CARSON

Cole: All right. Okay. So first, this is one I've asked to everyone. How much did your fit cost? And where'd you get all your pieces? Like, if you want to break down cost , if you don't, if you don't, if you don't wanna break down costs, then…

Carson: no, that's fine. Do you, um, have you seen throwing fits

Cole: mm-hmm.

Carson: we gotta start bottom up, right?

Cole: Yeah, let's start bottom to top.

Carson: Okay, so I'm wearing right now, currently I've got on Uggs , these are like low-key and knockoff of the stamped uggs. I actually really wanted the stamped uggs. My parents like asked me what I wanted for Christmas last year, and I sent them the stamped ones.  

Cole: I don't even know if I've seen the stamped uggs.

Carson: I threw these on this morning when I went out. Like I take a walk a couple times a day, so I like threw these on just to, to hit a little walk. But, um, I think these were like 300 bucks. Cool. Um, yeah, 300 bucks, The socks I've got on some Hathenbruck, um, Caleb Flowers.

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Local, local saltlake um, designer is maybe a word that you could call him. No, not really. Like brand kind of a maker of things.

Cole: Yeah. Brand creator.

Carson: Yeah. Um, snowboarder, product creator, um, whatever. Like, yeah. Snowboarding guy. So Hathenbruck socks. These, um, pants, to be honest, I don't even know what they're called.

There's like a label back here. Let's see.

Cole: What does that. Uh, it says R O A M E R S,

Carson: Roamers. Uh, I got these at a store in Chicago last year, traveling to see, um, Donda called Mild Supply. They're like, like specialized in lots of like vintage, not vintage, but like kind of vintage inspired ware stuff.

Yeah, like, um, a lot of raw denim. There's actually a brand in California. Where my parents grew up, you were kind of in that area. There's a brand called Rail Car Find Goods. And they carried their stuff at this store, which was cool to see. So these pants, I think were 250 oh socks, like 15 bucks, 15 to 25 bucks.

I can't remember. 250. I'm literally wearing a Mission belt. Mission belt. Nice. Just for Utilitarian need. I actually like, love how these function, don't love how they look. Yeah. The shirt, I've got a t-shirt on. I'm wearing 77 millimeter. My buddy Christian Santiago, his brand up in Salt Lake, kind of based on, on, um, ski culture and really like making a really cool culture for skiers specifically.

There's always been like cool kind of underground snow snowboarding culture, but never really for ski. So he's like leaning into that. Um, I've got a vintage Kirkland hoodie. Nice Costco style. Yeah, it's like the thickest Yeah. Knit material. Yeah. I don't even,

Cole: and it's not even really like fleece lined, it's just

Carson: like cotton kind of.

So I, my, I, I like, doesn't say this for sure, but just my like instinct and kind of product background. , do you know, like on your sweatshirts and on your like tees, like the ribbing on your collar? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. ? Yeah. The ribbing on your sleeve. I think this is literally a heavyweight ribbing that they just used for the whole body of it.

Oh, cool. It's got some really cool paneling. Like the way the pockets come into the actual That's crazy construction. Yeah. It's literally Costco's so cool. It's so sick and the wash. Like, I think it, it just is like worn over time. Well, um, I found it in, at the bins up in salt. . I don't have a lot of vintage pieces, but this is one of them.

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Um, so wearing that, keep the coziness. Um, I'm also wearing a Dr. Collector's jacket. Dr. Collectors is a brand started by a guy named Olivier. He's like an old Parisian guy. Mm-hmm. , um, born in, in France, I think in Paris specifically. Started the brand in the eighties in Paris. Um, fell in love with American…

Americana. And so he moved to LA and has been running the brand from LA. Um, their store’s on Melrose called The Trading Post. Oh yeah. And um, the story behind this, they'll just tell like a quick story on this. Um, I went to Bodega in la, another really sick store, and um, I saw a pair of these pants, these crazy pants.

I think they had something like 30 pockets. and they were Dr. Collector pants, that they had two or three pairs of there. And so I didn't end up buying those. I bought some art Arcterx stuff and the whole rest of the trip I could not stop thinking about those pants. So I happened to be in Melrose and um, like two hours before I needed to fly back to Utah, looked up.

