Tatsuro Horikawa bites and tears at his shirt in an effort to demonstrate his creative process. “Perfect is boring,” the designer growls through clenched teeth. This man, with shirt in his mouth, is responsible for Julius, a line that recalls the neo-Tokyo underground dystopian future of Ryu Murakami novels.
    He releases the grip of material in his mouth long enough to describe his inspiration: beauty that has been damaged and altered with the intention of bringing out something that is more profound and possibly more honest. Horikawa, through a translator, references a beautiful woman with a scar on her face—he slices the cutting motion of “scar” down his face—and how the scar makes her more interesting.
    Cities are beautiful in this way, too. Horikawa relays the differences between Los Angeles and Tokyo. Tokyo is “like Disneyland,” he says, and Los Angeles, ironically, is perfect and glamorous, but has a dirty underground back alley scene as well. It reminds Horikawa of the cathedrals he saw in the south of France and their “rotting” gold and copper vestibules. This spawned the idea behind his exclusive-to-H. Lorenzo capsule collection “Precious Metals.” One might dig for deeper meaning, hoping for some sort of social or political agenda, but Horikawa negates the implied contextual analysis, “No, the two just reminded me of each other.” Sometimes, complimentary elements don’t need explanation.
    Horikawa invokes David Lynch, whom he says he has already collaborated with. It makes sense: Lynch delves into that same murky contrast of beautiful and destroyed. Everything revolves around this theme. Horikawa and company go looking in far off villages to find interesting textiles, bring them back to their studio to alter them by ripping, pulling, and hand dying—all in-house and much of it by Horikawa himself, making each piece one-of-a-kind.
    There is a power to Julius’ single-minded determination. “I would like to create freedom to express oneself through my clothing,” Horikawa says, twice, in English.