How to Create a Job For Yourself That Has Never Existed with the NFL's First-Ever Fashion Editor

0:00I've learned a few things about being around athletes. One is they don't do a single thing they don't want to do. Kyle, welcome to Let's Get Dressed. I work for the NFL as their first ever fashion editor. I help the NFL leverage fashion to grow their fan base. This is a first-of-a-kind role. Why now for the NFL? There's so much opportunity in both spaces and they're just kind of getting to know each other. athletes bring so much authenticity to everything they do. And I think consumers can pick up on that. I always think my job is education. I love chatting with fashion people who are pure creatives, but also have to operate in a corporate setting.

0:40I always made sure to leave room for magic. It's like, okay, I got to pay the bills. But oh, I see there's a job opening at the NFL. I don't know anything about football. I'm just going to go do it and see what happens. This episode is coming out right as football season starting. What designers or fashion moments should we be excited about? Welcome back to Let's Get Dressed. Before we dive into today's episode, make sure that you're following the show both on Apple Podcasts and Spotify so that you don't miss a new episode. In case you want to watch today's episode, you can head over to YouTube.

1:14The full episode is available there too. And when you're done, leave us a review. I always love to hear what you guys think about the episodes, and it really helps the show go. Now, let's go get dressed. Kyle, welcome to Let's Get Dressed. Hi, how are you? I'm so good. I'm so happy to have you here. I can't believe it's finally happening. I know. I actually remember we had done a podcast episode at the beginning of this year, and we're covering the Super Bowl, and we're talking about football, and your name had come up, and I ended up doing a deep dive and became so infatuated with what you do.

1:48And I know we also share some team members over at CAA. So everyone had always been like, you need to meet Kyle. So up your alley. And so I'm happy to have you here today. Finally, we get to chat all the things. I can't wait. I feel like I don't know if we have enough time. We don't. We actually don't have enough time. I also knew that you were like my people when I emailed you and your Gmail photo was Edna mode. What's really funny about that is that's also my Slack icon for the entire NFL. Thank you so much. There's like 5 ,000 people in the NFL Slack and it's all like some professional photos and some people have like maybe they're like mascot of their favorite NFL team and mine's just Edna Mode.

2:33Thank you for that representation. Thank you. We need it. I feel like I dress superheroes so I look up to her. I love that. Also she's one of the most iconic. I think she is one of the most iconic Disney characters ever made. A hundred 100%. 100%. Her hair, her stature, her like little quips, like her little rules, like no capes. Right. Or like, I don't look back, darling. It distracts from the now. Like, yeah. People are always like, The Devil Wears Prada is my fashion Bible. And I'm like, nope, it's Edna Mode. No. Because when people bring up The Devil Wears Prada, that's my favorite horror movie.

3:11Every time. Like, what's your favorite horror movie? I'm like, the devil wears Prada. Yeah. I'm sorry. Like quitting a dream job because your boyfriend wants you to make him like a grilled cheese. With$7 cheese. Dude. Enjoy your life a little. Live a little. No. Like I go pay homage to that fountain where Andy throws her sidekick to like every fashion week just to like bring myself good luck in the industry and keep getting invited. Yes. And for all these reasons, you are a fashion icon. Trying. Okay, to start off, for people who are just tuning in, getting to know you, tell us a little bit about what you do in the fashion space.

3:51That's a really good question. I work for the NFL as their first ever fashion editor. That's like I always say my main gig and the one that I love to do the most. It's brought me so much joy in the world of fashion. But at the league, I help the NFL, one, leverage fashion to grow their fan base, help our players learn about the opportunities that exist within fashion to grow their personal brand. whether that's just looking and dressing really well, brand deals, how to go to Fashion Week, how they can talk about their charities and the causes that they support and do that maybe through fashion.

4:39The last big bucket of what I do there is talk to brands about the opportunity that fashion can have with sports. Is it the tunnel walk, for example? Can they get brand visibility by dressing a player, by inviting them to their table at the Met Gala. There's so much opportunity in both spaces and they're just kind of getting to know each other. And I'm kind of like grabbing both of their hands and being like, come on sports, come on fashion, let's chat. This is a like first of a kind role. This is something that you would not, when you're saying to someone sports and fashion, this is not something that I feel like we'd ever really put together in the past.

5:21And I want to go all the way back to the beginning of starting out this role because you have a really interesting career trajectory. You used to work for Carla Welch and now you're at the NFL. We love Carla in this house. She was on the show at the beginning of this year. The school of Carla is what I always say. It is a college. It's an Ivy League in my opinion. That's a PhD program, an accelerated PhD program. Absolutely. I'm sure learning from her was an amazing experience. So before you got brought back to the NFL, what were you originally interested in doing? I always knew I wanted to work in fashion.

5:56That was just something from the beginning as a kid going into college, graduating. I knew fashion. There was something there for me, but I never knew what. And then working in celebrity styling, like, okay, like, this is really cool to see how fashion could be a tool to grow somebody. One of the classes at the school of Carla Welch actually is leave room for magic. And I always made sure to leave room for magic. It's like, okay, I got to pay the bills. But like, oh, I see there's a job opening at the NFL on the network side as a stylist. I don't know anything about football. I'm just going to go do it and see what happens.

