YONY LA’s latest collection, YONY Racquet Club, was presented at the Town Tennis Club in Midtown-East. It was a fascinating sight to see attendees dressed fantastically outlandish, as one does during NYFW, meanwhile, the models were delightfully chill spread around the tennis court in shades of greens, oranges, and whites. They played catch, mingled with the crowds, hung out, and even occasionally broke for a tennis match—a testament to the durability of the collection. YONY boys exuberate the kind of aspirational cool one can expect from a group of incredibly attractive, charming, and jovial homies (who look like they come from wealth); perhaps this was because they seemed to really enjoy wearing these clothes. One of the models, dressed in a lightweight green pinstripe co-ord set, shared with me that he recently started golfing and thinks his outfit would be perfect for the sport, “It’s got a lot of versatility to it, a lot of breathability too, which is nice.”
YONY was established in 2020 by Johnny Schwartz amidst the global pandemic which continues to guide the brand’s aesthetic and principles. YONY focuses on functional, quality clothing produced ethically and transparently. When I asked Schwartz about sustainability he said, Sustainability is a term that’s thrown around so much…One area where we are sustainable is the fact that we manufacture everything domestically and the people that are making our stuff are very skilled and are paid a California minimum wage at the very minimum to make our stuff, if not more. So, they’re getting paid $17-20 an hour, and we retail our stuff at the exact same price.
Schwartz speaks passionately about clothing and textiles. We only source from American, European, or Japanese fabrics. We use one Korean lining fabric and then all the buttons, zippers, and linings are from those countries too. He points out a few examples, including a co-ord set made from organic cotton canvas produced in Texas with a matching tote bag, custom-made Japanese quilted-liner jackets, and two different kinds of swimwear fabrics produced in cotton yarn in the US. This collection also includes artwork made in collaboration with illustrator Kale Williams, which has been printed on shorts, and then embroidered and pinned on in an intricate process.
There’s a wonderful congruity here between the passion the makers have for creating the clothes and the joy that the wearers share in wearing them. One of the guests, rapper Yung Chris, was clad in a YONY ensemble. He said, I feel real grown in this, I’m normally on a kids streetwear type vibe, but I feel a little bit more professional inside of this outfit; more editorial, but I’d definitely wear this anywhere—this is an anywhere fit. Schwartz himself was clad in YONY raw denim jeans, which he proudly boasts he wore in the ocean two days ago. Perhaps that is the best thing about these clothes, you can live your life in them—you’re meant to wear and re-wear them till they’re beaten.