Bally High

The brand's new creative director, Rhuigi Villaseñor, is redefining the luxury landscape.

- NAOMI ROUGEAU

I’m going to have to find a new spot,” jokes Bally creative director Rhuigi Villaseñor, from what had seemed like a low-key corner of the lobby of New York’s Mercer hotel. During the course of the hour I spend with the newly appointed designer, six eagle-eyed fans and acquaintances (many of them donning Villaseñor’s own label, Rhude) politely cut in simply to shake his hand. Since founding Rhude in 2015, Villaseñor has won an impressive following that runs the gamut from rapper Future to actress Diane Keaton—who was once bold enough to ask for a jacket off his back. This season, with his debut collection for the 172-year-old Swiss fashion house, that fan base is about to get even bigger.

In a celeb-packed Milan venue in September, Villaseñor presented his own idea of luxury, informed by his unique life experience. It had been 20 years since Bally had last staged a runway show—and also 20 years, nearly to the day, since an 11-year-old Villaseñor had arrived in Southern California with his family, seeking refuge from a brewing civil war in the Philippines. In the audience, alongside Laura Harrier and Luka Sabbat, was Villaseñor’s mother, herself a tailor who once made all the family’s clothes.