Man In His Domain: Keith Hufnagel

NEARLY TWO DECADES AFTER LAUNCHING HUF FROM A MODEST STOREFRONT IN SAN FRANCISCO, THE ACCIDENTAL TASTEMAKER IS USHERING HIS EMPIRE INTO A NEW ERA OF SKATING AND STYLE

- Yasi Salek

It wasn’t Keith Hufnagel’s idea to name his clothing brand after himself. Anne Freeman, his wife at the time, suggested it when they started the company back in 2002, even pushed for it. Hufnagel had been using his nickname, Huf, on his pro-model skateboard decks for some time, and his sponsors put it on Tshirts. He’d built a personal brand around the name already; it was only a matter of transferring it to his new venture. He felt sort of insecure about it, but he did it anyway. Although they later divorced, Freeman remained involved with the company until 2013, and the name she helped mint remains to this day.

“If you look out in the world, there are tons of brands with people’s names on them, and you may not even know who they are. Like, do you know who Louis Vuitton is?” Hufnagel asks me.

I do not, in fact, know who Louis Vuitton is or was, despite owning at least one of his purses, so I get Hufnagel’s point. You build a brand, time passes, and you as a person become just one helix in its DNA. Or at least that’s the goal. I do know who Keith Hufnagel is, however, and so do a lot of other people — mostly skateboarders and skateboarding fans but streetwear devotees too.

When I first interviewed Hufnagel, back in 2005, HUF was a small clothing line with just two stores in San Francisco, some very limited-edition sneaker collaborations and a lot of buzzes. Almost 15 years later, we’re at HUF headquarters in downtown L.A., talking in his office, which is filled with clothing patterns and art pieces, including a giant pigeon sculpture by artist-skater and HUF collaborator Todd Francis. Hufnagel is wearing black twill HUF work pants, a white HUF-logo pocket T-shirt and Adidas shell toes.