Dr. Collectors saw they had a store literally five minutes away from me, so I just popped in there. Met a guy named Brian, one of the workers. All the workers there at the trading post are these like wise sage guys that are super, super, like even keeled. Um, really love and know the brand through and through.

Olivier does a lot of the actual dying indigo dying type stuff there on site at the store. Um, we were just chatting about clothing and manufacturing. Um, it's funny, I actually like, could take you to the exact places in LA where they got these materials. Like that fabric. Yeah. Like I know exactly where this came from.

Mm-hmm. . But we were chatting and he took me, he's like, do you wanna see the next. Seasons samples. And I of course was like, yeah, would love to see that. Yeah. So if he takes me upstairs, he shows me their little showroom of all these samples. This jacket was there. Um, it's like a reversible kind of bomber liner.

Yeah. With some crazy Japanese, like hand embroidered mm-hmm. , um, very like

Cole: Kapital esque. Yeah.

Carson: Super Kapital esque. And, um, the. Like fell in love with this jacket. The guy asked, or I asked the guy, I was like, would you ever sell that to me? He's like, yeah, I think we're done with it. So this was the first sample, the one sample they made before they released the collection.

Oh, so this is a sample piece? This is, this is a sample piece. Like one of one like sample piece. I actually went back to LA and saw the collection a little while ago that dropped. And because it's all done in LA by hand. I think they washed it and it actually, the, the like khaki material on the, in the, what is actually the outside, but it's more of like a green color on the production pieces and I didn't love it.

Yeah, I don't love it, so I'm stoked. You're happy you have Oh, I haven't been saying prices. The tee outside. I got it for free from my buddy. The, the hoodie was probably 20 bucks maybe

Cole: At the bins? No, if it was the bins, it was 20 cents.

Carson: Yeah, Um, so super cheap there. This jacket, I think was like 600 bucks.

Mm-hmm. , but is one of the staple pieces Yeah. In my closet that I love. Um, really, really interesting detail. The more that you look at it. There's like a label on the back that talks. It says, I think it says Teddy, is it hard Teddy or something?

Cole: It says Teddy forever.

Carson: That was Olivier and his wife's son.

He committed suicide, and so all their pieces have that. So this piece is really cool because it was just like, I have like a really strong story behind it. So yeah, that's, that's um, the outer, that's the outerwear. I'm wearing a Homer necklace that I got. Um, before they went online, I posted on my Instagram that I really wanted, one, had a buddy who was going to be in New York.

He was living in Boston. He was gonna be in New York. Went to the store, picked it up for me, um, went back to Boston. Where a girl that I met online, a Lone Ghost fan, connected with him. She was coming to the event that they had for Halloween. So she picked up the necklace and then flew it out to me, brought it to me at the event.

Um, so that's kind of like a cool story behind this one. I've got like a bead that my doctor, my, my holistic doctor gave me that's supposed to keep my like, body polarity.

Cole: You’ve gotfull on like chakra gear on,

Carson: So that, and then, um, I'm wearing a watch that I got in Paris on my 25th birthday.

Oh yeah. This was like my birth, my birthday gift to myself. Mm-hmm. , not to mention that I was already, was on a trip for my birthday, so I ended up splurging on this. But, um, I wanted to watch where I wanted to buy a watch on my birthday and I happened to be in Paris and I went and looked at a bunch of watches, found this brand.

at a store. They told me that they actually were a Parisian French brand. Um, it's called Mark's Lab. And so I was like, oh, I'm not gonna buy it at the store. It's like, I, I don't even How you say it's like Printemps or something? It's like a huge department store. Mm-hmm. . Um,

Cole: That is how you say it, by the way. It means spring, like the season.

Carson: sick. Okay. Wow. I'm right. So I found their actual location. I went and. connected with one of the workers. She was super, super cool. She walked me through the, um, she walked me through all the watches they had, and then she brought this one out Every year, wine companies will do, like, they'll take their batch of wine and do something special, add some special ingredients, and do like a limited amount of it.

This is their, um, there's a French word for it. I can't remember. It starts with, This was their like limited edition piece for the year. Um, so it's like, they usually do it in silver. They did it in black and then they did like an alligator band on it. So this is like one of 199 cool pieces. Got that on my birthday.

This ring I'm wearing is a ring I designed for my brother that passed away. Um, I did that before I served their mission. And it has two pieces of turquoise that I got from my great aunt who also passed away. She found these pieces of turquoise on her property in. Canna, Utah. And then I've got branded glasses on that I bought.

