Remember when it seemed as though Marc Jacobs would be confirmed at Dior any minute, and even Jacobs’s closest, most fashionable friends felt awkward around him because it was such a huge elephant in the room? You can also probably recall that the talks later broke down for vague reasons (possibly because of disagreements over salary, it was said), but Jacobs reveals in his new Vogue profile that he wasn’t really gung-ho about the job to begin with. “I don’t dream of doing anything else, or I didn’t,” he says. And despite all the editors who were hankering to see him try his hand at couture, as the Dior job would require, he just couldn’t get that excited about it. “It’s archaic — in my opinion,” he says. “With couture, one dress each season is photographed by a couple of magazines; there’s no advertising; it reaches 20 customers.”
Jacobs — who rarely grants interviews — opens up to Jonathan Van Meter about a number of other things you might harbor some curiosity about (his relationship to Lorenzo Martone, his non-relationship to his mother). This may or may not have something to do with the fact that Van Meter openly admits to having a crush on Jacobs: “I am only slightly embarrassed to admit that my 25-year-old self tore a picture of Jacobs out of a late-eighties Vanity Fair and stuck it on my fridge. Let me conjure it for you: nude but for a pair of black motorcycle boots, lying in a bed with strategically arranged sheets.” Anyway, here are the more interesting nuggets from the piece.
On Dior:
There have been on-and-off conversations about Dior. I don’t know; maybe someday in the future, maybe years from now, I may end up going someplace else, maybe Dior. But right now I am at Vuitton, and all that matters to me is that that’s where I am and I’m going to keep doing my thing … The irony in all of this is that I don’t dream of doing anything else, or I didn’t. My greatest challenge is to do something better than we’ve done the season before. The idea of couture doesn’t hold that thing for me. It’s archaic — in my opinion. I mean, I am really interested in the craftsmanship behind couture. But I can explore all that in ready-to-wear. With couture, one dress each season is photographed by a couple of magazines; there’s no advertising; it reaches 20 customers. I don’t feel there is anything lacking in what we do. I get to work with these amazing craftsmen. Maybe not the same ateliers that would make a couture dress, but, again, we are not in a deficit for working with people who create beautiful things. I am not sure I ever looked at couture as this great opportunity.
On his estranged family (he hasn’t spoken to his mother in twenty years):
I hate this idea that you have to love somebody because they are your family. Nobody can tell me what I’m supposed to feel and who I am supposed to feel it for. I don’t blame them, I don’t hate them, I just know that I don’t feel love for them. That’s all. And I am not going to make the call or try to stay in touch because society says, But it’s your mother. Oedipus, Schmoedipus.
On his relationship with ex-boyfriend Lorenzo Martone:
We are best friends … We speak to each other, I don’t know, six times a day … I thought it was going to be very sad moving into my house. I’d planned to move in there with Lorenzo. But it turns out, I am so kind of engaged in work, I am just not having those dark, sad, lonely feelings … But I always sort of want to end a statement like that with … today. I imagine I will have days where I think, What’s this all for if I can’t share it with someone? But that’s not the way I’m feeling right now.
On not caring what critics say:
Honestly, I think any woman who comes into our shop — she buys a dress because she likes it. She doesn’t really care what the references are or what a critic writes. Fashion isn’t a necessity. It pulls at your heart. It’s a whim. You don’t need it. You want it.
And with that, go forth and finish up your Christmas shopping!