6:39And it kind of just led to this. I never would have seen the really amazing outfits that players wear in the tunnel if I wasn't on set of the NFL Network dressing Kimmy Chex and all the other hosts of the network. And I just was paying attention and saw like there was an opportunity to do something. And you were doing that. I think I learned that you were actually posting tunnel fits during COVID on a separate Instagram account. Yeah, it was started that while I was at the network pre-COVID and then COVID happened, got laid off. I kept it up because I'm home and bored and the NFL doesn't stop for anything.

7:16So the games were still happening. I was like, okay, fashion must be happening still in the tunnels. And then one day an executive on the social side of the NFL saw that account and they were like, who are you? Do you want a job here? And I was like, haha, I used to work here. Like, you don't know me. And I remember even when I went to an old, old executive at the league saying, like, we should be posting more fashion. He was like, oh, we do on this other account. And it was like one in 40 posts were fashion. I was like, no, people want more because players were DMing me. Like that little account with like 800 followers, players were DMing them for me to be like, hey, I love that you're posting this.

7:59It's really cool. Players were noticing, which was, I think, a key, a key moment. I think what I've always really admired most about you is this idea that you've been able to create something that didn't exist before. I think about, you know, I got my start on Instagram in like 2012. And I had a front row seat to so many incredible talent who created lanes and entirely new industries for themselves. And I think hearing you say this, leaving a little bit of room for magic and that vision to be able to see there is a need for this is a really, really rare thing that I think a lot of people can really learn from, especially in this day and age where we are experiencing a lot of newness and a lot of different industries.

8:46First of all, thank you. If you asked me when I was a kid if I was going to be in sports, no. So I had to leave room for magic there. Any sports at all, like in the family? anything? Did you ever watch anything growing up? No. Zero. Nothing. Nothing. I remember getting my dog on Super Bowl Sunday years ago and I was like, this is never going to be a problem to celebrate his gotcha day. I was going to say a different kind of American holiday. Yeah, I was like, I'm never going to have to like worry about am I busy on Super Bowl Sunday and I can spend time with my Australian Shepherd and celebrate him.

9:21You have an Australian Shepherd? I do. So do I. Stop it. What's yours? Tell me everything. His name's Ozzy, short for Osiris. Love. You know, Egyptian. Yes. He's just wild. He's just living wild and free. What color is he? He's a black tri. Oh, beautiful. Oh, my gosh. I know. What about yours? I have a red merle. Stop it. His name's Bodhi. Yeah. We'll, like, share pictures later. We have to. Like, oh, my God. Not, like, I don't meet, I see a lot of Ozzy's in LA, but I don't meet a lot of people who have Ozzy's because they're a very rare breed, but so are we. there's so much energy in work it's a lot of work it's a lot of work I also have a special place in my heart for fashion people who have dogs that shed we're all black do you see a hair on my body no no really quickly run us through what's the routine because I'm sure there are people listening with dogs I have lint rollers at every exit point of my house I there's a steam setting on my dryer that is like really good for all of this too.

10:20Me too. No, it's just, I can't, I can't be seen like that. I feel so seen. Yeah. Genuinely, the steam setting on my dryer is on every day. Yeah. Do you have the LG one? The LG dryer? I think I do. I can talk about washers and dryers all day actually. We need to do a whole separate episode on how to properly wash our clothes, but yes. Yeah. That's amazing. Yeah. It's, it's a lot of work, but he's so worth it. so worth it. They really are. But where were we? Talking about a gotcha day and how sports had. Oh, yeah. I never saw myself having to be busy on Super Bowl Sunday. I wasn't watching that when I got my dog.

10:58And now I miss it every year. Except for this year. It's the BNLA. So hopefully I get to see my dog on Super Bowl Sunday as well. What was in this pitch for the NFL? What were some things that you shared that you thought were like this is important it's so funny so like to get the actual job or whenever I got that dm to that account it wasn't even like I had to pitch anything they saw it like that's really why I made that account was to just have a proof of concept fans care players care there's enough content to be posting this and I don't even want to work in social I was like graphic designing up until like four in the morning like had photoshop open making things for instagram that wasn't my end goal but it was just to prove that there's enough content and care that people want to see this but when I was at the league pre-covid styling I was in this like internal program that helped employees if they had an idea have mentorship meet the right executives and so I spent a lot of time actually creating a deck around why this matters we talked about my art history degree and that's really where a lot of this also came in was like how do you quantify a trend or show that something like fashion can matter and I remember finding this like data of people that were searching for NFL fashion and it correlated with the NFL season.

12:35Like would peak at Super Bowl, trail off during the off season and then pick up again during the season. Like people were actively searching to see what players were wearing. And just looking at that data alone, I was like, look, clearly there's opportunity here to make this better, but then also opportunity during the off season to talk about fashion. So I kind of just showed them that again, and probably for the first time, actually. No one ever saw this. And then I got the job on the social team. I started during the last LA Super Bowl in 2022. And just was the person posting the best tunnel fits.

