspiring to me, questioning their function and capabilities to expand their use for sculptural work and wearable forms. Integrating hardware into such fluid crocheted forms seem to generate dynamic contrast with sensual seduction. While my father carried cement forms and built inhabitable structures, I sat and watched as I pieced together jewelry from everything in his toolbox. Ultimately, my father is a major inspiration for his work ethic and approach to projects he doesn’t even think of as high art.
Who is your ideal customer?
Emma Chamberlain. Emma Chamberlain? Emma Chamberlain! I would love to style Emma Chamberlain, Remi Wolf, Harry Styles, Frank Ocean, Troy Sivan, and the list could go on. To describe my customer would be someone who isn’t picking up one of my pieces and wondering why it might be so heavy, but wants to wear it as sculpture and understands the play on materiality and context of gender and sexuality. Some pieces may be intimidating, but someone who is excited about the challenge of styling a Buckethead Productions piece should have a Buckethead Productions piece. Something peculiar I find time and time again is that every piece I’ve made has found it’s proper home. It’s almost like I knew exactly who to make each piece for, and when they try it on and and we both look at each other knowing it’s theirs, it’s the universe working in insane ways.
What is the best thing about your upcoming collection?
These pieces have been sitting in my head since i’ve started crocheting two years ago. I am extremely thankful to have the space to show pieces like this, as I have been focusing my energy on more “sellable” pieces, safer pieces, as a means of immediate income and sculptural pieces for my honors thesis. Seeing these looks in physical space, holding whats been floating in my brain, is indescribable. It is a mix of my favorite materials to use, incorporating repurposed hardware and fibers common on construction sites like my fathers. The most satisfying part of the collection for myself as a designer is looking at these pieces and seeing exactly what I anticipated communicating and validating the trust I have in my approach.
What are the top 3 skills that fashion entrepreneurs need to have?
Pure Insanity, Insomnia, High Metabolism. Immediate answer but more genuine answer : Extreme Work Ethic, Confidence, and Mental Stamina. If you have the vision and you know you have taste, you have to put everything you have into what you want to create. Something that i’m still learning is how to not depend of validation to know what you’re making is “good”. You know the feeling when you’re holding something that’s so right and it’s something you know needed to be made, that it’s lacking in the world that you know. If you can’t work around the clock and you have hobbies, you might want to give them up or if you have them already it might be too late! And mental stamina because you have to allow yourself to have the highest highs and the lowest lows while knowing it’s all part of the process.
What is your advice for those who want to start their own fashion brand?
Do it. Never feel the imposter syndrome, never feel insecure, never feel not worthy enough. If you don’t see your perspective out there, it’s your job to show people what they’re missing.