La Double the Fun

30:47But it's just interesting to me, you mentioned spirituality and anyone who knows you who works in fashion knows that you bring that into your energy. And I was talking to Leandra Medin who did the forward for your book, about you. And I said, what should I talk to JJ about? And she said, honestly, we always end up talking about spirituality. And Leandra and I became close when she was doing Man Repeller. And she would come to me and we would talk about the business. And even though I was a reporter, it was kind of like she wanted to know what I thought about what she should actually do. And so much of it ended up being driven by how she felt and how she her gut instead of saying like I said to her I'm like you have an amazing media brand that that could do well um you should keep doing it but she knew that she needed to end it and um I'm just curious like you said you you still work with your ex-husband and of course like your business partners sometimes you have to just kind of stick it out.

31:52That's the spiritual practice, Lauren, literally working with your ex-husband. That's the spiritual practice. Exactly. So like you have managed to do that. The other thing I was thinking about is like being an executive, you're obviously creative, but you're also a business owner woman in Italy is still, I'm always amazed by how it isn't like America where women are, you know, even if there is still sexism, you're at least like they act like they're treating you equally in America. Like it's still, there's a lot of sexism. There's a lot of just because I spent more time there in the last year, just experienced it, not myself, but like heard stories and things.

32:36Do you feel like, I guess the first question is, do you feel like all the challenges as an entrepreneur that anybody has, do you feel like your sort of groundedness in your spirituality and how you use it has helped to navigate that stuff? Yeah, for sure. On the one hand, like, I'm very much about the energetic with people. So if there's anyone who's operating from one of those like patriarchal sexist places, like we're not going to work with them. That's number one. Yeah. So that's just going to exclude them. I personally have not felt that much frustration about being a woman in Italy. And I'll tell you, I have had been meaning running my company this way because the Italians are very, I think, bringing the best of my Americanness, which is being very clear, being very direct and being very organized.

33:35and at the same time, the sort of more feminine softness, playfulness, joy wrapped together makes a really good package that I have found most Italians, men and women, really like. And they like working like that. So I haven't felt, if anything, as an entrepreneur in Italy, the thing that has driven me more crazy is being an American entrepreneur in Italy, because there's just not the same hustle. And there's not the same, oh, my God, drive, like we will do anything like that blind ambition, which by the way, you know, is what makes the Italians so much more happy, because they're like, not thinking about their job 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

34:24So, but I would say it's really been that part of me that's like, guys, let's get up and move. Let's now, I want the answer now. No. Yeah. You know, that's what's been way more frustrating for me. Yeah. I can, I can understand that. It's, um, it's interesting to hear how different people navigate different things and also building a business there as a person who's of two cultures in some ways I'm sure is an advantage. Yes. Because you understand both sides to it. And there's positives and negatives to both cultures. And so it's really great to be aware of that and then try to just cull the best out of both.

35:09What I love about America and something that it just doesn't exist here is that Americans are born and raised believing that anything is possible. Yeah, that's true. And that mentality is really rare here. And so I'm really grateful for my American roots that way. I had a mom that was really like pushy and bossy and a career woman. And I'm really grateful for that. There's many things I'm not grateful for about that relationship, but that I am certainly grateful for. What did she do? she um it's funny she was her first job was selling ads in a like local magazine and then my my dad got sick when we were in high school so she took over his uh company he was selling life insurance and disability insurance to doctors they were sales people my parents were sales people so it's i actually really enjoy the sales part of the job yeah put me on a sales floor You're good at it.

36:15Put me in the showroom. I love to talk to people. I love to hear. And we have so much to learn from our wholesale partners, but even more so from the women who are actually in the dressing room. Yeah, you just did you just open the store in the U.S. this year? So we open the upper side or has it been there for a while? We opened the store in New York in May and it's really exciting. It's our third store in the U.S. the first one was supposed to open a year and a half ago but they got burned down in the la fire right before you're supposed to open so that was a was it in the um palisades village yes no it was across the street it was across the street from the village okay yeah oh man it was nuts oh that's what a shame what a shame i'm so sorry what was so incredible was being able to you know we open a store in palm beach and dallas in the meantime and they were great they were smaller they're smaller stores, but then we really concentrated all of our efforts on the US flagship being New York.

37:18And it was really interesting because we kept, you know, this is another issue that a lot of small brands do. You know, we can't always afford the best location, the biggest store, you know, you have to be so smart about getting the right opportunity in the right place that, you know, all these things, we don't have the luxury that a lot of other brands do of just like throwing down the cash. And so there was a big debate about where to be in New York. Should it be Soho? Should it be the meatpacking? Should it be the Upper East Side? And the Upper East Side felt like the right fit with our customer.