13:19Players were going to Coachella, so I was like, okay, let's talk about what they're wearing. They're going to Fashion Week, of course. and that's how I re-entered the league with my first position that I created as the fashion social person. Okay, a little fall wardrobe PSA because I always know as we enter a new season, we all get that feeling. We want to become an entirely new person and get an entirely new wardrobe. But I have to tell you, one of my favorite things about getting dressed for fall is that really you don't need a whole new wardrobe. I actually think that the best seasonal refresh is figuring out how to make those pieces that you already own feel so exciting again.

13:57Maybe it's those jeans that you've worn a hundred times and love, and you're adding a great new suede boot to, or you're swapping in a new shoulder bag, or adding a little animal print, some statement jewelry, just a little sparkle to something classic. That's essentially the idea behind Macy's Fashion Remix this fall. It's mixing in a few new finds into the wardrobe that you already know and love. And they have so many of the trends that I'm really excited about right now that we're beginning to talk about. Rich suede, relaxed and voluminous denim, tailored separates, a really good statement sweater, and such good accessories too.

14:32So before you go down the rabbit hole and buy an entire closet or decide it needs an overhaul, let's try adding one really great piece and see what suddenly fails new again. You can find it all at Macy's. One of the things I love most about fashion is that true luxury is often found in the smallest details. It's the weight of a beautiful fabric, the way a jacket is tailored, the click of a clasp, or how effortlessly a piece moves when you wear it. Lexus thinks about craftsmanship in a very similar way. At Lexus, master craftsmen called Takumi are involved not only in the physical craftsmanship of each vehicle, but in every sensory detail.

15:08They evaluate things like the way a door closes, the click of a switch, and the acoustic feedback of all the controls. And much like a designer knows when the cut, fabric, and finish of a piece feel exactly right, Takumi craftsmen rely on more than instruments alone. They use human perception and intuition to create an experience that sounds and feels right. That's what Lexus means by engineering to be felt. Understanding that the most powerful tool is knowing what will make someone feel something. Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing. So experience amazing at your Lexus dealer.

15:40I love that you talked about your Instagram as the proof of concept, because that's something I believe so much in today is Instagram just being this resume slash business card that you can create with your POV to share with so many other people. And whether it takes off or not, I really think it has so much power to show a potential employer, a potential collaborator, exactly what you're about with not really you personally having to like say so much. You can say so much with just that. I mean, you have to learn how to say the right thing, make sure you're coming off the right way. But yeah, it does so much.

16:21Say more about the finding the right tone and right thing to say. I'm actually curious what helped you kind of strike the right tenor. That part is what's actually really exciting because it's all new. It's new for the league to be talking about fashion in a way that's more than just, I don't know how they talked about it before, to be honest. I don't know if it was important to the league or to the social structure of everything they're doing online. And also it's new for the fans, especially the older fans. It's really fun to see their reactions because they're like, get back on the field. They'll say something like, they wouldn't have lost if they weren't dressing up.

17:09And I was like, can I see what you were wearing today actually and on your way to work? And were you good at your job? because of your outfit. So it's fun just to see that generation of our fans kind of learning that fashion is important to our current generation of players. And then it's fun to, when we connect with Gen Z, Gen Alpha, that follow the league on Instagram and TikTok and Twitter and see their responses because they get it. They get that fashion's important to the players, that you can be interested in fashion and sports and it doesn't detract from one or the other. And so figuring out the tone of our fashion content is something we're always kind of playing with.

17:54And, you know, I'm no longer on the social team and they really get how to talk to our fans. And I help create kind of content with it, like go into a player's closet, for example. And what people have to say is it's always fun to see fans kind of connecting fashion back to the game. Is there a moment you can think of that you feel has been the most successful in striking that chord? A project I love is I went with DeAndre Hopkins to Goodwill to build a tunnel fit for under like$30 or something. I was nervous. That one was also leaving room for magic because I got really scared. There were no shoes that fit.

18:34I was like taking over the whole store. We like emailed them taking over the back stock bin area. They're like, you can't be back here. I'm like, you don't understand. I can absolutely be back here. This is a really important thing I'm doing. I'm putting together a tunnel fit. Yes. And we're like almost done. DeAndre's there. We have like a pretty good look going. And this woman comes out at work there and she's like, I found shoes. Like I thought we couldn't find shoes. These red Converse were donated like two minutes before like we were done filming. Magic. We left Room for Magic and it ended up being a really great piece that I think people loved because it resonated, I think, with many people because it's something that's close to DeAndre and my heart as well is that fashion doesn't have to be expensive.

19:24It's not about the brand. It's not about, is it the newest thing? It's about being a reflection of you and being a part of whatever you're trying to say to the world. you know it's a language and um so putting together that look and then being able to broadcast it on NFL socials and then it was picked up by like Good Morning America and like all these other news outlets having that platform to tell a message like that is so rewarding and I think that's one of the reasons I love being in this space I love chatting with fashion people who are pure creatives, but also have to operate in a corporate setting.