Oh, where did I buy 'em? I bought 'em at At the brand Dead store. I think I bought 'em at Bodega. Oh yeah. I did buy 'em at Bodega. sooo. That's it. Dude, the fit.

Cole: Sweet.

Carson: Sorry, that was probably wordy.

Cole: No, that's totally fine. That's totally fine. I feel like if all these, all these interviews are around like 10 to 15 minutes,I kind of expected yours to be longer

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Um, when do you feel like you found your personal style?

Carson: tomorrow.

Cole: Okay. Profound.

Carson: I, for me, I think that style is, I'm, I'm like obsessed with the idea of dynamic versus static. I think we as people are dynamic in general. We are becoming something that's like, for me, the reason I think that we're even alive. So I expect and know. My interests and desires and, um, I style are going to change throughout my life, especially based on like growing, getting older.

I hate when people like y not hate it, but like, , you gotta know your body, you gotta know where you're at, and then you gotta dress kind of according to that. Mm-hmm. style isn't just like a blanket where it's like, oh, I really like street wear, so I'm just gonna wear street wear. If you don't have a body for street wear, like won't, okay.

Don't wear street wear. You gotta, so I'm like currently in this mode right now where I have actually been really feeling the desire to like mature my style like I want to be wearing. Slacks. I wanna be wearing pleaded trousers. I want to be wearing like loafers. Mm-hmm. . Um, I want like a lot of like our legacy, um, Jill Sanders mm-hmm.

type stuff. So I feel like I'm constantly discovering my style, which is like honestly a fun,

Cole: beautiful process. Yeah. Good answer. Um, . Okay. Let's see. This is kind of a surface level question. What's your, what's your least favorite fashion trend? Oh,

Carson: very cute. Wow. That's a good question. Um,

I, I don't honestly love sneakers. Mm-hmm. , I'm not a big sneaker guy. I think that, sneaker. Last guy said this too. Okay. Yeah. Sneakers are like a, an easy, sneakers are the path of least resistance. I feel they're so available and it's being so pushed and it's being so monetized. Mm-hmm. that it's just like, it's not even about the shoes anymore.

Yeah. It's like, it's just this crazy like world. So for me, I think sneakers. Yeah, I think

Cole: that's a good answer. I feel like, I feel like. people who classify themselves as like sneakerheads. When like the, the only thing they do is put on a certain pair of shoes that they paid a lot for. Maybe they don't even like 'em.

Mm-hmm. , they don't know how to dress 'em. It's like that's worse than just like, throw on your new balances that you got for 20 bucks and throw on your. When you, when you like fake putting in the effort, I feel like it's almost a little bit embarrassing

Carson: when, when your sneakers cost 10 times more than your whole outfit.

Mm-hmm. , and not because they're just insanely expensive, but because you just don't know how to dress all the other stuff. It's just like, yeah. It doesn't, doesn't make sense to me. Yeah. I also, I mean, maybe like, the other answer I would say to this is just like, I, I, I, I don't, maybe, maybe not something I hate, but something I don't necessarily understand is people that just dress themselves.

with zero thought put into it. Yeah. Like being unaware of your style. For me, it's like such a strong expression, form of expression that it's just, and I get that people are different and people, not everyone's as creative as maybe like you and I are, and I don't say that in like a, yeah. Learning type way.

It just like, that's not something I really understand.

Cole: Yeah, I get that. And segueing from that, my next question was like, how do you feel like your clothing choices do portray like your person. Oh, for sure.

Carson: If you can articulate that. Yeah, for sure. Over the last, so I, I think the last two years for me have been the first time that I've made money in my life, whatever.

Had some, some disposable income before that even, I always prioritized clothes, but I couldn't necessarily do it in a, in the same way that I, I can now. Um, and I kind of made decisions over the last year and a half to pretty much only shop for clothes when I. . So if you like, almost everything I'm wearing right now are either things that my friends made or that I bought when I was traveling.

And so if you look at me and dig deeper like you just did, you'll see these personal journeys where I learn so much and I gather these objects. So I think for me it's just like an expression of literally the places I go, the way I live my life, like every day. Cool. The silhouettes and stuff are another.

like, depending on where I'm at, like you could say, like I, I find that when I'm insecure, maybe when I'm like in like not the best spot, my clothes will get like baggier. Mm-hmm. when I'm more sure of myself, I'll wear things that fit me really well. So that's like layer two of

Cole: that. Yeah. Cool. Um, what is your favorite, like, or what you think comes to mind when you think of like your most interesting.

