Ian Wright: That’s a good question. It probably comes back down to being with your teammates. That’s what you miss most when you stop playing: the camaraderie, the togetherness. In the moments when you win, but especially when you loose. Sometimes people think that football players don’t have normal lives. That they don’t have sorrows or problems like anybody else. But of course that’s not true. The only difference is that you always have people around you to share them with. 

Yes! The connection you build up while going through so many ups and downs, lasts for a lifetime. With some players I’ve been together every day over seven or eight years. It’s difficult when you stop being an active player and have to spend your days on your own again. Quite a challenge!

When I was younger, I was a terrible loser. I would cry on the football field and I wouldn’t speak to anybody for days. But luckily I got a coach who teached me that losing is just part of the game. When you are asked about football, you wouldn’t tell at first: „Oh, I remember when I lost the Final. Oh, I remember I didn’t score a goal!“. Instead, you think of the great things you did. But what gives you joy with the great things is what you learn from losing. 

You lose way more often than you win. Not many people can win the World Cup, The Premier League, The Champions League. It’s only gonna be one team that can do it. And the other teams have to loose. The earlier you can accept that as a player, the happier you will be. 

Absolutely! What I often explain to young people, is that you have to embrace losing. Ask yourself: „What could I have done more, so that I don’t have to have this feeling again?“. This is not only about football. It is also about playing the big game – life. Learn from every defeat! You must not simply be angry, then nothing will change.

Football is a gift and it’s for everybody. I’m in a position now where I’m able to advocate for it. This is now my passion. I want to speak up about things that are not yet working well and I want to improve them. It’s also important to me because my granddaughter plays football and wants to become a professional.

I wish for her to stay free from injuries. She shows great potential, and I hope she can make the most of it. When she was a little child, she used to sleep with the ball in her hands. Now she’s 10 and when you start playing so young, many things can happen on the way to becoming a professional footballer, whether you are a boy or a girl. So all I want for her is to be able to continue to enjoy playing without injuries. 

Football brings people together. It is about the unity, the togetherness. When you walk around Berlin right now, you can see all nations – Scottish fans, Hungarian fans, Albanian fans and so many more. And look at this place, the Home of adidas Football – what a brilliant idea to make it accessible for everyone. To provide a space to people to celebrate for free. 

The fans are so important, they are the only thing pure that’s left in a game that is so much about money. More money for the payers, more money for coaches, more money for everyone. But when it comes to the fans, it’s often about „take, take, take“. Give them something back! Without them, it is not the same. Look at the atmosphere here at the stadium. Look at the Dutch fans dancing in the streets – that’s what it is about.

It’s been amazing so far! If the teams were able to play to the level of what the fans give, this would be even better. Because the fans are fantastic!

I’ve been skateboarding since I was eight. Once you’ve been in the skate scene, you’ll never lose that passion for skating. Back when I was skating, I often saw shoes that I thought were cool. I was never allowed to get a shoe over 30 euros. So that the shoes last longer, I always glued over them. That’s where this love of sneakers and the connection to fashion comes from. I have also been really interested in interior design as well. Being a child, I always saw windows and houses that were really cool. Shapes that I already found really great. Very early I also wanted to be a hairdresser and have always cut my own hair. I was always kind of a creative head.

The first thing I sold was not from my brand NO/FAITH, but through my personal Instagram. I made shirts at skate camp back then with screen printing. I printed a lot, took them to school and sold them. That was kind of cool. You sold a shirt for 15 euros at every break. They actually sold well, there were only 30 shirts, but still, it went well. I mean, the shirts cost 2 euros and screen printing ink costs maybe 3 cents for a shirt. That was already a cool feeling. Then I bought my first awesome Jordan in 2014, but I sold it a year later to buy my screen printing machine. The first jackets I released for NO/FAITH, I went to military stores, got some blank jackets and asked my grandma, if she could sew a patch on it or sew a long stripe, so it looks cool. That was not a thought out design but that was just like, I want to make jackets now. At that time I couldn’t yet screen print. I had a print shop here that did it for me. That was not on any level. But somehow you start.

NO FAITH means that you shouldn’t trust anyone but just do your own thing. That’s always been the mantra. I mean, I live in the Eiffel. If you don’t live it, it’s hard to get ahead at all. The name describes this attitude of just believing in yourself, just doing it no matter what anyone else thinks. I don’t regret anything I did back then. That’s kind of the main thing.

