Born out of a desire to create clothes deeply rooted in skateboarding without using its culture as a cheap marketing ploy, FUTUR is one of Paris’ most innovative new labels. Using its own skate team to create short films to accompany its colorful, high-quality streetwear, the brand’s co-founders Felix Schaper and Benoit Frédoni certainly show a commitment to skateboarding that goes above and beyond many other brands. Ensuring their vision wasn’t compromised when shooting the clothes, for their sixth collection the co-founders and friends shot with photographer and skateboarder Quentin de Briey. “He’s a good friend of ours, he has been skateboarding for a very long time, and he understands what we are doing so it was just a natural thing that we would do something together at some point.” As for the model, the pair enlisted friend and androgynous beauty Tamy Glauser, who you might recognize from Andreas Kronthaler for Vivienne Westwood and Louis Vuitton’s spring/summer 17 shows. “We often hang out in the same bar in Paris as Tamy and one night we asked her if she would be down to do some pictures with Quentin for a FUTUR edit.” Get an exclusive look at the editorial below as we catch up with Felix and Benoit.
What led you to start Futur together?
We started FUTUR, first of all, because we wanted to do our own thing. We had the urge to work on a project that didn’t have any boundaries and hierarchy. Many brands in fashion are using skateboarding as a marketing tool but really don’t have anything to do with skateboarding and most certainly don’t give anything back to skateboarding. There are many cool, young brands out there run by skateboarders but the assortment is mostly quiet basic — tees, hoodies. Our idea was to create an apparel line which from a quality and merchandising point of view, would stand alongside premium clothing labels but at the same time would keep the DNA and priorities on the skate side.
Do you think your clothes reflect a modern Paris?
Initially, we wanted the brand to have a more pan-European vibe but being based in Paris automatically puts the brand on a geographical map. Paris, historically, has been one of the places in Europe with a very large skate scene for a long time now; with the rise and fall of spots, it has always stayed a very interesting place where many skaters from all over the world pass by. A place like Republique in the center of Paris is a perfect example. Spots like this keep the city vibrant. Paris obviously also has a strong fashion scene so for us, it’s the perfect place to be.
With brands like Pigalle and Etudes Studio all the rage, plus the city’s first Supreme store opening, do you feel about Paris has started to really embrace streetwear over the past couple of years?
There have been many Parisian brands that have made a name for themselves over the last few years and fashion in general is definitely keeping an eye on the street, but it’s more a global movement in our opinion. It’s the same in NY or London. With shops like Supreme opening in Paris, one sees more Supreme bags on the streets than before, so this maybe makes it feels more present than before. But Paris has always been a city of many faces and sportswear has been popular for a long time now.
What brands are you interested in right now? Did any spring/summer 17 shows particularly inspire you?
There are many good brands at the moment so it’s hard to give a list. We like the graphics some of the smaller skate brands put out. It often has this intimate, familiar vibe that we try to bring to the table too. But we definitely also like stuff the more traditional fashion houses do — creative cuts and fits. But we don’t really follow the shows in Paris. We really like the approach Japanese brands have when it comes to execution and quality of the garments. I think that this is going to be more and more important in the future, and for anybody starting a brand we would advise them to dig into it.
What excites you most about tomorrow?
We recently got our first office at Republique. It has a small gallery on the ground floor where we plan to do regular photo exhibitions in the future. So that’s some exciting stuff. Also, our next skate clip that was filmed entirely in Italy will drop very, very soon!
Credits
Text Ryan White