His designs beautifully balance aesthetics with emotional effect, whether it’s a stunning floating pool in the East River or a peaceful bathhouse in the Cayman Islands. This ideal combination of creativity and practicality sets Wong’s work apart.

As the visionary founder of Food New York, he has carved out a unique niche by blending art, functionality, and cultural stories in exciting ways. His impressive portfolio includes high-profile partnerships with icons like the late Virgil Abloh, Nike, and Kim Kardashian. However, what truly inspires Wong is his heritage and his heartfelt desire to create spaces that unite people.

Wong opened Food New York in the heart of New York’s Chinatown in 2010. The neighborhood formed the firm’s character and the approach of its architectural practice. “There were a lot of deep cultural roots that affected our work. We always talked about community, but it was from a top-down perspective. After being in the neighborhood for a couple of years, we had to tap into things that were local to the community. Now, every project we try to make hyper-local,” Wong said. Instead of imposing a style, the locality influences the look and feel of the project, with context becoming the face of Wong’s process.

In 2023, The New York Times published a multi-profile piece centered around Asian American figures under the pretense of “saving Chinatown.” While Wong doesn’t entirely agree with this headline, he admits the notion intrigues him.

“I never know how I feel about it when it’s presented as ‘saving Chinatown,’ because sometimes we should just leave it alone. On the other hand, there’s the threat of gentrification, but there’s also a need to transform,” Wong explained. He noted that the older generation has competing visions for Chinatown compared to its youth. Wong emphasized that he’s actively listening to all perspectives to see where Food New York fits in. “It’s exciting how we can be a part of this transformation without displacement, and that will be interesting to watch unfold.”

To encourage people to return to the neighborhood after the COVID-19 pandemic, Food New York launched the Food Mahjong Club, inviting neighbors and friends to a community game night, expanding the firm’s broader mission. However, Wong avoids defining the firm’s scope of work, which resembles an ever-changing menu.

“I’ve been trying to think of an underlying theme or connective tissue of our work because aesthetically and materially, it’s all pretty different,” Wong says of his firm. “I think the one foundational thing is that we always work with an emerging culture. Even if the client isn’t coming in with an explicit ask to create change, that’s always the angle that ends up being the most impactful.”

Wong’s community-driven mission resonated far beyond Chinatown. Even before Food New York, Wong’s architectural language attracted collaborators redefining culture in their own fields, including some of the world’s most influential creatives.

One such collaboration was the eight-year project on the home of Kim Kardashian and Kanye West. “What was nice about working with them was that Kanye was interested in going against what everyone else was doing at that time with their homes at that level,” Wong said. He described the process as similar to marriage counseling or therapy. “Through even like a paint color, you start seeing priorities come up that maybe they haven’t talked about yet as a couple,” he explained.

It’s undeniable that Kim’s relationship with Kanye played a pivotal role in her evolution into the fashion icon she is today. When they began dating in 2012, Kanye helped her refine her style, literally throwing items out of her closet, altering it into something more sophisticated.

Wong mentioned the wardrobe overhaul and how Kanye’s input with the houses mimicked this. “This was as much for him and his family as it was for how other people are going to see them,” Wong said. He recounted how Kanye would have teams of artists, designers, and musicians over at his home, bouncing between groups, sharing his opinions.

Weighing in on Kanye’s design methods, Wong gained a front-row view of Kanye’s world-building, observing the aesthetic connections between his music, home, and clothing line. The main house in Calabasas that Wong and Kanye designed was primarily white, but with a distinct shade of white that had a sand undertone. The monochromatic and serene design, similar to his Yeezy collections, which often feature earth tones, has created a cohesive visual identity for Kanye that has endured for decades.

Through Kanye, Wong also witnessed Virgil Abloh’s dynamic partnership with West. Abloh’s role as creative director helped shape many of Kanye’s fashion and music projects, mixing high fashion with street culture and leaving a lasting mark on both industries.

“People like Kanye and Virgil are the clients who bring ideas that push you into new sectors you hadn’t considered, and you’re constantly moving in multiple directions with them,” Wong shared.

