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Thursday, November 19, 2009 12:36am PST
Five Questions Mike Gomez, Design Director at Matix Clothing
By: mull
Can you talk a little bit about yourself, like where you're from, your background, that kind of stuff?
I'm 10 years deep as the design director at Matix. I'm 35 years old. I'm the product of a youth spent riding the public bus from The Valley in LA to Malibu and Zuma. I also spent about five years in Santa Barbara that I don’t remember much of. But now I live in Venice.
How’d you find your way into apparel and other soft-good design?It was a combination of some dumb luck, some desire to avoid a real job, and a little bit of help from some friends. Basically, I took some architecture classes in my school days, so I had a basic understanding of design as a technical skill. I also spent most of my younger days surfing and skating, and if you do anything long enough you end up knowing most of the people involved. So, long story short, I basically bumped into the right friend at the right time, and he thankfully took a chance on me.
Can you run me through a typical day in the office?We're usually crammed in our dark design dungeon, running behind schedule. We get the occasional drop-in from Gabe Kling fresh out of the water and on his way to his next tropical destination. And we can usually hear Daewon skating the park out back while we slave away on his next jean sample. It is truly glamorous.
How far in advance do you work for producing a line?
We start drawing concepts over a year ahead of when product hits your local shop. It's hard to believe I guess,
but it takes a long time to draw then test and review and revise, and ultimately produce collections that are quality constructed, aesthetically interesting, proper fitting, and relevant to diverse global tastes.
The cliché answer would be to try and claim some obscure, too-cool-for-school inspiration source. As if I have some secret ubercool lifestyle. The no-bullshit answer is that Matix is simply inspired by the guys on our team that go out and bust their ass and expand our concept of what is possible on skateboards/surfboards/snowboards. My job is to just take their styles and needs and mold it all into the collection that we call Matix.
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