20:09And this sounds like a perfect moment where like your creative was able to do really good in a corporate setting. I'm curious what things you've had to learn in a corporate setting that have been like helpful in your last few years. This is like my first corporate job. Right. This is my first corporate job. You're doing great. I don't, I try really hard to hold on to the things that made me me before corporate. I think that's also why I was hired. You know, they wanted someone from the fashion industry, somebody that hasn't necessarily been a football fan their whole life. Walked into the office wearing like five inch Rick Owens heels the other day and, hello everybody.

20:54But like what I've learned to operate in the corporate world is you have to back everything up. You can have a really fun, creative idea. It could make so much sense to you and to me and to everybody else that is a creative person or a fashion person. But someone in the middle has to approve it, sign it off, give you budget. This isn't the 90s. We're not just throwing budget at things and hope it works. We're not all flying business class anymore. We have to really prove that something matters. And again, like this is a lot of things I learned through the process of getting here, but also through my art history degree.

21:38It's like proving something that's so intangible, like a creative idea, a trend or a thought and saying why it matters. And so once you can kind of have that concrete plan, the return on investment and everything, you get that sign off. that's probably the biggest lesson I've learned. Is art history to fashion like the perfect pipeline? I think so. Yeah, it sounds like it. Some of the most interesting people I know in fashion, like writers and even people that work in fashion marketing have a degree in art history. I think you should study fashion design and if you're more on like the construction side of fashion and designing things.

22:24but if you're those peripheral parts of fashion I think art history is a really good way to get into it. It teaches you how to write really well, use data and also you're forced to study like years of references the number of times I've brought up the Parthenon in a fashion meeting is more than I thought I would I always say my job is education especially when I'm working with like a player and styling him for something. I remember having to explain an artist to a player and I was like how do I like make it relevant to his interest? I threw references and it's it's really helpful. I love that you say that your job is education because I do think you are translating.

23:17Yeah. You're translating a lot. I want to get into that a little bit because in the last two years, I have never been to a football game. That's not like a college football game. And even then I've been to three. So my education is very small, but have I paid attention? And is this the second football conversation we've had on this podcast this year? Yes. Maybe more. Maybe we've talked about it. I've probably talked about it in like solo episodes or things like that. And I've definitely taken note of what's been happening since you've joined. I think of the Tom Brown show, Abercrombie. I think of so many players, a lot of Birkins going around.

23:54Hermes is doing a great job there. Great job, yeah. Great job. Do you think that fashion has changed? Who's welcome in football? So we'll start at the fashion part of it. I think even seeing internally when I'm in the office too, I think a lot of people are scared of fashion. Say more. A lot of people don't understand fashion. And so it's become something easy to mock or put aside. People, I think fashion scares them. But I felt the same way about football growing up. I felt if I hung out with the boys that played football, they would probably call me a slur or something. But now all my best friends are NFL players.

24:41but fashion has been a fun way to connect I think and find new audiences for the league and for players I start like every conversation with like what was the first concert you went to and do you have merch from that concert with this new generation of players it's fun to hear their answers a lot of the time it's Miley Cyrus wow I know I know that makes me feel a little bit older than I'd like to feel. No, I feel really old every day going into the office because they're drafted right out of college. Right. They're like 23. Miley Cyrus. Wow. Yeah. What was your first concert? It was Beach Boys with my grandmother.

25:21Incredible. No, it was like really fun. The bar was high for you. I know. My grandmother was like, we're not gonna, we're not playing around here. I'm pretty sure mine was like Justin Timberlake at the Staples Center. Oh, that's heaven. It really was. That's really heaven. It wasn't NSYNC. It was Justin Timberlake. It might have been NSYNC. I think it was NSYNC. But you had your eyes on the prize. Yes. I knew where to look. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay, now imagine it's Football Sunday. You're at some watch party that you don't even want to be at because you're not a football fan. And they show the tunnel.

25:55And you see the quarterback of the Ravens wearing an NSYNC t-shirt. You're like, who is that person? Now you want to know more about that player and then that team. And you're like watching the game now. You're following his number. You want him to win. A fellow NSYNC lover, Justin Timberlake lover, if you will. Now you're kind of like a little bit of a fan. We're not expecting you to then watch every Sunday, but you're kind of interested. Maybe you'll go buy his jersey. Maybe you'll follow him on Instagram. Maybe you'll, I don't know, like, who knows what you'll do? Go to an international game because you see that maybe he's playing our Paris game.

26:42And that's like a fun little trip for you to go on. So it's fashion is just a fun way to unlock a new audience, build our players' personal brands, like let people see our players with their helmet off. It's really hard to connect to somebody when they have a helmet on. so we we want to find every way to have a helmet off moment but we're doing that with so many other ways at the league as well besides fashion and not just maybe even a fashion focused audience i'm trying to broaden it to be that nsync music t-shirt moment but i can also be more specifically a fashion audience you know wearing a brand that only a fashion person would know i think is really fun, but we're also, you know, we're allowing our players to express themselves in ways that maybe they didn't feel like they could before.