Wong collaborated with Virgil Abloh on the design of the first six Off-White stores, beginning with the brand’s flagship in Hong Kong, which opened in December 2014. The first part of the Hong Kong store resembled a lush garden jungle rather than a traditional storefront. Wong explained that what they did challenged people’s perceptions of what a store could be. Drawing on his training in public space design and his childhood spent hanging out in skate/surf shops, he envisioned a place where people could simply be with one another. The store was not just a site for selling clothes, but a location where people could buy into aspiration.

A significant takeaway for Wong was Abloh’s approach of never saying no. Wong said that “if someone suggested something he disagreed with, Abloh would find a way to redirect the conversation or present his thoughts in front of them, which sparked something new and kept the momentum going.”

“That kind of attitude I’ve never seen in anyone else. It’s like guidance and flow combined. It’s wild. And especially when you think about how he was going through thousands of ideas a day,” Wong reflected.

After Virgil’s death, Wong shared that he often thinks back to the energy that Virgil brought to creating. “He was intuitively doing it. I have to remember to do that a lot - to redirect instead of giving a straight no. That piece of how he worked will remain in how we work in the studio. It was amazing how energized you’d get working with him, and how many people he energized. That kind of optimism and transfer of energy is something I also try to do as much as I can.”

“I learned so much working with Virgil, especially not to be overly precious with the stuff you’re putting out in the world,” Wong said.

“Virgil’s body of work feels so complete, not because of any individual thing he was putting out, but because the total, vast collection of work felt like a singular personal project. His projects–like welcoming young Black kids in architecture, for example, making fashion scholarships for people that didn’t have access to fashion funds, making architecture more accessible, making book design a thing that was cool again–all of these things were outcomes of the day-to-day work he was producing. It makes putting out individual designs much less precious knowing that it’s building to a much larger effect.”

In an age of creative and capitalistic perfectionism, Virgil’s ethos, as told by Wong, is provocative simply because his relentless artistic output and generosity of spirit opened countless doors for others.

This same enthusiasm infuses Wong’s new work—a multi-site project in Barbados with Ghetto Gastro founder Chef Pierre Serrao. Wong spoke about working in a place steeped in history and recognizing its potential for transformation and cultural elevation. Opportunities like this make him especially grateful and excited to help shape meaningful change, with Serrao’s passion guiding the way.

While Wong spends much of his day shaping exteriors, the essence of his work lies within. His architecture isn’t about imposing a vision but about nurturing possibilities. He has mastered the art of creating rooms that gather people, feed their imaginations, and invite them to dwell in metaphors. In an era when architecture often chases spectacle or commerce, Wong reminds us that spaces can still carry meaning, memory, and movement—quietly reshaping how we live and illuminating fresh ways of seeing the world and each other.

Featuring butterfly motifs, various shades of purple, a fusion of tradition and modernity, and an ancient tie-dye technique called bandhini, abacaxi’s pre-spring 2026 capsule collection is an amalgamation of designer Sheena Sood’s favorite things.

Following her fall-winter 2025 collection titled Apsara, Sood felt inspired to create a new collection that revolved around the bandhini pieces she had just debuted. Dating back to 4000 BC in South Asia, this intricate process makes a unique pattern by tying very small knots, dunking the fabric in natural dyes, and pulling apart the knots to reveal a design made up of tiny, contrasting circles. The word bandhini comes from the Sanskrit and Hindi word bandh which means to bind or to close. Traditionally, this technique is done on silk, which is how Sood created her periwinkle blue and deep brown sarongs for spring-summer 2025’s Mystic collection. This time however, the self proclaimed “textile nerd” known for her ability to combine her Indian heritage with western-leaning styles wanted to try this technique using a jersey cotton fabric.

Jersey, compared to silk, is a much more casual and versatile fabric due to its stretch and durability. Some of Sood’s most popular designs are made of jersey as it is a forgiving fabric that she says has the ability to “grow with you or shrink with you,” as your body changes. So while she was interested in seeing how bandhini would look on this new material, she also wanted to continue her brand’s legacy of creating clothes that are inclusive to a wide range of physiques.

