The Cult Of Fear Of God

How menswear designer Jerry Lorenzo is remaking american luxury for the boundary-less, genderless now.

- Horacio Silva

Jerry Lorenzo, the reserved designer of Los Angeles–based cult label Fear of God, is known for his defiantly understated clothes, which disregard fashion seasons and inhabit a different register from the loud, status-conscious glamour of many of his contemporaries. Lorenzo’s low-key, luxe looks, based on his personal style and created ostensibly for men but beloved by women, offer an almost muffled rebuke to the din of the fashion circus.

But despite his efforts to exist outside the fleeting nature of fashion, Lorenzo, who started his label in 2012, now finds himself very much of the moment. The hosannas for Fear of God’s seventh collection—a study in languid luxury two years in the making and unveiled in August—presaged the “all sweats all the time, but make it cute” orthodoxy of our new lives and all but anointed him the saviour of American fashion. At a time when fashion is seeking salvation, from the social and racist sins of its past as well as the commercial and psychic battering of the pandemic, the 43-year-old has gone from self-taught newbie to Covid-era critical darling, an agenda-setting second coming of Ralph Lauren. Once a name known primarily in the cliquish, mainly male-dominated streetwear scene, Fear of God welcomes a broader range of shoppers with its latest collection. The diehard streetwear collector will surely find something, but so will the woman who still longs for the luxurious simplicity of Phoebe Philo–era Céline.

“It’s pretty crazy, man,” says Lorenzo, speaking over Zoom from his studio in the Arts District of downtown LA. “I’d be lying if I said I knew exactly why the label is resonating the way it is now, but I’d like to think it’s partly because we’ve always approached fashion in an honest way, providing honest solutions.”