27:35Like, you guys should start a podcast. You should start Twitch streaming. They love to play video games. Like, are they traveling during the off season? Hey, Sony, like, give this guy a camera, teach him how to vlog, and now he's on YouTube and building a fan base that way. So the league is, we're really trying to find so many ways to just let people get to know our players and our athletes and how cool and interesting they are and all the things they're up to and why it's worth following them. Do you think fashion has a little bit of a PR problem? Because what you just kind of described is this extreme tension that I think you probably witness really up closely at a corporate league.

28:19For you and I, who love fashion, we see it. It's emotional for us. But I have been thinking a lot about what you brought up at the beginning of this, like, oh, I don't, I don't pay attention to that. I don't, I don't know that. Like, like there is that wanting to like kind of disassociate from fashion because it feels materialistic. But what you just described is like fashion as a gateway to connectivity. Like seeing that t-shirt instantly builds a sense of camaraderie. And I think Like that isn't thought about when people think about fashion. That's something I think about. Like if you want to talk about Roman empires, like that's my Roman empire.

29:00Right. That's also, again, why I think I wanted to know I can talk about fashion because it's so serious to me. It's so serious to me. I know we're not curing cancer with fashion, but that's something I think about a lot. I think we also have to kind of distinguish capital F fashion, like the industry, and then fashion, the thing we all are wearing every day, and even just going to Walmart to buy a t-shirt. And then there's the fashion industry that is the fashion weeks of it all, and the creative directors and everything that you and I talk about as people that work in capital F fashion. but because people are scared of it, they're not realizing it's actually a tool that they can use.

29:48I'll start talking to somebody that maybe doesn't work in fashion and they're assuming I'm wearing like certain brands or something or I'll bring up a brand and they get visibly scared. And I'm like, it's not about that. Like you need to be using fashion for your own like goals. That's something I always ask players and clients is, what rooms do you want to be in? That's going to help me decide what outfits you should be wearing. Where do you want to go? What do you want to do after you retire from the league? Where do you want to be in five years? You know, I tell people, like, stop wearing a logo.

30:31You'll never catch me wearing a logo on my body unless a brand is paying me. or it's so emotionally connected to me. My dad loves Burberry, grew up wearing Burberry. It was like one of our first fashion father-son moments was like looking at a classic Burberry check situation. So maybe I'll wear that. If I wore color, I would wear Burberry plaid. But all that to say is like, it has to really mean something to me. Other than that, I'm not letting a brand use me. I'm not letting fashion use me. I'm going to use fashion. And that's the big takeaway I want for so many people, to not be scared of it and to really embrace it and use it for their goals.

31:18I love the what rooms you want to be in and how can we use fashion to get there. I think that's a big thing. And I think every person listening can take something from that. For someone who's not in the NFL, what would you say if they wanted to get into maybe a promotion or a different room that they're already not in yeah i mean dress for the job you want is so serious yeah that comes from a very real place but also you have to remember the room you want to be in you're going to be in that room so who are you you always have to kind of start again with like what music do you like like when I watch a movie what character do I resonate with probably because of their outfit like what are they wearing yeah I want to be me in every room I go into but there's also like a future version of me that you know I want to respect that person and where they want to be and so writing that balance of like I know what I like and I know what makes me feel good but how does that person dress you know like even then if I'm like oh I want to say I want to be like an executive.

32:28I want to get that executive promotion. I hope I still look like me. Absolutely. I hope I can recognize myself. Yeah. All to say, I haven't even asked you the golden question, which in my mind is, so why now for the NFL? Why are they attracted to fashion now more than ever? A lot of things internally and externally are making it make sense. one thing so let's take it i think start from the player side of it our players are so important to us they make up the league i always say like if anything ever happened like i'm on the side of the players like i'm with the players i ride for the players even though they are much larger than me and they don't need my help you know i'm i'm for them and they're like what make my job so fun and I want to make sure that people get to see them for who they are.

33:24That's really important for the league as well. And fashion's got a great way to do that and get to know somebody. They don't have to say a word, but you'll see their outfit and hopefully can glean something about them. But that's up to that person to figure out how to use the tools of fashion. I think also externally, we have a big influencer problem. By we, I mean the world that is in 2026 on our phones doom scrolling. Everybody's an influencer. No one has a strong background in anything. And a brand can just pay anybody. Everybody wants this brand deal. And a brand will pay you a little bit of something, a crumb, to talk about their viral cardigan or they'll send it to you.

34:17You know, if you do two reels and six story slides, talk about their viral cardigan. And I don't believe that person one bit. Is it viral because they're saying it is or show me the numbers, show me the data. So we're waking up, consumers are waking up and realizing this is fake. but athletes bring so much authenticity to everything they do. I've learned a few things about being around athletes. One is they don't do a single thing they don't want to do. They will not be in there. I've seen them leave a conversation mid conversation because they're like, I don't want to be here anymore. So, and I think consumers can pick up on that.