While the process of tightly plucking and tying small sections of fabric is already quite laborious, doing so with a thick material like jersey posed a challenge for the artisans Sood works with in Bhuj, India. Such intricacy and experimentation took time that didn’t follow the brand’s typical semi-annual collection calendar, but still deserved to be showcased alongside complementary abacaxi designs. “This particular collection has a different process than my usual one, where it’s like a puzzle —piecing things together that I wanted to use and turning it into a cohesive collection,” says Sood, “This one is like a mix of my favorite things.”

The standout bandhini dyed shirt, dress, leggings and skirts feature a familiar motif for abacaxi - the butterfly. Sood loves butterflies. From her childhood bedroom wallpaper to Mariah Carey’s Butterfly album being the soundtrack of her high school years, they’re a mainstay for the designer and she sees them as a symbol of transformation. “I’ve always been told that if a butterfly lands on you, it’s good luck,” reflected Sood.

These bandhini butterfly pieces come in two neutral colorways, espresso and dark grey, while brighter accent colors create the butterfly motif and linework. Because the design features three distinct colors, each garment had to be tied, dyed, and dried three times — a time-intensive process. Every step of this process was done by hand, making each garment one of a kind.

Innovation, individuality, and community are at the core of everything Sood creates. While the obvious goal for any business owner is to earn a profit, Sood’s relationships with her manufacturers are vital to keeping these sacred artforms around for future generations. Adapting traditional techniques to create clothing that can be worn in a modern context provides work for craftspeople whose jobs are being taken over by machines through fast fashion industrialisation. While a lot of arduous work goes into creating each garment, Sood says her manufacturers will ask, “When are they going to get larger orders?” She goes on to say that, “Even though it’s individual women knitting and crocheting in their homes, they want to do more business.”

Bandhini is not the only fabric manipulation technique done by hand that Sood is proud to incorporate in her designs. In this collection, there is a quilted, indigo-dyed, jacquard suit set that’s hand embellished with hanging pearlescent beads, as well as a rainbow-striped jacquard jacket and skirt set with a detachable backpack that comes in cream and espresso. Both fabrics were created in Punjab, India. There is also a smocked skirt that can be worn as a dress, a silk chiffon top with fabric buttons that attach to a matching skirt to make a dress, and a sari-style blouse and matching scarf that use a resist dye technique known as clamp dying to create the pattern.

Textile design is Sood’s first love, and is the heart of abacaxi. “I really wanted to bring the traditional Indian textiles into that more contemporary wear in an authentic way, where it’s also about sharing the history behind the tradition. Because, of course, there’s so much garment production in India, there are so many brands who do all of their embroidery in India, but there’s not as much focus on the history behind those practices.”

Through her international travels, Sood has met and later collaborated with a number of artisans whose work she admires. All of her crochet and knit pieces are made in Peru, where they have a long-standing tradition of working with native cotton strains and alpaca wool (where the crochet butterfly purse styled in the lookbook with the bandhini butterfly dress was made). The woven crossbody bag was made by an artisan she met in Oaxaca, Mexico (styled with the cream jacquard skirt and jacket set). Even the brand’s name abacaxi is the Portuguese word for pineapple, where she first heard it sung by fruit sellers on the beaches of Morro de São Paulo, Brazil.

This collection encapsulates everything Sood has built with abacaxi over the last 12 years, as every garment and accessory in the lookbook is handmade in either India, Mexico, Peru or New York City. She photographed the thoughtfully stylised pre-spring collection throughout her neighborhood of Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, worn by her friend and first-time model Nazuk Kochhar, and shot with her father’s old film camera. Set in New York City, the photographs radiate the same warmth and ease Sood felt on the sand in Brazil, dreaming of creating textiles to one day use in a collection of her very own. They portray a young woman who confidently wears these designs while going about her day in a way that is both aspirational and practical, the way that Sood intended them to be worn. They embody innovation, creativity, and appreciation for the artisans who created these techniques thousands of years ago.

Ribombee, a small fairy Pokémon with gossamer wings, is tattooed on Erik Charlotte’s left shoulder. It gathers pollen to create tiny bursts of energy for others, despite seeming too delicate to run on anything itself.

