My Tribe: Haute Leather
Designer Melinda Fletcher and Jean Pierre Guez teamed up to launch My Tribe, a line of high-quality leather pieces with a 1970s rock ’n’ roll vintage slant. Guez, who owns the apparel company IBGroup in Los Angeles, is also a cousin of veteran denim manufacturers Paul and Gerard Guez, but his company has no business relationship with either Paul Guez’ Blue Holdings Inc. or Gerard Guez’ Tarrant Apparel Group.
My Tribe’s look is edgy rock ’n’ roll and Western. Distressed denim skirts have attached leather belts, metal hardware and novelty buttons while tough leather jackets have whip-stitched trim. Some styles have a mass appeal while showing off the quality of the leather and construction of the garments. One jacket in crinkled leather has raw-edged cotton canvas pocket trims and sleeve inserts, another has a tailored quality in a buttery soft brown collarless style with peaked shoulders and a defined waist.
“I want to make something that you buy and you could just keep, wearing different ways with a lot of different things. It’s not a jacket you’re only going to wear that season. I think that’s what it is with leather—you want to live in it,” said Fletcher, who worked as a free-lance designer before launching her own collection.
Fletcher’s affinity for leather can be likened to some designers’ obsession with treated denim. “Fabric for me is so flat and boring. Leather for me, you can just do so much,” said Fletcher. “You can sand it. You can wash it and get different effects. You can do a lot of different processes to it. It’s kind of like the more you wear it, the better looking it gets. I never get bored with it.”
Wholesale price points range from $139 for a pair of jeans with attached leather belt and leather patches on the back pockets to $189 for a leather studded handbag with fringe. Leather jackets with hand-stitched details range from $249 to $349.
For more information, contact the Bryan Wilson Showroom in the California Market Center, suite B513, at (213) 629-2201. —Rhea Cortado