35:04And we can tell that if this player, this athlete is wearing something is because he really likes it. He wants to do it. So he might be getting paid as well, but also we know he doesn't need to necessarily get paid. He has a job. I don't know if that influencer over there has a job outside of telling me to wear a cardigan. So we can trust these players more. So fashion has a lot of opportunity with athletes. The authenticity that athletes bring and we know their story. We've seen them in high school and in college and they get drafted to the NFL. We trust this person. They didn't just come out of nowhere.

35:42They're focused on being the best athlete that they can be. And so everything else is extra. They're wearing something really cool. I'm going to want that because they look cool. I want to look like them. There's so much opportunity, I think, for sports and fashion with each other. And then with the league, we get to now talk to a new audience. it's no longer just like the boys club on a sunday because i i see and hang out with all my players at fashion week in paris or something and then we'll be there with like some cool artist and um like a young person that started up like a really really cool charity or something you know the the people that are then around like this new audience of people is very exciting and like of course the league wants to be a part of that it's such an interesting thing to think about athletes as the antidote to this quote-unquote influencer problem because an athlete is the polar opposite of like a flash in the pan talent like athletes are signing very long contracts they are there for a long time not only are they signing long contracts they have put their whole life into this thing they're not just gonna end it over something silly you know like they've devoted so much time and energy into this.

37:04I've had fittings with athletes. They'll come home from practice. I've been at their house for hours setting up like, you have 15 minutes. Because then my physical therapist is coming right after that. You know, like they don't mess around. They really dedicate their time to this. So again, like if they're wearing something or talking about something publicly, like they really like it. They mean it. Yeah. One of the things I love most about fashion is that true luxury is often found in the smallest details. It's the weight of a beautiful fabric, the way a jacket is tailored, the click of a clasp, or how effortlessly a piece moves when you wear it.

37:38Lexus thinks about craftsmanship in a very similar way. At Lexus, master craftsmen called Takumi are involved not only in the physical craftsmanship of each vehicle, but in every sensory detail. They evaluate things like the way a door closes, the click of a switch, and the acoustic feedback of all the controls. And much like a designer knows when the cut, fabric, and finish of a piece feel exactly right, Takumi craftsmen rely on more than instruments alone. They use human perception and intuition to create an experience that sounds and feels right. That's what Lexus means by engineering to be felt.

38:10Understanding that the most powerful tool is knowing what will make someone feel something. Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing. So experience amazing at your Lexus dealer. Today's episode is sponsored by Aerie. And because we spend so much time on this podcast talking about how to get dressed every day and how we feel our best, I have to share with you guys that a lot of the times that starts with what we're wearing underneath our clothes For example if your bra strap is digging into your shoulder if it's riding up or it doesn't feel like the right fit It's probably not the right bra and honestly I feel like we've all accepted uncomfortable bras for way too long Aries on a mission to make you feel good and they actually have 59 different sizes of bras and different colors fabrics and fits Because your bra should hold you in and not hold you back from all of the things that you need to do in a day and And something else that I really value about Aerie is that they have committed to real bodies only.

39:03In 2014, they stopped airbrushing. And in 2025, they have committed to no AI-generated bodies. So it's always real people, real bodies, and 100 % Aerie real. Visit Aerie.com to find the right bra and your perfect fit. One athlete that I think you've had such a great role in helping shape is Joe Burrows, who I did not know about. And then obviously, since following you, I'm like, okay, I'm tuned in. I'm here. No, he's the best. I would love to hear like what those initial conversations were like when he approached you to work together. Yeah, he had an opportunity to go to the south of France to speak at Camblyan and then was like, well, maybe I'll also go to Paris.

39:48It's the same time as Fashion Week. Yeah. And never left the country. Obviously, he was seen as a fashion star before I was even in the picture. But his team called me just to see how I can support him going to Fashion Week, being invited to shows. Again, these are the same people that always are like, I don't know anything about fashion. They get really nervous. And I was like, it's really easy. Just email info at Hermes.com. but I right like try it out it works sometimes but I was at the league on the social side still at this point so I hadn't really been styling and outside like that in a while and I was like actually I feel like if I offer to come out of retirement and styling and this could be really big for Joe yes but for me as well and I offered to you know like take him to fashion week as his stylist and help him get around and it was his first time leaving the country as well so I was like okay I have to be his translator as well it was so it was so cool to see the reaction from him from his audience from the fashion community like who is this guy in a backless suit in vogue world yep huge moment that was so huge it was so fun I remember we were in the fitting and Vogue brought out like a bunch of options and the first option was that like backless Peter Doe suit and this was like the first time I met Joe too or I was like around him and I was like oh my god like I'm gonna have to convince a football player to wear a backless suit not just like backless like he wasn't wearing a shirt under it either and I love Joe because he said sure like was no convincing he's like yeah that's sick I was like okay easy at the fitting and then a couple days later it was the show and it was so wild it was like every big model every big celebrity was there FKA twigs was like walking back in and then he was walking out and it was like just so insane and I never thought sports would bring me to my fashion dreams, but it did.

