BRYSON SAPIO

In this interview I pick Christopher Lusher brain about his new clothing project “Les Dechets”.

Interview by: Bryson Sapio

Photos by: Bryson Sapio

Art by: Lusher

How are you Lusher?

I’m good man.

Where are you from Lusher and howd we get to where we ae today?

Fuck man that’s not an easy question. Well im from just across the river a little ways down the road in Ohio, grew up in the area, lived here, skated here, made art here. As far as how’d I end up here in this bar talking about Les Dechets? Thats a whole can of worms but long story short, making these shirts and this brand kind of fell into place. Its art, its art man thats how it works, it comes and goes, different mediums and whatnot and making clothes, using clothes to make art was the next thing and so now were here.

Where are we at right now?

We are at Luke’s place. Shh. It’s a top secret spot. Luke’s place. Top secret spot. Drinking a couple beers right now. Smoking some cigarettes.

Epic, so, what is Les Dechets?

Well it started off as a joke, it started with me mocking these people who are selling clothes for way to much money and I wanted to make cooler shit that anyone can buy. It’s basically a clothing brand, it’s a joke, it was a joke but I want it to be something real. A real brand that people wear.

How did that name come about for the project?

Les Dechets means the garbage or the trash in French. And the name came about because my favorite artist did a fashion editorial for some brand that had a French name “ENFANTS RICHES DEPRIMES”, which means depressed rich kids. So, I googled trash in French and it was Les Dechets. And I thought wow, it was just so beautiful that I had to put it on something. And ya know when you see it, you don’t know what it means, it doesn’t register, and it just says the “trash” across your chest. So, I had to make some T-shirts.

Are you, are you trying to establish this as a brand?

Yeah, that was the idea, that’s the only idea, you know. Otherwise, it started as a joke. It’s a joke. And people didn’t get it. When I discovered this American born, French named brand that was charging eighteen hundred dollars for t shirts, I thought it would be a funny thing to make fun of these people through Les Dechets. I want to makeaffordable twenty dollars distressed and fucked up t shirts for twenty bucks to say fuck these people.

Where does Les Dechets stand as a brand right now?

I just want people to be in on the joke. I have a couple graphic tees in the works and we sold out of the first drop, we didn’t even get to do a drop, It just sold out. It was funny, people kept asking me what Les Dechets meant because it was kind of vague. And I explained it, and then people started buying them, it sold out before it even dropped. It was just gone. There’s like forty shirts or something, which I mean was no big deal. But. It was pretty fucking awesome. You know, where people are trusting your vision and they’re like, I get it. Like I get the joke. It’s a joke until it isn’t a joke and I want it to not be a joke anymore. I want to kind of pursue it as a brand, make it a brand, and stand behind it.

Talk a little bit about what makes these special, ya know with the distresssing and everything you do with them.

I wanted to destress the shirts. You take the t shirt, and you get a cinder block and you kind of rough the shirt up around the edges, just fuck it up. Fuck it up but not too bad. And when someone puts it on, it feels like the most comfortable thing they’ve ever fucking put on their fucking torso. That’s what I wanted to feel like, It’s just butter, you know? I want it to look good, I want the silhouettes to look good, I want the cut to look good, I want every fucking thing to look good. And not all of them are perfect, I went outside the lines and I did too much distressing on some because I was doing the process for the first time and learning how I wanted them to look. You can go overboard with it and turn it into some Balenciaga fucking bullshit. Like it can just look like trash.

So by the end, you were distressing them less? Did you find the sweet spot?

It was just a soft touch with the distress. Ya know, there’d be a tiny hole over here, a tiny hole way over here. That’s the shit. Not fucking blow it the fuck up and over do it.

So you kind of got your groove by the end?

Yeah, just got in the groove by the end. I want this to be a very specific aesthetic. I wanted to be patient with it because it just looks so good, just those two words. That’s the beauty of it all really.

So what’s up with the next Les Dechets drop? What can people expect?

There’s not going to be any more logo shirts for a while. We’re doing two separate graphics shirts. One of them is an old collage of mine and the other is something elsethat my partner in all this wants to do. We want to do some work jackets and hats, ya know things like that. Things people will give a fuck about. Stickers too. We’re just figuring things out as we go but, we have some things in the works. It’s art, it takes time.

Your art is obviously a big aesthetic driver in Les Dechets, talk about your history with doing collages?

Well, I mean. I started doing collage back around Covid, whenever that started, that’s when I started doing collage and It became compulsive. I did it every day, I’d get off work. I would start drinking beer at three, smoking weed, and then I would just start making collages until I just fucking got tired for the day. I ended up with almost seven hundred at the end of the quote unquote, end of Covid and so I did a show called “Cracked Up” that had over six hundred pieces and which was incredibly kind of insane.

And so now those are making their way into the new medium, which would be the clothing that you’re doing now?

I don’t want to ever repeat myself when it comes to art. Creatives do what they do, whatever that is. I dont want people to see this and make up their mind that , yeah, this asshole’s just doing the same shit over and over and over. I dont want what I make to be some kind of repeating broken record. But as an artist thats what I output. You can’t stop that. That’s just what it is. That’s art, man. That’s like the bones of it. So yeah I like using collage in my projects including this one. If I want to make something, I’ll just make it.

How has this journey been for you personally?

It’s been fun, fulfilling you know what i mean? It’s just that perfect thing that I can pursue and give my time to make something that i care about and that other poeple might give a fuck about. It’s just art on shirts and its the right thing for me to give a shit about right now.

Do you want to say anyhting else for the people?

Yeah, fuck ENFANTS RICHES DEPRIMES and put something cool on your body instead. Much love.

Thank you Lusher.

No, thank you brother.