37:51But then like the stores were so small on Madison, and like they were getting more and more expensive. And so we ended up finding a wonderful townhouse on 69th between 5th and Madison, way better price, much more retail space where we could play with five different floors and do the raise your vibration stuff, the temple, the store, you know, so it was really a great opportunity. How does the customer, I'm sure some of them are very into it, but how does the customer sort of respond to the vibration stuff and the sort of more woo-woo elements of your personality? Well, I mean that in the best possible way.

38:34Totally. Very woo-woo as anyone who knows me or listens to this podcast. Absolutely. I mean, the way I approach this is that, you know, I always knew that there was something kind of energetically happening with the company. And, you know, my serious spiritual practice has been going on for like the last 15 years. But I never really talked about it overtly to our customers until COVID. and everyone was at home and there was like, it was such a shocking moment and people were kind of really open and available. And at that time, I just started getting on Instagram and starting using video to sort of talk about everything from alchemizing your emotions to like how to develop a spiritual practice.

39:21And we really received so much feedback from our community that wanted more information on this. And I had, I kind of had never considered that that might be the case. And so from there, we started organizing a lot of online gatherings. So we would, you know, over the years, I've kind of gathered hundreds of healers and teachers that have helped me a lot. A lot of people come to me when they need advice on where to go to, what a new modality. I've tried many things over the years. I've hosted retreats. I facilitate and retreat circle work, all this kind of stuff. So I started saying, okay, how can we, you know, do this in a way that is just optional for people?

40:04Because our company's mission that I started being more verbal about in 2020 was raise your vibration. It felt like everything we were doing was like an energetic pursuit. And that happens on many different prongs. So it happens on the product. You've got the color, you've got the pattern, it's optimistic. Also, color has a frequency. There's something going on there. There's an exchange. These clothes are an invitation to be open, to spark a conversation. Then the way we communicate, very friendly, as I mentioned before, open, warm, that's a vibration. The stores have all become what I call raise your vibration stations.

40:45So Dallas is an eclipse. uh palm beach is a chakra station milan is the divine mother cave new york is the um lighthouse and so on and so forth and then like also there's more literal product like the jewelry that we do like i'm wearing some of these necklaces here it's all 24 carat plate so it's not the cost of full 24 carat which is like throwing things over 5 000 euro just for a gold chain which is so ridiculous. So you're getting the luxury and you're also getting the frequency of the gold metal. Then we've got all the, this is how light right here, but we've got amethyst, we've got malachite.

41:23So the stones are emitting a property. We also have, you know, we're selling meditation cushions, those kinds of things. And some of our collections are specifically, you know, inspired by either my trips to Egypt or a recent one I did to Ireland for our most recent collection. So those are all kind of ways that people can get involved with it. But I also wanted to say, hey, if you want to go deeper, we also have channeling, breathwork, sound healing, yin yoga. Let's introduce you to the ancient Egyptian mystery school. If you're not into that, come for some amazing, sparkling Murano glasses, hand-blown by the happiest artisans you could ever imagine.

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44:51I have one question for you. Do you think of yourself as like an intuit or a medium or a psychic or anything like that? Like, do you identify as something in that way? Because I think it's a lot of it, like, if you're not a spiritual person, you could just analyze and say it's just a person who has a good sense of themselves and other people and they can see empath or whatever. But I'm curious if you feel more strongly about how you identify yourself in a spiritual way. I think every human on the planet is an intuit and a psychic and a clairvoyant and a clairsentient and a claircognizant. It's just how much of that you're aware of.

45:37So truly, I believe all human beings have this capability. you're not like born one way or not it's more just like all the kind of we get a lot of programming we get a lot of like beliefs tapped into ourselves and so what i've found is that a lot of these experiences that i've had whether it's plant medicine whether it's multi-dimensional channeling star consciousness etc has opened up way more awareness of things that are not happening in a physical way and just giving me a consciousness of existence beyond this physical body and this physical mind. There's literally a higher mind, a higher consciousness that I believe all of us have.

46:28And that for me is what a spiritual practice is, is like tapping into that. And once you do, what's so amazing about it is that that can really help you with the 3D physical world. Because if you start tapping into what's happening up here at the higher mind, and you start channeling it down into your body, into your thoughts, into your actions, I mean, I truly believe that my spiritual practice helped me develop this company. I really do. Oh, yeah. I mean, for sure. Because it's also about knowing yourself. and it and i think they're one of their yes you were one of the only or the only um english speaking journalists i think i was let's be honest but you were you were larger than life jj like and i that is not everybody is like that like you you had such um you always had such um like self you really understood yourself and you could you care you had such a presence like i I remember seeing you at shows the years ago and just being like, oh, she's so she really knows herself and doesn't look like anyone else and all of that.