Erik Charlotte, the eponymous women’s wear house, is rooted in fantastical escapism. It’s her creation that exists in a whole other universe away from ours — where everything’s puffy and cinched and has a weird design language inspired by door and drawer handles, alcoves, and doorways.

Early Contradictions

Erik wanted to be an architect when she was young, and now she’s building a different kind of world. One stitched from fabrics like taffeta, twill, and brocade rather than concrete — dressing the likes of PinkPantheress, Halsey, Emma Chamberlain, and an ever-growing list of celebrities, all while somehow bending time to keep everyone else running.

Last summer, she spent some time in Vienna (where her dad is from) in nature and looking at the architecture. “I loved looking at all the buildings everywhere, like the regular apartment buildings or the apartment that I was staying in. The way that the door is framed. I love small details,” Erik said softly, framed by the white fireplace that doubles as a backdrop for her Instagram. A classic setting against which her avant-garde designs stand out. “I have this attention to detail that also comes in the form of my inspiration.”

The past year has been both tough and transformative for the young designer.

From the step and repeats of the AMAs to the stages of the Oscars and Coachella, her designs have been everywhere this year. In the few weeks since I visited her art-deco live-work studio, she has gained at least 20,000 Instagram followers. NYLON and the Los Angeles Times published pieces on her after my interview. And the brand is barely a year old.

“It’s hard because I feel like my dream projects change, and then I do them and I have to come up with a new one,” she said.

Finding a Signature

She’s been sewing since age 15 and is mostly self-taught (other than the basics her grandmother showed her). At first, she held back from sharing her work, worried that without professional photos it wouldn’t look polished enough for Instagram. After graduating from college, the stitches started coming together. “I had gone through a really crazy breakup, and I was just trying to figure out what I wanted to do with myself, because I had landed a job, and I felt like everything should be going well, but I was so unsure. Once I moved into this apartment, I felt like I had so much room for freedom. I brought a whole bunch of fabric with me, and I just started making more stuff with the time that I had.”

Erik continued, “And I was like, ‘I’m just gonna set up my tripod on my phone and take these pictures and post them and like, not have to worry about it.’ I felt like the barrier to entry was kind of removed for me. And so now that every product shot, every garment is shot in the same exact spot—it gave me a lot of freedom to shoot whenever I want. I can shoot on a workday and get it all knocked out. The focus gets to just be on the garment, because it’s the same backdrop every time. And so that’s when it really started to kick off.”

Eighty-hour weeks are her norm now while balancing a full-time technical corporate job and the collaborative, freewheeling universe of fashion. What began as chance Instagram follows has blossomed into a creative network of artists and stylists, opening the door to collaborations with MARINA and Ravyn Lenae.

Erik’s mind is on 24/7. Living and breathing fashion and wanting to work all the time. Wherever Ribombee gets its energy from, that’s apparently where Erik is plugged in too — she keeps going long after she should’ve burned out. It’s not always healthy. To find balance, she turns to video games, DJing, and baking.

“Having activities that I can be comfortable being bad at has really helped me,” she said. “I’m such a perfectionist when it comes to my work... It’s refreshing to bake a cake and totally fail at it, but it still tastes good.”

Dreams in Motion

Antithesis is also at the heart of Erik Charlotte.

“I had people texting me who didn’t know that I worked on it, like, ‘Oh my God! Did she make this dress?’ Because they could see that signature shape that I do.” Lindsay Normington of “Anora” (and organizer of the first unionized strip club in the United States!) wore an all-white, structural ensemble to the Oscars, which contrasted sharply with a sea of black tuxes and the black stage. The dress clung with a gossamer-silk sheen, its two loose armholes drifting off the sides like a garment in the middle of being peeled away, echoing Erik’s fascination with clothes that seem to undress themselves and reveal what’s beneath. Its corset, tiny waist, and big geometric hips are emblematic of the brand’s dedication to diametric opposition. Erik added, “I loved it. It was the coolest moment for me ever, just that my work could be so recognizable.”

Erik is preparing to stage her first runway show within the next year. She imagines it in a brick warehouse here in Los Angeles with natural elements like sand and water. The next collection will be grounded in realism and human emotion, offering a counterpoint to the fantastical elements instilled in its house codes.

