[CLASSICAL MUSIC]
When we first met, I think about year-end,
I said to Fernando, like, do you want to, like,
leave and start our own company?
And he's like, nope.
And then five years later, do you want to leave?
And he's like, nope.
And I said OK, fine.
And then like six years went by, and I asked him again.
I was like, I think it's time for us to start our own company
and Fernando's--
She would ask me basically every week--
--like, I'm OK.
--and I'm like, I just got my dream come true.
Can we give it a second before we do our own thing?
When we realized that everyone looks at us like we
are Oscar's kids, Oscar's DNA, that's when I really
told Fernando, before it's too late,
we need to define our DNA as, uh, Laura and Fernando instead
of Oscar's children.
It took a little convincing for me,
because I felt I hadn't learned enough to start our,
uh, own brand, but like Oscar always said
and Laura continues to do with me,
sometimes I need a little bit of that push to, um,
take the leap.
[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]
Monse say is Fernando's mom's nickname.
Her real name is Monserrat.
Her name is from Spain.
I met his mom.
And she introduced herself, oh, my name's Monse.
And I've never heard that name before.
And I was like, that's actually like, a very powerful name.
And she's really feminine, and she's, um, very pretty lady,
but there was something masculine about the name
that I really loved.
So when we started our line, Fernando's like,
should we call it Penelope?
I'm like, no.
And then--
Monse at one point was Penelope,
--and you--
Then the second name was--
Um, the dog we love, Phoebe.
Phoebe.
But then that was too much like the "Friends" character,
so we moved on from that.
Yeah.
And then I was like, what about your mom's name?
Because I love how it's written too.
And--
It's like, five letters.
It's like--
Yeah, and it's very like a rectangle.
Short.
Yeah.
Fits into a nice shape.
It's good for branding.
And I love his mom, so we named it after his mom.
The biggest lesson that we can teach about the name
is if it doesn't feel right, it's not right.
It's very instinctual.
You have to follow your gut.
It's going to be something that you're
going to be hearing for the rest of your life.
It has to ring true to you.
[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]
Our aspirations initially were just
to make sure that we didn't look like a mini Oscar de La Renta.
It was important for us to make sure
that it looked like we had fresh new ideas about how
we thought people should wear clothes right out of the gate.
And we wanted to make sure people understand that we're
not just Oscar's assistants.
So we actually went through--
I think we sketched the first collection like, five times.
And every time we had a new set, we'll show people.
We'll have like, editors come in, like, friends come in.
And they're still like, oh, it still looks like Oscar.
And we're like, OK, let's start again.
One of the great things about having a network of people that
have helped you at another company is they come, uh,
to see your clothes right when you're about to launch
your-- your brand.
And Carine Roitfeld, who is the founder of "CR Magazine,"
revered editor, decided to pay us a visit
and helped us filter out the things that
felt unnecessary or perhaps, you know, already
existing in the market, like Laura said, because they
were at the Oscar shop already.
And it wasn't just for our egos.
It's actually super important for market
to launch something that doesn't exist already.
It's true.
Like, if we make a beautiful Oscar skirt at Monse,
it could be even prettier than what Oscar at the time
was doing, but people don't come to us for Oscar skirts.
They're going to go to Oscar to buy Oscar skirts.
So even for business reasons, we really
wanted to be something that doesn't exist in the market
already.
In the beginning, you can't really target everyone.
So we kind of like, narrow it down to who we want to be,
what kind of customer she is, what floor is she shopping.
So we actually started it--
in a way, it was more like a niche
rather than I'm going to target everyone.
Mm-hmm.
And I think that that is-- at the end of the day,
for the first year or two of your brand,
is you have to make product that is niche.
Because people are only going to come
to you for that deconstructed shirt
that you developed that nobody else has.
So once you have that one product that is fresh and new,
you multiply that every other season and then
do versions of it the season's after.
And that becomes where they come to buy the deconstructed look.
We didn't know that we were going
to do a deconstructed look at the beginning.
We just stumbled upon it.
[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]
It has to stand out.
It has to be niche.
It has to be one-of-a-kind, nowhere else can they get it
but at Monse.
I do think it's important to start
a brand with something like, high fashion, like,
very special, so people like Selena Gomez
will wear it for you and then the word will spread.
And then you build your commercial part
of the collection out slowly.
Not over six months, more like within three years,
you kind of build it out to a bigger audience.
I mean, Selena Gomez was so great for us.
But, uh, that was also the beginning of street style.
Yeah.
And Monse it isn't a brand meant for a red carpet.
It is a brand meant for street style more than anything.
So there was a perfect alignment in the universe
where street style became the new red carpet.
And lo and behold, we had enough people
to want to support us to have these girls walk around
the street and be photographed.
And the photographs that they got through street style
were getting more attention than the red carpet's
perfectly-polished gowns.
Because I think more people relate to--
Yeah.
--street style.
Yeah.
And it was more affordable.
You have to also tap into what's happening in society,
not just develop a product that is unique
but how it's going to be worn, how
it's going to be shot, where is it going to live online?
Instagram was beginning when we started Monse.
All that factors into standing out.
[ORCHESTRA MUSIC]
I think it's really important to listen to yourself,
surround yourself with very creative friends,
and make sure you look at all the new art, new TV
shows, whatever's hot.
Something-- you have to make sure that culture is permeating
through you.
Because subconsciously, it's going to affect your design.
However, like, objectively, I design things
that I miss seeing.
So if I feel like at Monse that it's the right time
to go with this type of a blouse or a jacket
just because my mind is hungry for it,
I haven't felt it around me in any way, shape, or form-- not
in a movie, not in a red carpet, not in a New York City street.
It excites me to see it again.
I want to try doing a new version of it.
And the same thing for Oscar.
And even if it's like, the idea is boring, if your eyes
and you trust yourself, like it, I feel like it works.
Yeah.
Instead of like, overthinking it,
like even if it's like, a dumb floral print.
If you really like it, sometimes it's
actually much stronger than a very abstract idea of us
trying to figure something new.
Yeah, and that's something that's
very important for every brand too.
You know what?
Stick to what you're good at.
I have tried to do other things at Oscar and other things
at Monse, and it's just-- just hone
in what that brand is known for, and celebrate it unabashedly.
Yeah.
I love it when I see other brands that I have never cared
for design-wise, but I see how brave they are in going
for that ridiculous color and cut.
And I'm like, you know what?
You're doing something right.
Because that's what people go for, and that customer
is going to come to when you really
believe in what you're doing.
[DRAMATIC MUSIC]
Trust your gut, your instinct to know what you can do
and what you can contribute.
You have to be OK to take risks and make sure
that you have a Laura to defend you when you're being chewed
and destroyed apart.
Or I threw you under the bus.
Look what Fernando did.
[ORCHESTRA MUSIC]