It’s very important to have a close team or community in the beginning. The biggest ones aren’t there all at once. They had a team too. If you don’t have that team, then you’re not going to get to the top unless you have somehow rich parents. For me it’s really important, that I have a team I can trust. A team, that I can argue with, have conflicts with and speak on the same level.

We have local tailors here in the area. Be it Resi, who is sixty years old and has knitted us sweaters and can design us any look. They don’t get it, but they can make it look so cool. In the end, the quality has to be right. That’s just Team Eiffel. Especially here, in this small community, you have grannies who have sewn something. That is simply my community and I really enjoy being here. That’s why I would never give it up, this loft. Even if I ever have space in Paris or Berlin, I still want to have a base to come down to.

I don’t have to go to Berlin or Paris and meet with like-minded people. I also just like to chill with the locals from around my place. I would also go to Fashion Week in jogging pants, but I don’t give a shit about that. I just want to do my thing and not have to talk to people at a loss. That’s not me. I’m not having conversations that I don’t want to have. That’s why this small community is so important to me, because I have my friends around. So, as long as I have my little base here, that’s the most important success. I often get requests from publishers or television channels. But if I feel uncomfortable, I won’t do that. Although I would perhaps sell more. Right now I just don’t feel ready for something like that and then I rather honestly say, that it doesn’t fit right now.

For me it’s crazy, because in the end, I have learned nothing. I never went to a fashion design school. I also don’t have parents who come from the fashion industry. That makes it even harder to get in touch with people. That’s why Instagram was the only platform that helped me. Without Instagram, it wouldn’t be like that now. It’s also amazing what difference a platform can make. So many people, live only through Instagram. But we want to reach this point now, at which we are independent of Instagram, so that the brand will exist when Instagram is already dead. We want to make that leap.

I’m a big fan of the early 2000s. We want to keep the Y2K aesthetic, but make it more modern. I’m also inspired by these used looks. Some of our pants look as if someone had just been on the construction site and got dirty. Just that used and deconstructed. Combining this used look with sexyness, that is what I wanna do. I’m also really into leather lately. I associate it with pure sex. With Denim, it would create a real fucked up look. I celebrate this combination of both things, this elegance but still this fucked up look, that breaks this elegant feeling.

It’s crazy. We did a pop-up store in Berlin in september. I think that’s why a lot of people from Berlin have them. We had one colorway that was only for the pop-up. In real life, it’s a completely different feeling, you appreciate it even more, when people buy your clothes. You’re just grateful that the kids are standing in line outside. They just want to spend money on something you made. There were also parents of one dude who lives in California and they were like, we really need these pants for my son who lives in LA. He really wants these pants. That’s just cool to see that people are willing to spend money on your stuff.  I don’t think there has been such hype for an upcoming fashion brand in a long time. We went there with a really good number of pants and it was all gone. I thought we had way too many pants. In the end, we still had three fucking pants. That was just mind blowing. People really wanted to buy only these pants.

The design was a quick ten minutes. The designs we do the fastest, they sell the best. In the end, you just have this drawing that somehow emerges in your head. It wasn’t a big inspiration from some designer or something. I was just thinking of designing a jeans wash, that i like.

These pants are very commercial for me, but still have a cool vibe and are pretty unique. It perfectly meets the spirit of our time. I think the price is also the most important thing. I once made the Denims more expensive and we sold much less. I think the price has to adapt to the target group. And what do you want to achieve? Do you want to go for quantity? Do you want to keep it limited? We’re going to have a lot of products that are limited. The flared Denims will be never out of stock, because with them we finance everything. In the future, we want to have a mixture of limited things that we have in small quantities and things that are simply always in the store. Otherwise we don’t have a store. We want to move from this kids target group to these people who buy leather jackets for thousands of euros. That’s the narrow path we’re on right now.

We want to focus on leather and denim. We believe that the two fabrics go well together and give a huge amount of possibilities. You can also make so much out of leather and denim.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen that in Germany. That’s why we don’t want to focus on hoodies, because there are already enough brands for that. We really want to work with the fabcris denim and leather. We just created the Wave Denim. We also made a bag out of the fabrics, a skirt, a dress and a coat. We want to spread denim out on to multiple looks. And now, with my new stuff, a new time is coming. First, I want to build a good team, that sticks together.