“A lot of my work revolves around opposites. I love to mix two different things together. My ideation process has always come from dual ideas. I think that’s been a big theme in my life—I grew up super religious, but I was also trans, and those were two really dueling ideas. It’s something I’ve lived with, and it’s become a central theme in my work: two competing concepts. Sometimes one wins, sometimes neither does. But I like trying to find a way for them to coexist.” In Erik’s designs, those dueling forces don’t clash; they converse.

By Lilibeth Orozco and Sureni Weerasekera

The woodchips prickled my legs as I accepted my fate, releasing my grip on the monkey bar and dropping into the soft pile of sticks below. I can feel the blisters forming on my soft hands, not yet worn from adulthood. As I flex my fingers, feeling every burning sensation left behind from hours in the jungle gym, I rise eagerly to take on the monkey bars again. I can hear the distant chatter of my older sister giggling with her at-the-time teenage friends on the swings. “¡Lilibeth, ten cuidado!” Be careful!, my mother yells from outside the jungle gym, holding my baby brother’s hand, knowing her middle daughter was always the boldest. During the summer, while school was out, my mother would take her three kids to our local park to let our energy run free. “Te pareces a un chivo.” You look like a goat, my mother would say every time I did something rambunctious. Looking back at it now, I think our local park was our “babysitter,” allowing my mother to take a seat, socialize with her friends, and just catch a break. The park remains a safe space for me today. It’s a third space for families, friends, and communities to gather for tranquility and play. Coming from a family that didn’t have a lot of money, going to the park was an opportunity for my family to enjoy fun activities, sports, and celebrations. I am an avid park-goer.

I am also a kid of immigrants.

Growing up as a child of immigrants myself, the word “immigrant” was considered a bad word. Being an immigrant or coming from immigrants was not something to be proud of, nor was it something to be discussed. Whether it was for safety or from shame, that piece of my own and my family’s identity was to remain hidden. However, seeing the bad word printed boldly across a t-shirt for the first time back in 2018 intrigued me. This clothing brand, called Kids of Immigrants, is a force to be reckoned with. When the Santulan team approached me with the opportunity to cover topics that resonated with pillars of my identity, I was thrilled.

Third spaces have come under attack with recent ICE raids, military intimidation, and racially charged detainments. Our safe spaces are in jeopardy, and the community is terrified. This piece, a beautiful combination of visuals and written word, created by the community for the community, serves as a direct response and reimagines the park as a safe space. The images shot and directed by Brittany Bravo represent the power of children of immigrants to gather, create, and lead. Rooted in joy, celebration, and immigrant pride, this cast and crew—made up of artists, entrepreneurs, organizers, and visionaries—embody the idea that we are the leaders we have been waiting for.

Through creating art, claiming space, and uplifting the community, we can confront today’s challenges and serve as a beacon of hope. This collaboration reflects the community Kids of Immigrants has created—a future shaped by community care, cultural pride, and one that supports the creative force of the next generation.

We had the opportunity to discuss with the Kids of Immigrants team what it means to use their creativity to strengthen hope and representation, while ushering in the next generation. In difficult times, community care becomes essential—especially as we approach their ‘Support Your Friends’ month.

Lush plant life danced amid a knit of mid-century furniture, offering a setting that felt more like the coolest listening party you weren’t invited to, and less like where Weleh Dennis, Daniel Buezo, and Debbie Gonzales would be grilled about their baby, Kids of Immigrants. An earth-toned, diamond-patterned rug and a deep blue printed couch created a warm, calming atmosphere—one that was immediately cut through by interviewer and comedian Sureni Weerasekera. She joked, “The melanin, y’all look like a college pamphlet. You know that, right? I feel like if I put DEI into an AI image generator, a photo of y’all would pop up.” They laugh in a way that says, We don’t take ourselves too seriously.