42:11And we pulled this off. And to that earlier point of having to prove something, I didn't tell my boss what I was doing. I just said, hey, I need to take the week off. I have something to do. And I came back and then I had my PR team calculate the impact of Joe walking in the world. and they said it was worth$22 million of press. Wow. Or like paid media value. And then that's when I told my boss and I was like, okay, this matters. This is important. So you took a week off while you were at the NFL? Yeah. You didn't feel at the time that you could tell them? It wasn't bad. It was also like it wasn't my job there.

42:54Right. You were still doing social. I was still doing social. Also, like there's so many rules. Right. We talk about what you learned in corporate. Yeah. Like if I told my boss, they'd be like, we have to run this up the chain and we have to ask so-and-so and blah, blah. I was like, so no, I'm taking time off. Like I'm not an NFL employee right now. I am just a person that understands fashion and sports. And I'm going to take the like number one quarterback in the league to Paris and do something really cool. Excuse me, like give me a second, like give me a minute. I'm going to do something cool.

43:28I'll be back next week and I'll see you in our team meeting. I love this calculated risk. Sometimes I think you just have to kind of risk it a little bit. A little. If you know it's going to work, I do. Like I, you have to be so delusional. And I think that's the second thing I've learned from athletes. It's like one, don't do anything you don't want to do. The second is like be so delusional. Like doubt is not even in the building. Like we don't know doubt, doubt who. How did you know that would be right? because something that I, again, another thing that I really admire about you is you are the most offline person ever.

44:04Like so offline, you are not trend spotting or scouting or trying to figure out what Gen Alpha wants from football. Like you're not that person. So how are you sitting in a fitting in Paris, looking at a Peter Doe blazer and saying, that's what works? i am offline but i am to your point trying to figure out what jenalfa wants out of football like i'm just reading you're like i'm still looking i like i print out things still like i'm the only person in my office that knows how to use the printer i'm reading a lot i do want to know but i also i figure it out by going outside is what i always say like i travel i read a book i you know i watch maybe like a movie something like just more than just like scrolling this whole thing I knew was right I think so I'm at the time and still kind of very new to football or at least like there's so many names are floating around all the time I have a different idea of who's a like a popular player versus like who actually is based on like oh I see this guy coming with great outfits all the time and I'll like ask a co-worker do you know this player and they're like kind of kind of he was like a six-round pick or something but I remember hearing Joe's name a lot in the office.

45:20Like, all the time. So I got the call. I was like, oh, yeah, I've heard the name before. Like, lest we forget, he's like a first overall pick of the 2020 draft. Like, first guy picked. Like, a really, really, really standout star, superstar athlete. So I knew that if I did this, it would be right. We could have put him down anything, like down the runway and anything. Right. And it would have slayed. Right. Because it was so unexpected. It was an Olympic-themed show, and so to have two football players there, two of the best football players there, was going to cause a ruckus. But you have also just the factor of, like, he is such a model already to be in, like, a backless suit.

46:15There's shock value there. There's so much because I remember when you watch it to the live stream of it, you see them come out and you can tell he doesn't have a shirt on underneath the jacket. Everyone's like, oh, like, oh, but like, whoa, like NFL players like America's in Paris. And they they're walking. This is like Gigi Hadid and Kendall Jenner behind them on horses. They start to keep walking. and then you realize like backless suit, which I think also gets to a big thing that I think about a lot is just the masculinity of everything we're doing. You know, it's a heart-shaped backless suit with like white, not lace, but it's a little ruffly around the cutout.

46:59There's something very like sweet and tender about that too. Have like a six foot four muscular man wear that outfit. I still am just so fascinated. I still love hearing how you're able to like form those thoughts and have so much conviction and excitement towards those moments and choose to take a very different route in the way that you construct your feelings of the world. Because today I feel like the way that people do that is just being chronically online. Okay. We want to talk about why I'm offline is because everything is made to look good online. People freak out when I tell them I don't go online.

47:42And they're like, well, how do you find trends? The girl's like, if I was finding trends online, I'd be late. And back to sports, it all comes back to sports with fashion. Like, you know, by the end of this podcast, I think you'll see why I'm actually so at home at the NFL. But I love our athletes because they don't follow trends. They go to Fashion Week and they'll go shopping and doing whatever, but they're not wearing something because they saw it somewhere else. They just have really a strong sense of self and they'll wear something because it resonates with them. Like, oh, I like this and I like this and I like this.

48:18And then that's the outfit. And so when also people ask me just what is a trend, I say, wait till week five of the season. Then I'll know. I can't trust whatever a magazine is saying or somebody on TikTok is saying, I look at the tunnel because that's truly what cuts through the riffraff of whatever came out of Fashion Week and what's being sold in stores is what's in the tunnel. Because then also, then musicians start wearing it and other influencers start wearing it and the kids start buying it and the fans are buying it. Then it truly becomes a trend. They're truly trendsetters. I want to look forward a little bit on that note because for people listening who have gotten bitten by the football bug in this conversation, this episode is coming out right as football season starting.