I’m just getting started with my friend Mo. I also hired my brother for customer service. Adi a very good friend of mine from the neighborhood, always helps me with packages. There was not a day where he hasn’t helped. We would rent another room, so I have a storage room. But that can only happen when we really have permanent stock. The problem is that I can not estimate the hype at the moment. I just ordered 500 denims and 480 are already sold. I have again only 20 Denims left. I just don’t want to take the risk and order more, because it’s a lot of money, if you are independent. I also have no investor, but I want to keep the circle small for now. So fast fashion, just doesn’t fit. For me, it doesn’t matter how much money an investor want to spend on you, the brand is your baby. I just wanna avoid to be forced to create something, I don’t like. If it’s the right person, it will fit.

This superficiality. This superficial thinking that you don’t get in somewhere if you don’t look like this or like that. If you have sweatpants on, you’re often not taken seriously. So, that’s what you got in this whole fashion world. You experience an extreme adaption in the community. Now that NO/FAITH has grown there are also people who have not looked at me before, but now want to connect. Right after my pop-up event I saw masses in my pants at a party. But I didn’t get in, because they didn’t know who I were. If it doesn’t work, I don’t need to prove who I am to anybody and make a big thing out of it. I accept how it is and leave it that way. I just want to be treated as if I were a guy who studies next to me.

The stylist just hit me up, that she needed an outfit for Kylie Jenner. We just talked on the phone and it seemed all legit. She sent me all the measurements and then we designed the boots. We also want to shoot soon with the boots in Berlin. With ten girls, we have it already pictured in our heads. We have only made a small delivery, with not such a large number of shoes, because we first want to see how it sells. The models also have a denim vests on, like a mafia. I’m definitely excited about that.

I think through shapes in everyday life. Be it a floor or tiles. Whenever I go to the city, if I see something that looks cool or worn out, I remember that. I don’t get inspired by this or that style. I do have brands that I celebrate. But my designs that are dropping now are more inspired by impressions I’ve seen. Everyday patterns. I saw so many unusual floors in Paris, that was just awesome. I also took pictures in a park in Amsterdam and in an industrial giant garage. We applied these shapes to a bag on a leather jacket.

To make that leap. From creating denims to putting out a high quality collection, that sells. We have the denims as a hedge, but it would be sick if the new stuff, would also sell. It would be so awesome to just create some sick dress, knowing it sells for 6000 euros. That’s unattainable for most people who have an upcoming brand and are independent. Recently however Sierra Kid, who is actually a really cool guy, bought a leather jacket for 2,200 euros. There is a person who just spends 2,200 euros, so he can wear this leather jacket. That is a completely different feeling, as if you sell 15 pants. But that’s why somehow this independent path is so cool, because it’s a completely different impression that you have as if you were under contract. I have to say that there is a lot of pressure on me and a lot of stress. So, this total package is just difficult. I really just want to create upcoming designs and don’t want to sit here and think: I’ve got scores that I have to do, I’ve got calls, I have to write with four productions at the same time. My goal for next year is that I focus on creating. I don’t think there’s any industry in Germany that runs it the way, we are doing right now, that really does such large numbers on its own. I sometimes think it’s so stupid doing it on our own. It’s important that we now have more structure, so that NO/FAITH can change and grow.

Somehow I don’t want to think about it. I just want to live right now. Live and enjoy. Maybe it will be over in 5 years. Nobody knows, but until then I had a great time and I did the shit I loved.

I am pretty excellent. How about yourself?

It was great, real smooth. That is the best you can ask for as an artist I feel like.

For me, Chicago feels like home. I was raised by my grandparents. You know, I’ve done a lot of traveling now because of my career, but Chicago still feels like a unique experience. There’s so much unspoken dialog in Chicago. Talking about empathy, connecting and relating with someone, I think the city is one of the places where it’s almost assumed that every person that’s from Chicago has had some type of similar experience. So for me, growing up there, I felt understood. Even early in my career when putting out music and telling stories that are really specific to my upbringing and experience, I felt understood by the city of Chicago because it’s a place where you can be so many things, you can be so many versions of yourself. It kind of enforces that you can just develop new sets of skills, things that you probably never saw yourself doing, having to communicate with people from different walks of life. Chicago is a really diverse and also segregated place. It’s one of the most beautiful but also most ugliest places and I think that type of juxtaposition really gives you a complete people. The balance that you grow up with is just different. But I mean, I’m biased because I’m from there ( laughs) so it’s hard to imagine it any other way.

When I think of home and the concept of home, L.A. is where I pay to live but to me, home is so much more than a transactional definition. That’s what my experience in L.A. is right now, I’m here for mostly career purposes and the weather etc. But mostly really for work. I’m coming here for something. I pay however much a month and then I get to live, right? But to me, my experience in Chicago was way different: over there, I know that I’m home because regardless of whether I book a hotel or not, I know I’ll have somewhere to stay. I know I have a community, I got people, I got family and to me that feels like home, it is this idea of safetyness. That, to me, makes Chicago always at the top of feeling at home.