Debbie, Head of Community & Creative at Kids of Immigrants, is sporting one of the brand’s pieces from their recent collection, “Built to Last, Here to Stay” – a black zip-up sweater with the logo, “Kids of Immigrants” flashing in silver rhinestones, matching her silver Nike T90s, pairing perfectly with a pleated black skirt à la Issey Miyake and a bold red lip. Weleh, Co-Founder, is clad in an all black fitted look: a t-shirt (that dare we say, shows off his muscles), slacks, and classic, low-rise Doc Martens. Daniel, Co-Founder, in a classic streetwear look: a camo hat, a white graphic tee from Café Colmado in New York City, a textured baby blue button-down, light grey pants, and sneakers (we’re sure he has muscles too under this flattering, baggy look).

Sureni Weerasekera: “I just wanna say, personally, I’ve known of Kids of Immigrants for years. I remember seeing the name ‘Kids of Immigrants’, and I did a double-take. I was like, ‘Wait a second, that’s me!’ You know what I mean? I never once thought that looking at American Eagle, right? …we got good genes.” Sureni jokingly nods to Sydney Sweeny’s campaign. “And I would love for you to introduce yourselves with your name in the context of being an immigrant kid, what you actually do for work, and what your parents think you do for work? I’ll start. My name is Sureni Weerasekera... I’m a stand-up comic, actor, writer, and my parents think I say ‘fuck’ too much on stage. Sorry, Mom!”

Daniel Buezo: “My parents are from Honduras. They don’t really understand it. I think after years of consistency, and saying that this is what I’m doing—they kind of get it. One day, they think I make t-shirts, which they don’t understand because my mom used to be a tailor, so she was like, ‘Oh, you make suits and dresses!’ and I was like, ‘No, we design t-shirts.’ She’s like, ‘You make t-shirts?’ My father thinks I make shoes the next day, and it’s like, not really… Yeah, we design the shoes, but we don’t make the shoes. I think they know that we’re doing something creative, but I don’t think they understand what creativity means.”

Weleh Dennis: “My parents are originally from Liberia. They are pretty hip to what I do. My family all know what I’m doing for the most part. They just want to know that I’m happy doing what I’m doing. They’ve been supporting us from day one. I played basketball the majority of my life. I always appreciated the culture of skateboarding, too, and seeing all the different ethnicities coming together with similar mindsets.”

Debbie Gonzales: “I’m a first-generation, Mexican-American, and I think my parents think I’m a hustler of some sort. Now that they have been to a lot of our events and brought them in as talent, they understand that I’m in a creative field and maybe a boss of some sort. I think they’ll never fully grasp what it is.”

Founded in 2016 by Weleh and Daniel (and unofficially founded in 2015 in Daniel’s living room), Kids of Immigrants began as a clothing brand that donated profits to organizations that helped Los Angeles. The two creatives started this journey by visiting thrift stores, selecting pieces, and hand-painting them. Debbie later came on board after working as a stylist and touring with Kehlani. What began as a clothing brand boldly stamped with the word ‘Immigrants’ has grown into a movement for representation. Daniel points to the moment Weleh transformed his own relationship with the word: “We don’t run away from the word immigrant, we run toward it and run with it.”

Debbie: “It’s nine years later and we’re still here. It’s evolved in so many ways. At the end of the day, it’s pride that’s allowed us all to lean back into our roots and celebrate it, rather than being embarrassed by it.”

“I think what we have created is a space for others to also feel safe and seen and celebrated,” Debbie adds. “Whether it’s the storytelling, whether it’s the designs that unapologetically say ‘immigrants’ or ‘Kids of Immigrants’ or whether it pays homage to our parents, it’s become such a big part of who we are. Growing up, we weren’t as proud of my family being of mixed status. It was like you don’t say that you are a kid of an immigrant – out of safety, out of fear, out of you know, all these things.”

Sureni: “That is what that is, coming back to yourself… because I think there’s a self-rejection based off your identity, when you emigrate somewhere. To come back to yourself, for your roots and to have pride once again, that is such a beautiful return to home. Where did that pride come from? Why do you feel that, even though so much is perceived on you, do you feel like you believe that within yourself, like you have this inherent pride? Did you always have that?”

Weleh: “I don’t know if it was pride. I had the same upbringing as a lot of kids — when my parents packed me lunch, I didn’t always want to bust that open at school because it could have a strange smell. But I think again about the idea of duality, I feel like when we’re speaking about being American or an immigrant in America. I think the idea for me was this idea of the dualities of the life I lived at home versus the life I lived in school.”

