A look into the life and creative process of Fashion Design major Ian Vailliencourt.
Producer, micro-influencer and upcoming fashion designer Ian Vailliencourt is best known for his unequivocal personal style, uninhibited personality and contemporary streetwear designs. The fourth year student is currently studying Textiles and Fashion Design in the School of Human Ecology with an apparel focus. With designs influenced by his interests in rap music, archive fashion and the world around him, Ian (@ianvailliencourt) is bringing an innovative edge to the fashion scene in Madison.
Ian, 22, has been designing apparel since 2016 under his brand @vailliencorp, with his most recent collection featuring five distinct looks, each defined by their inventive use of architecture, proportion and texture. Earlier this summer, I sat down with Ian who I admire as a close friend and designer to get a look into his world and discuss his community, design process, and outlook on the future.
Ian’s design process reaches beyond a mood board or file folder into every aspect of his life. When out-and-about it is not uncommon for Ian to point out inspiration in many different forms throughout the world. “I gather a lot of images on my phone through various places like Instagram, Pinterest or real life. I’ll take pictures of things, anywhere where I see it. Not just clothing inspiration but like art inspiration or even scenery and landscapes and things that I think look cool. Then I usually make folders on my phone.” A look into a live moodboard on Instagram account titled @paincritic will reveal a chaotic collage of Balenciaga, Legos and Fortnite, combining to create a mirage, the essence of Vailiencorp alive in industrial hues of forest green and cardboard beige.
Community and culture are recurring themes in the lexicon of Ian’s inspiration. Gl333morld, a project of the designer, has created a community for the exchange of ideas and projects between others in Ian’s local streetwear scene. “I originally made it almost like a label for me and my friends to release what we were working on separately . . . but then I started signing random people to it . . . I started making so many posts like ‘this person signed’ and it started getting so many views, people were commenting like ‘congratulations’ to random people and everyone thought it was a real accomplishment until they looked at the page and it had like 300 followers.. . it usually guides itself. It’s not really me that’s Gleemworld, it’s all the people that we post and all the people we show love to. @enigma.curation @jakejohnhoward, @jacobmarvinday, @whothefuckaloy are a couple of OG members.”
Ian always keeps his airpods within an arm’s reach, in fact, using the strap of a wii remote, they are usually tied around his wrist. Through an airpod or UAL speaker, music is constantly streaming into the consciousness of the designer. “I’ve been listening to Snow Strippers for forever . . a little bit of Maz G and the new Lucki album.” Ian’s most streamed genre, by far, is Milwaukee- and Madison-based rap. “I feel like part of the reason I really like it is because a lot of my friends are kind of tapped into it as well. Some of my friends make a ton of beats for Milwaukee artists and it’s fun to see how all the songs and music videos are made. What I love about it is that a lot of these rappers make a bunch of songs every day, they’ll just drop like three albums randomly. They’ll just go crazy and constantly make music, it’s really inspiring . . . But I’ve given clothing items to [them] before. I like to show love to local artists [because I’d like to see the Milwaukee sound blow up]. I’d like to see it happen because it’s not far, I’m able to go to small shows and go and meet people and show love. It’s easy to connect to the scene.”
It’s not often that local rap dominates the top discography for an individual, but “showing love” to other artists is a top priority for Ian. “@peopleinmode are some fire producers from Milwaukee. @maz._.g and @runalongforever both make music. For fashion I like @dasyori. For beats and music also @xaviersobased.”
Between his budding music career, his studies in design and his constant networking, it may seem like Ian is constantly doing everything at once- and he is. Even in his free time, Ian says that he enjoys “sensory overload.” On a normal day, Ian can be found in his room listening to music while watching The Walking Dead and playing rounds of first-person-shooter video games. Outside of his campus house Ian is most likely thrifting or shopping other streetwear drops, locally or on SSENSE. Regarding the evolution of his personal style, he mentioned: “It’s pretty carefully curated. . .There are things I’m wearing now that I’ve been wearing since high school. I’ve been wearing oversized for forever . . . a lot of vintage I’ve gotten from my dad and I’ve had forever but a lot of it I’ve lost. . . not a lot has changed, the silhouettes have been pretty similar, but I tend to indulge in shoes. Every year around my birthday I’ll buy some really cool sneakers. . . I hope that one day I can have a wall of shoes but it’s all just like weird shoes.”
Ian’s wardrobe is modular and ever-changing and he’s not afraid to take a chance with bold style choices. After this interview Ian stopped into ReThreads and contemplated swapping some of his more expensive pieces for a pair of bright blue Balenciaga Speed Trainers, and he recently picked up a pair of black and white patterned Sherpa Rick Owens x Converse shoes. “With friends of mine if I see them wearing something I like[,] I pretty much always ask them if they’d trade for it . . . there’s something better about eliminating things you don’t want and getting something you want more that feels better than just going and buying that thing. . . it feels like I’m in a video game and I’m upgrading. . . and I like seeing things in real life too, I hate buying something I kinda want on Grailed with tax and not knowing if it’s gonna fit, but if I see that thing in real life I start thinking like, ‘how would I style it and what’s it gonna look like?’”
As Ian enters his fourth and final year at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he anticipates lots of big projects and development for both his personal career and GL333M World. “I have my senior runway coming up next year and I want my winter collection to be a preview of the final one. . . I’m making an ‘Ian website’ coming soon that will show my styling work, my collections and my runway and maybe some 1/1s. . . I might drop an album called ‘Ian 3’ on SoundCloud. It’s mostly just some silly stuff I’ve been working on, I’ve got a lot of features on there, and it’s like for fun obviously on bandlab, but I might put it on SoundCloud. . . And I think I want to do a better line of Gl333mWorld merch, like vintage blanks and screen printed by hand using stencils. I’d love to do some footwear or something crazy like that. Some 1/1s or something.”
Every design student’s dream is to have a namesake clothing line. For Ian, the question is not how, but when, Vailiencorp will grow to be his most successful body of work. I asked the designer where he sees himself in 5 years, to which he replied: “I just hope that I’m doing runways twice a year and that I have a website to put them on and that I’m selling 1/1s. I don’t care if Valliencorp ends up becoming a huge thing or making me money, and I think it’s a tough expectation to put on myself that in 5 years I’d be making money from my own brand. But I hope I’m still doing biannual runways and that more people view it than now, I want to get better and better at it. I feel like the first shows are just getting the hang of how to do a runway and style everything, but the next ones I want to have a more coherent theme and make it sick, you know?”
It is obvious that for one reason or another, Ian Vailliencourt will become a popular name amongst the media, the exciting part for everyone else will be finding out what avenue makes that happen. Until then, consider supporting Ian’s work by following him on social media so that you, too, can see what is next for this inspired designer.
Production Team:
Directed and Styled by: Robyn George, Executive Editor
Assisted by: Lisa Lor.
Photographed by: Pranav Volety
Modeled by: Ian Vailliencourt, Lisa Lor and Sydney Taylor Collins.
