In Living Colour

A peek into designer JJ Martin’s vibrant Milan home, which matches her colourful vintage wardrobe.

- Charmaine Ho

I don’t really mind not looking like anyone else,” says JJ Martin, the Los Angeles-born, Milan-based founder of fashion and lifestyle label La Double J. “I actually kind of like it.”

Known for her exuberantly printed clothing, Martin is staying true to form, dressed head to toe in eye-popping pattern as she shows me around her sunlit apartment with her adorable pug, Pepper, trotting at her heels. “When I moved to Milan, I brought a suitcase full of vintage clothes—I remember walking around the city streets with people staring at me, like, ‘What are you wearing?’ Now, everybody wants to join in!”

Christened Jennifer Jane, Martin gained her nickname to differentiate her from the three other Jennifers in her high school class. “I grew up in a very masculine environment. My dad was a hunter and a fisherman, and I used to have a bowl haircut and go on camping trips wearing my brothers’ hand-me-downs,” she recalls. As a teenager, she rebelled, got a perm, and started wearing a combination of tie-dye, pink lip gloss and blue eyeshadow. “I didn’t have any taste at all. And when I look back, I had no one in my life or orbit who had any either! But in my heart, there was always this attraction to fashion—I dreamt of being in that world, but I had no idea how to get there.”