A beacon of the brand’s growth is its annual Love Day event – a celebration hosted by Kids of Immigrants to give thanks to the community with local vendors, games, music, and more. Traditionally hosted in a park, the team reflects on how much parks meant to them in the brand’s younger days. The event originated from the team’s clever scrappiness. They’d invite their friends to a barbecue at the park in exchange for modeling Kids of Immigrants pieces. Love Day is a heavy lift for the whole company, but when the day comes, it’s obvious why this celebration is important. In 2023, the City of Los Angeles officially proclaimed May 6th as Love Day, recognizing its significance to the community.

Sureni: “It’s that labor that no one talks about, where everyone wants a house party, everyone loves a house party, but nobody wants to throw a house party. But you have to throw the house party because the house party is the best kind of party, and that requires cleaning up piss off the floor. But we’re so grateful to that person. So, thank you for metaphorically cleaning the piss off the floor to make this shit happen.”

Daniel: “We’ve cleaned worse.”

Sureni: “No, actually, go into that. Elaborate on that.”

Daniel: “You know, to throw an event that’s gonna host over a thousand people at a park. I think every Love Day outside of this one in May, I’ve left the park at 1 AM, even 2 AM, smelling like garbage juice.”

Sureni: “Oh, yeaaaaah.”

Daniel: “It’s funny, my family travels. They come to town for it, and they’ll stay at the park with me ‘til 2 AM. They’re like, ‘No, this is part of the experience,’ and they talk about it ‘til this day. The day we got into my car and we all smelled like straight garbage juice… These are the spaces that we are honored to create for people like us—for our generation, the younger generation, and the older generation. It’s the day we’re constantly reminded as to why we do what we do, and everything that we represent shows up IRL for seven hours.”

Each team member had a different relationship to parks during childhood. Yet, the sentiment was similar across the board – parks are a sacred space for family and community.

Sureni: “Did your family take you to parks? What was your relationship to parks and nature growing up?”

Debbie: “Yeah, definitely. My dad is, and still is, an adventure dad. We always went somewhere every weekend… They made it a big deal for us to see different things—whether it was nature or like trying different sports. It was never the newest anything, but it felt like we had a little bit of everything. Maybe it wasn’t a Disneyland trip, but it was a trip to the lake, that’s what we could afford. They had a beautiful way of giving us everything, even if, on paper, it wasn’t the shiniest thing. It was just the joy of all of us being together and experiencing something new. That was a huge part of how I grew up. And I think that’s still prevalent in how we are as adults now. Exploring or craving that, because it feels so nostalgic. It’s such a huge part of home and I think what grounds us all.”

Weleh: “I think my connection with spirituality is this idea of omnipresence, and so if I could get as empathetic with as many people as possible, I feel like I’m getting closer to this idea of a higher power. I think hearing different perspectives is something that expands my mind and imagination, and it’s like really cool to see your friends level up there. I hope they see themselves how I see them. Then, we can spread that perspective to each other versus this assumption, or kind of like a lack of trust in.

Sureni: “You know you might break my vase.”

Weleh: “That’s something that I feel like Love Day is synonymous with—involving people and just giving that trust from a human, from like a humanities place.”

Sureni: “When you busted out the word omnipresent, I was like, He does mushrooms.”

As the company approaches its 10th anniversary, Kids of Immigrants has kept their word in using creativity to give back to their community. Today, Kids of Immigrants is deemed a brand that stands by the community. However, this has not been the case since its outset.

Debbie: “That was the inception of what has now been coined as community or marketed as community. It’s always been part of the ethos of the brand.”

Daniel: “It’s important that we become that bridge to our community. It doesn’t matter who the brand or corporation, or partner is… we’ve been able to figure out ways to bring it back to our community. 10 years later, with more resources, we’re just leveling it up all the way. I would use Buchanan’s Whisky, with which we’ve been a partner for the past three years. We’ve been able to donate over $150,000 to several organizations, small businesses, and this is built on that trust that the partners build with us, but also on the trust that our community has built with us. We want to continue to be the bridge. To be a platform. To be this place where our community gets to empathize with different cultures. Kids of Immigrants is a multi-generational brand. It’s a multicultural brand.”