Inspirational, favorite, whatever you wanna say, story when it comes to like you creating et-al.

Carson: Hmm.

Dang, that's a really good question cuz et o has been the thing for me for a long time since high school. So it's like pretty much the accumulation of everything to this point, um, is what Et Al is. It's really for me, it's like the personal journey of my. So that's hard to, like, that's hard to really, I guess I'll put it, I'll put it, this is a good, this is a good story.

So I met a, I was running around LA living in downtown, working for a clothing company, um, kind of learning the ropes. Spent a bunch of my free time walking around LA trying to find materials, trying to find my connections. I walked into this, That I'm super grateful for. Uh, they sell like really, really amazing denim.

Mm-hmm. , uh, a lot of brands that you and I love, especially LA based brands, use their stuff. Um, so I walked into this, this place, stumbled upon it one day, walked in, met this girl named Gina. We connected. She's really eclectic, creative. A little bit hard to wrap your head around. , she kind of resonated with me.

I would go back there like pretty often. One day I was telling her about the designs that I was working on for Et Al. I was developing this 20 piece collection, 10 piece men's, 10 piece Women's was like super ambitious, 19 years old, trying to make it happen. Didn't know what that meant. Um, didn't really know the reality of how much it costs to make that many pieces custom.

And so she just loved my drive and she's like, there's a girl I need to connect you with. Her name is. And she does all of the manufacturing for like at the time, 424, which was like mm-hmm. the pinnacle, especially being in LA it was like the coolest little hotspot of things going on. Yeah. She did like fear of God.

She did all these brands, so she was like, I want to connect you to this girl. We ended up, I think, coordinating a time to meet in person at that, that fabric store, the denim supplier, and. , we, I set a meeting with her. I spent that whole like whatever week prior to the meeting, preparing these tech packs that were literally pieces of paper I printed off of different jackets.

I love with sketches on top of it, showing where I wanted things. Little, little like swatches of fabric stapled to the paper. Sketches I'd done. Um, a couple reference pieces that I took, some samples that I had made, patterns and samples I'd made on my own. And I walked into this girl's office who does all this amazing production as a 19 year old with no background, um, and sat down with her and just explained to her what I wanted to do.

And, you know, a lot of places are pretty selective with who they will work with. I was able to get her to be like, I was able to. Kind of get her buy-in and in investment time-wise, she connected me with some other people that we then started taking steps to really actualizing et-al. Fast forward down that road, like it ended up coming up to like the grand total of like $600,000 was gonna be needed to do it.

So I, I, I, that was also when I was having some spiritual journey in my life, so I ended up putting on pause, but I'm really proud of that. That to me just shows the determination and the willingness that I've had to take whatever risks and put myself out there to make my dreams possible. Um, so that's like whatever, like one of the, the cooler experiences I've had with Et-Al.

Cole: And So you put that on pause to go on a mission?

Carson: Yeah.

Cole: Okay, Cool

Carson: Put it on pause. I, it was kind of an, there were awkward conversations to have. I had to go and tell these people that I was in the middle of working with that I had gotten. . I've, I'd not, you felt like the ball was rolling? Kind of, yeah. Not really convinced, but like I'd, I'd kind of like, I've, I'd had to, to really prove myself to them.

Yeah. That I was ready to do this. They were on board. They were on board, and then I had to like tell 'em, Hey, I'm like leaving. I don't need to pause this. And they're like, why? And I'm like, oh, to go like, be a missionary, which I'm so grateful for. But to. . They didn't really understand that. Yeah. They were like, what does that even mean?

So I, I didn't burn any bridges per se. Like I've, I've had little bits of communication with them since I've gotten back. I also now have a different network that I can do things kind of on my own. Yeah. But I was really grateful for that because it was just, I, I stepped into a world that I was so unprepared for, but just did it with confidence.

Cole: Totally. Oh, I love that. Um, Cool. I think that that's, I think that's it. No, you're good. You're good. Um, let me, uh, let me figure this out. Okay, cool. Thanks, Carson. Yes, sir.