It’s hard to quantify it as the biggest lesson but I think one of the probably most important ones that I experienced in my youth in Chicago was not really being open minded. I think part of being a teenager is being close minded, just like ‘these are the things that I like and I hate everything else’. I think that’s part of almost everybody’s experience as a teenager. For me also being like that, I think when I challenged myself or when I was challenged by people around me to break that down, I found myself enjoying my life a lot more. The type of community that was in Chicago really encouraged that and challenged all of these ideas of what was socially acceptable or normal, there were so many just following their own intuitions and beliefs. That is really an encouraging environment to be in because you start challenging and pushing yourself to do new things, things that maybe weren’t necessarily cool. Authenticity is something that was really unique to my teenage experience in Chicago, there were so many people around me that were just 18 and fully set on following their dreams. That type of energy is contagious almost, you know?

The most important thing that I do as an artist, maybe not even as artist but just throughout my day is I try to check in with the younger version of myself. Before the world gives you its opinion on you, you are just so much more free in your thinking and your soul, you’re so much more brave before you are ever shot down by anybody. You got an understanding of yourself that nobody else has. It is the freedom that comes with youth. You get to wear the purple shoes with your Barney jacket, just something that you would never recreate as an adult because it’s too embarrassing or it is not socially acceptable. The young version of you is so artistic, creative and brave. Throughout my day when I found myself overthinking or asking myself too many questions, a lot of times it is because I’m thinking about how other people feel about something but the young version of myself didn’t care. Nobody could tell me that something I liked wasn’t cool. And I think that’s one of the most important things that artists and creatives can do because: it’s so easy to just go with what’s popular and normal because part of artistry is still career, we are seeking success. We are trying to feed ourselves and our families, so a lot of artists end up doing what they think will be successful versus what they want to use as their form of self expression. I think the young version of me had that in check.

I think the first time I performed with my father, like at an actual show, was in 2017. We played a concert in Chicago at House of Blues. It was an annual concert that we did before the pandemic as a fund raiser in memory of my cousin John Walt and I brought my dad out to do GPS from “Bucket list”. I figured it would be appropriate to have him come out and perform it.

Yes, I think so, but more importantly, he was influential to the development of my mind. I think just early on, watching my dad really pursue music and follow his own dreams just kind of gave me the confidence and encouragement to do it myself. Just to see somebody go for it, you know?! But he was definitely influential to my music too, some of my chord progressions I just learned from listening to his music and some of my hooks are inspired by his way of layering.

To me, the easy part is the actual creation. A lot of times I’m not even thinking about how personal what I’m sharing is, it is just what was on my mind. So I’m writing it down, then I’m recording it and work on a song. That is the part that is really fun. The actual releasing of the music is where I tend to be a lot more hard on myself in terms of what I’m actually sharing, because sometimes, when I write something not realizing how personal it is, means that it is just a free ride. I’m not really thinking about what the words mean. What makes it ok putting it out then is knowing regardless of what is popular, I know that when I’m honest in my music, somebody will latch onto that for whatever experience they’re going through at the moment so it can help them too. I feel like by just doing that, I make some lifelong fans, people who will support me until I’m not on this earth anymore. That’s a really special thing, it is unique to being authentic and being honest in music, being personal with what you share. So to me, as scary as it is sometimes to say things that are so personal, I can’t really imagine it any other way. It is too important to me to just be me.

To me, it’s just context, you always have visual context for lyrics, for what I’m describing in songs. A lot of it is storytelling, specific to a certain time or place. Sometimes it’s like you leave up so much of the work to the imagination of the listener, but so many of my listeners have never been to Chicago and seen the street that I’m describing or how it was growing up there. So to me, it was really important to not be too literal with what I’m saying on the album. I wanted offer a visual, to give that same type of context where you can see the stories play out, whilst still be open ended to your own interpretation. Movies are such a tangible medium, it’s like live music. With music as a medium, I do feel limited sometimes with what I can or can’t say. With a visual, I don’t have to say anything, you can just look at it and see everything.

Well, we had a lot of help (laughs), a lot of people did things out of pure support, love and belief in the project. A lot of people just wanted to be a part of it. But yeah, to be very honest, I think films are just really fucking expensive (laughs). So probably if I had to just say transparently what the biggest challenge was, it would be figuring out how to afford to actually incorporate all of these ideas that me and C.T. Robert, the Director, and the team had to do the short movie. Thankfully we had resources and a lot of people that were willing to help, otherwise it would have been impossible.