49:09Great timing. So tell us what to look forward to. Who are we having our eye on this season? What designers or fashion moments should we be excited about and have our eye on? Especially as fashion people in this room. We don't know where to start. So guide the way. I would just say start in the tunnel for sure. There are a few teams I always love to look out for. Delpit is one of my favorite players ever. We actually go to Tokyo like every March. You moved to Tokyo for a month, right? All of March. All of March. Like the whole month. See what I mean? You don't have to be online if you live in Tokyo for a month.

49:45No, you don't. You actually don't. Because by the time you come home and it's Thanksgiving, you're like, wait, I saw that six months ago. I literally saw that six months ago. But I love Grant. I think he's so well-dressed. He's on the Browns. And Quentin Lake on the Rams. Really? He's amazing. That's what I love about the league is, as opposed to maybe other leagues where it's very like one body type, because there's so many different positions that require different body types, we have just a breadth of bodies to look at and look up to as style icons. just watch the tunnel you'll find someone you love does the nfl post all of the tunnel fits or is there a better place for us to find how i started was just going to every team's website they'll post them usually great and then through nfl social channels nfl style we'll post some of my favorite looks or some of the social team's favorite looks i have to say the hermes inspo in the tunnel is...

50:49Insane. Unmatched. Insane. I would say the only other place where you're getting that level of inspiration is actually at the Hermes show. Yeah, well... The Birkins, the bags. Saquon Barkley, styled by Josh McPherson, was the first person to have the shadow Birkin. There are a lot of people at Hermes that are big football fans. I'm really happy for them. No, happy for them. I'm so happy for them. I'm going to tell you now, though. if it's a home game if it's a player on the home team and they have like a Birkin it's empty why do they need to have a bag I love a flex like that like thank you so much for your service no really no use to you so much use for us to them it was just to complete the outfit which is fair right it's fair like they're like oh it's stuffed perfect they're just like stuffing in it thank you for doing this research yeah okay we do a couple segments on the show for starters receipts Tell us your favorite investment you've ever made for your closet.

51:48Best investment I ever made was those like dehumidifiers for my closet. Say more. You know the things that like capture water? Yes. Yeah. Like that was, those are amazing. So just like nothing in there is getting like moldier. Yeah. Because, you know, I have archives. I have like, you know, we live in LA. Like sometimes it rains. Yeah. You know, like that's been amazing. I'm very big on like making the closet. Like I want scents in there. I want the temperature to be right. I'm big on the humidifier situation. Dehumidifier. Exactly. And in that same vein of just like, I'm all about consumption, not overconsuming.

52:30I want my clothes to last for as long as possible. I will be wearing this probably decades more. One thing I got, and I wear a lot of Yoji. Yoji also makes, but anybody can use this. it's a spray it's called as linen spray but it also has antimicrobial and like germ killing in it so i can't be washing this all the time right you know so you let your things kind of hang i kind of like let them air and on like a rack or something i spray his linen spray and it kills just all the bacteria things that cause odor to go from sweat and your body so i don't have to be washing it as much also helps the environment that's been amazing i love this because i actually firmly believe we are all washing all of our clothes wrong okay so i can talk about wash and drys forever forever i love it okay and then we also have something called let's get you dressed where people who follow the show submit in events that they're going to okay maybe it's a birthday or a wedding and we actually have one that i think is perfect for you I get asked all the time what to wear to a sporting event.

53:43What do you think works? Well, obviously, it depends if you're going into a suite or not. Going into a suite is a big question to ask here. But let's just be very generic. Yep. I think that really changes the footwear. Exactly. Because you could do a cute heel. But, you know, like, let's just say you're getting down in there. You're in the stands. Like, you don't necessarily wear your team and be dressing up. Like, I still wear black no matter where I'm at. We'll have some great other Raiders game, but at least just don't wear the other team's colors. We have actually a lot of really cute stuff in NFL Shop and at Abercrombie.

54:20You guys have a partnership. Yes, the Abercrombie partnership I actually love. This is not even a plug. If I didn't even work for the league, I would say it's my favorite sports merch. It's very comfortable, so I would stop there. Just wear denim if that's fine with you. Wear jeans. I don't personally wear much denim, But like, I feel like it's a great way to be comfortable. Just add some jewelry to it, I think. Add some sparkle, if that's your thing. It's always just be you. And I really love about the array of options now. Is that like, it used to only be like, oh, it's a women's sports thing.

55:04Like, so it's covered in glitter or it's pink. Like we have Kristen Jusik now making the coolest stuff. Abercrombie making cool stuff. We have like a fear of God collaboration. If your thing is about being like an LA baddie that only wears fear of God, like there is an NFL collaboration for that. So we really made sure also like there's everything. There's every possible way to express your fandom, which means dressing like yourself. so that question that's like yourself maybe you'll see me at a game this season I think I'm gonna have to go to a game I think you have to I think we have to now I think you actually have to thank you so much for coming on I loved hearing about everything you're working on and everything that led you to this point so unique like I really again have so much curiosity and admiration for people who have paved their own lane so thank you for bringing fashion to the NFL Thank you for having me.

56:03It's an honor to be here.