47:43Like it's just so and you need that sort of self-possession or whatever to be able to to build something. And I guess the question for you is like, what is your ambition with it? You're you're not afraid of commerce. You're not afraid of making money, but it also you want to do it in the right way. like, what do you want to achieve with this? Like, where do you see it in a few years? So one of my goals has always been, I mean, number one, let's be profitable. Because like, other way, you know, yes, that's literally number one, let's be profitable. But together with that is, I want to create a conscious fashion company.

48:27And I mean that on the level of everything that we do so that the product actually means something and has actually added value to someone beyond just a possession, beyond the superficial pursuit of consumption. And I really think that beauty, which is such an important concept in our life, and I believe it's actually a very high frequency. I mean, all those Renaissance churches and all that Renaissance art that was happening, that was like super high consciousness coming through. You know, like there's all this. So I believe in beauty, but I believe in it being used in the right way, in the controlled way.

49:17I don't want to use that word controlled, but in a conscious way so that we're not just blindly stuffing it down our throats and getting, you know, completely, you know, binging on this. Like a foie gras. Exactly. Like a foie gras. That's what was happening for years. It was, that's what was happening in, in fashion for years. It was just give, give, take, take, take, take, take, take, take, sell, sell, sell. And then it lost all Exactly. And I honestly, I care about the customer. Like I want to have a company that actually means something to these people that we're not. I don't want anyone to ever think they're taking advantage of me.

49:59Oh, my God, I just saw that item that they sold for this now on sale. We don't put our stuff on sale. That's also part of the pricing strategy. We never go on sale. Yeah. So an honest company, like how can we create beauty, share beauty? I mean, I have this wonderful life coach that I'm working with in Santa Cruz right now. She's not that really fashion forward. And I went to go visit her over August and I brought her one of our like most classic sets of the large shirt with a palazzo pan. She has worn this outfit like 14 times for all of her big presentations. She keeps sending me these videos being like, I feel so good.

50:37And I mean, I would like that to happen for as many human beings as possible. And I would like to grow it so that this can touch as many people as possible. And I don't think we need to look at numbers of like, I have to hit the billion, I have to hit the 500 million. You know what I'm saying? Like, it really just needs to be, what's the word? Not spontaneous, but like natural. It should feel natural. But also what's so important to me is that the people working inside this company as well feel good. They feel valued. That we're all, you know, and we're really working a lot with all of our new stores and the people working in there, the kind of attitude they have, the conversations, like all of this.

51:24So, yeah, a fashion, a conscious fashion company. I think all of the Marie on your team, who is amazing, sent me kind of your rundown for the fall of what you're working on. And it is so clear from all the sort of strategic initiatives that you have going on, if you want to be MBA-ish about it, that this is how you're practicing it because you open the store in the spring that is a big commercial effort. then you're doing a mahjong collaboration you have this amazing book coming out and then also you're during this is going to run the friday of milan fashion week so i think i don't know if your event is that day but you have this capsule collection launching with carolyn murphy sisterhood of light this is the power of light collection i know i can't wait to see i know no it's gonna be so good can you just like a why why carolyn but b why do something at fashion week like you don't need to yeah you know that you covered it forever you know how goofy it is the whole time and people are why be there and why why is this partnership like makes sense in that context i think you know one of the things we always said was that like okay let's have that luxury product, but let's not operate like a traditional company.

52:50So that's why no fashion shows. Like, I don't think we need to compete on that level and do that. But it is a moment in which a lot of people come to our hometown. We want to be present. We want to do something. And so we always end up doing something that feels uniquely Double J. I mean, we had a marching band dance party inside the Galleria, that major Galleria, you know, where the Duomo is, that was one year's presentation. We did a, we set up a carousel, you know, one of those spinning, like horse-drawn things in which we invited customers to come and be models. We did that one year. We set up a sound healing sanctuary in this like huge, massive, it wasn't even a Palazzo, what do you even call that?

53:42It had an open courtyard. And we set up this huge installation. We had sound healing all day and the fashion presentation upstairs. So I feel, and then, you know, these last couple of seasons, we've been inviting everyone to our new star quarter so that they can see the Gong Temple because we have Gong Temples in both the New York store, as well as our office in Milan, where we're offering these experiences that are open to the public. Some of them are free. Some of them are by payment. But it's just basically, again, to give people these experiences. So why fashion? Why do we even do something?

54:15Because there's more eyeballs. There's more opportunity for exposure. So I do see the value in being present, but let's do something in a different way. So that's how I look at it. And, you know, Whenever we do partnerships with people, it's just like what we were talking about before, like the sexism thing. If they're not on my wavelength, I'm not doing business with them. When we partner with brands or people, it's all about who do we really like? Who is embodying what we're talking about? I mean, Carolyn Ruffie, do you know her? She is like pure light. I don't. I've never met someone that is so kind, generous, like grounded.