I’ll say for context, that that type of challenge isn’t only a challenge because I’m independent, people on majors go through similar experiences. They might have an idea of something that they want to do, but they still got to get somebody to sign off on paying for it, you still have to get the resources and support. To me, I wouldn’t say that I would consider giving up the freedom of independence, but I am open to partnering and still doing things our way with whatever company. I’m not close minded to it, I never want to say never. But right now this is just what has worked for me and I’m happy with it. I definitely want to continue to grow, I don’t want to be pigeonholed into independence if it wasn’t working for me though. So whatever works best for me, I’ll be doing.

For me, I don’t necessarily consider empathy a part of everyone’s artistic mission. I don’t feel artists should be responsible to empathize. I would like to believe that every human has a redeemable level of empathy. But a lot of times as artists, you’re so involved in your own world. It makes it hard to come down and to really understand the people that are listening to you. I feel like I’ve always been a super empathetic person, so it makes it easier when I’m writing to understand my music from a fan’s perspective. I’m able to write from my perspective while using a language and words that create a story you can empathize with, regardless of whether you lived the exact life that I lived in Miami or not, but because it’s so human. What has always been important to me is incorporating that I don’t want the pedestal of artistry – I want to be big and successful as an artist, but I want to do it being myself. And with that comes a level of understanding from my listeners, they know regardless of what they’re getting, it would be me at the end of the day.

For me it is partially just nurturing growth. I think the more you nurture growth, the easier it is to remain authentic. Some people, like some fans, for instance, want a specific sound. They like a song you did six years ago, and that’s the song that they want you to continue to make. Some fans heard the same song six years ago and they hear you keep making that and wonder why you aren’t making something new. So I think if you were creating from the point of trying to please people, you’ll always be stuck at one level because it’s impossible to please everybody. I believe that to nurture your own growth, to take as much time as you need to really be honest and truthful to what you want to make is the most important thing you can do as an artist in life. That’s what I think will really push the industry forward. Like you just said – it’s not like the industry is really nurturing the idea of growth but I think fans do it and artists too, and a lot of niche communities within the industry. I believe it’s just a matter of mentally challenging yourself and staying grounded in truth and what you represent, not to say you can’t change, we are humans, I feel like every two years, I sound different (laughs). Some people would hear that and it’ll be a negative thing to them, but me, I love that about my music, I can listen to it and hear eras. I could hear my voice doing something specific and could tell I recorded that in 2016. The level of self-awareness that is required to be creative gets intense, but it deserves to be intense because creativity is really just self-expression. So you should be aware, nobody has the answers. It’s not like we need you to be perfect and really in tune and you can never contradict. I don’t think that is what people are asking for, they are asking for something that is real. And to me, that is exactly the way to do it, to keep nurturing your own growth.

Sadé would be a dream. And do you remember Child Rebel Soldier? It was Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco and Pharrell Williams. And they put out one or two songs. I would have them perform the two songs. And then, let me think about this. Maybe we would do something where we had A Tribe Called Quest performing with some type of crazy band like Roy ​Ayers or Earth Wind & Fire, somebody like playing for Tribe. Yeah, that’d be interesting. I needed more time to work out the kings of what they’re supposed to be and the specific bands but that would be the idea behind. I don’t want to take up too much time brainstorming (laughs).

In the United Center in Chicago.

Let me go through my phone because honestly I’ve been listening to the same songs for most of my life (laughs). I would say first, it would have to be Notorious Thugs by Notorious B.I.G. and Bone Thugs N Harmony. That was a really influential song that made me want to become a rapper. Then maybe Runnin’ by The Pharcyde because that I feel taught me a little about harmony and layering.

Yeah, you know, I really can’t wait to get back into the swing of touring and playing shows. In artistry there has been a lot of downtime which also made me more aware of what I want to do. There’s really no limit on what I see this year really being able to be.

Yes, it is scheduled for September 12th. I’ve been to Berlin a few times. I actually really like Berlin.

It was just always a good experience. I’ve only been there for shows, never to like kick it, but everybody was just really receptive. It was always a good energy and it felt just like a cool place. Also, I randomly have family in Germany too (laughs). I got a cousin out there, he lives in a smaller town, I could not tell you the name now. So it is always nice to play shows in Germany because I get to see my cousin.