The Look Book

Brian Ermanski, Resaler

"This is my Prince of Elizabeth look."

By Amy Larocca
Published Jan 14, 2006

(Photo: Jake Chessum)

What do you call that look?
It’s Edwardian punk fop. I usually wear the same outfit for a month. I’ll go a week without showering. I’m only on, like, day two. This is my Prince of Elizabeth look, which I’m wearing because I make art outside an abandoned building on Prince and Elizabeth. Today Vito Schnabel is coming to see it. He’s, like, the best gallerist in New York. He’s going to pay thousands of dollars for my work.

Is that how you make money?
I buy used clothes at thrift stores, and then I resell them at expensive places like Ina and Resurrection. I can find a seventies Yves Saint Laurent men’s suit for $10 in a thrift store and then get $125 at Ina. When I was a freshman at NYU, I got lots of copies of Wallpaper and studied. I’m a visual learner.

What’s going on with your eye makeup?
I woke up and it was still on. I try to put on a lot. It’s a lived-in look. I like the fact that it reminds me of the night before.

So what happened last night?
I don’t remember. I live for today. Not yesterday, not tomorrow. Wait—I guess that goes against what I just said. Dammit.

Do you have style icons?
I admire my friend Countess’s style. She’s a real countess, from, like, London. She’s just London extravagant: eighties punk. Very royal.

Are you into royal style?
When you invent something, you have to live it. And I invented that I’m the Prince of Elizabeth, so in that way, I like royal style. I’m actually in love with the Queen of Broome—she’s a supermodel. But sometimes I’ll just wear long johns for, like, three months. Everyone was like, What are you doing? But then I saw long johns in V magazine. Maybe they saw me, or maybe they saw some other first ape.

What?
You don’t know the first-ape theory? It’s that all the apes in the world think of the same thing at the same time: like the wheel, for example. And some apes put the idea into production, so they get all the credit. Like, Madonna has a boom box in her new video. I’ve been carrying around a boom box for four months. No, eleven. I’m a first ape, but I never get things into production. I’m going to be better about it this year.