55:03She literally emits light. And we had this collection that is like launching both the homeware, as well as we had this idea of, let's talk about the power of light. And on the third part of this, you know, Carolyn Murphy is not really a print girl. She is a real minimal girl. And I have a lot of friends who still think Double J is just about print, where it's like, we have so many things that we've moved and evolved the collections way beyond that. This is all about wardrobing, what to wear with print. We offer 10 different versions of a white shirt. And we also have a lot of dresses and separates that are way toned down.

55:40So we said, let's use this opportunity with her to create a very high-end dress collection, but really show a different side of us that is much lighter, much more minimal. I mean, there are moments of pizzazz and shebang, et cetera. But it's very much designed with and for her. And yeah, it's a sisterhood. It's fun. I can't wait to see it. JJ, I have one more question for you. Are there any energy vortexes in Europe? Oh my God. Because, you know, I think about you, I think about energy vortexes like Ojai, Sedona, Santa Fe. And you can really, the first time I ever went to Ojai, I was like, shit, like, I feel it.

56:25I feel the energy vortex. Are there any that you would recommend in Europe? so many and I want to do a book on this. I basically travel to them. All of my travel these days is just to energy vortexes. So quick list. I had no idea, people. I had no idea. Is Sicily. The island of Pantallaria is entirely made of obsidian rock. I've been there. Did you know it's the entire island is obsidian? No. I did know that and I knew, honestly, one of the only places in Italy I've ever been. Because I never, my husband and I, neither of us drove until we were 38 years old. And so we couldn't really go. But we went to, we went to Pantellerie.

57:10I was like, I have to go to this place. Because what happens in a place like Pantellerie, it's an expander. So it either brings out the worst or the best in you. How did you feel when you were there? I felt great. I would say, I think we stayed at like a resort, which was like not, it was perfectly nice, but I think that's a place where you need to stay in a house. Yeah. And I think we just weren't, um, but we were honestly pretty open to talking to people. Like we went to the what the zabibo wine guy um obviously not john tui too but um the guy with the arrows uh the wine bottles i don't know we went to meet him like we would just not i i'm a little bit more i'm just i don't i don't do stuff like that normally but um i felt expansive and a little disturbed but i was just so attracted to it and felt like we should do it again in a different way.

58:14But I remember the Sky Teen girls were going on doing yoga retreats there a lot. And I was like, I have to go to this place. Oh, I'm so glad you went there. That's a hot spot and so is Mount Etna. I highly recommend. I mean, I've hiked up to the top three times, two of which times it's erupting while you're walking up and they still allow you to do this. I don't even know what this is so Italian that they're like, the volcanoes erupting, no problem, walk on up. I mean, it's so funny. But I got to tell you, it is a super hotspot. And the other hotspot that's erupting is Stromboli. Not as beautiful.

58:55I wouldn't stay on Stromboli. The town is kind of crappy, but it's a hotspot. Then the other place is Sardinia. I've been obsessing over it. I was just there this summer. I was there in May. I was there at Christmas. There's a, so Sardinia is really known for all the yachts and the parties, et cetera, but there's this whole spiritual part of Sardinia, very ancient, a lot of archaeological sites. They're sacred sites. They call them the Tombini Gigante or the Naragi. They are initiation sites, ancient initiation sites, stone circles, incredible. So you've got those at Barbadja, Ardicena. I was just in the southwest of Sardinia.

59:39That's a hot spot. And then also, I really love Ireland and Scotland. So our current fall collection that's just dropped was inspired by my trip two years ago on a sacred site tour of Ireland that ended at Trinity College in Dublin, where I discovered the Book of Kells. And I mean, It was after this whole trip of spirituality and then to see this 9th century manuscript that looks like everyone has taken ayahuasca and is completely on a psychedelic trip. It was so fabulous. It was really good. I'm going to maybe try to go to the Dior show there. I know. Someone just told me. That's so funny. It's so aligned.

1:00:21Great. I'm glad we're all thinking Ireland. Yes, I've never been. I lived in the UK when I was first out of college but never went. So I need to go. It's very, very special. JJ, thank you so much for your time and your efforts. And this was so fun. And I can't wait to see you during Fashion Week. And congrats on everything. It's really amazing. Thank you so much, honey. It's a pleasure. And I'm just grateful and honored to be here. Fashion People is a presentation of Odyssey in partnership with Puck. The show is produced and edited by Molly Nugent. Special thanks to Puck co-founder John Kelly, executive editor Ben Landy, producer Maya Tribbett and director of editorial operations Gabi Grossman an additional thanks to the team at Odyssey Kelly Turner and Bob Tabador

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