As pioneers leading the intersection of branding, marketing, and social impact, the team’s latest mission is to provide support for the future leaders of the immigrant community. Whether future leaders are inspired to start businesses of their own or channel their creativity through activism, the brand is eager to use its resources to help the younger generation flourish.

Debbie: “It’s us supporting future leaders using the platform that we have built. It’s not like we’re telling them what to do. We already see it within them. We’re almost like the big brothers and sisters that are here to cheer you on, and be that bridge because we didn’t have it. It’s our way to pay it forward, to support our friends.”

As the crew looks to the future goals of Kids of Immigrants, there’s a shadow of past challenges and lessons that guardrail the way forward.

Sureni: “Can we highlight an accomplishment and maybe an L, and what you guys learned from that? Like a big lesson that we learned?”

Daniel: “I think with lessons, we learn them every single day. I think the biggest failures, the biggest L’s, have been the best lessons, and the reason is why we’re here. Like having moments where you know they print some shirts incorrectly and you lose $25,000 and that’s like all the money you have.”

Sureni jokingly gasps: “Noooo, don’t say that!”

Daniel: “We’ve had those very defining moments, and it’s hard at the time. It’s great to have a team when I’m losing my mind. It’s this thought of, we’re always gonna figure it out… Some of the hardest lessons are to do with money because every single penny counts. We don’t have money to burn, we don’t have investors.”

The bond between Kids of Immigrants and the local community is paramount for the team’s philosophy. Kids of Immigrants actively strengthens this bond through direct fundraising and collaborations with relevant organizations. They recently partnered with CHIRLA (Coalition for Human Immigrant Rights) to develop the “Know Your Rights” campaign, helping undocumented immigrants equip themselves with knowledge to protect themselves during the recent ICE raids. Further bridging the gap, Kids of Immigrants successfully united over 180 brands to raise nearly $250,000 for various immigrant-centered organizations such as CHIRLA, Immigrant Defenders Law Center, United We Dream, ACLU, Inclusive Action, and the Central American Resource Center.

Sureni: “I want to talk about your collaboration with CHIRLA for the Know Your Rights initiative, directly in opposition to the recent aggressive and dehumanizing ICE raids. How did this collab come to fruition? And what have you learned about fashion as a vehicle in the activism space?”

Debbie: “It’s always been part of our brand–part of our individual responsibilities–to bridge nonprofits with brands to introduce them to our community and vice versa. I think there’s been so much power in being that bridge in these moments… It’s offering light, offering support, offering tools and resources. We may not have the solution, but we can help support those doing the hard work.”

Daniel: “I hope that we can give people the strength to fight the fight how they know best. Not everyone has to do the same exact thing. We’re all different, and we’re all skilled and gifted in so many different ways. Some people’s fight may be prayer. Somebody else may be on the front lines of the protest, and someone else may be designing a flyer for the nonprofit.”

In the height of these ICE raids across the country, activism fatigue is inevitable. However, Kids of Immigrants offers a versatile vehicle for activism across many levels. The company hopes these pieces not only provide safety to the community, but also become an opportunity to believe in themselves and remember who they love.

Daniel: “I feel like what I’ve been seeing is this activism fatigue. When I say we can do anything, but we can’t do everything, I think that’s really important for everyone. Especially some of the younger generations who have fire in their heart. I love to see the work that they’re doing, ‘cause it’s like, they’re going to save the world. And, also–(dog barks, interrupting the interview)”

Sureni: “Hold for dog.”

Debbie: “He’s agreeing!”

With creativity at the forefront of the Kids of Immigrants’ purpose, the team understands the weight the brand carries across communities. In 2016, when the brand began, people questioned whether printing the provocative term “Immigrant” across a t-shirt would be a good idea. Yet, the brand remained proud and “ran to the word,” embracing Weleh’s mindset. The team has dreamed for this brand to introduce people, not just to the clothing, but to different experiences and worlds. Each project leads with the objective: “How do we bring people to our world and community?”

Sureni: “What is the future of Kids of Immigrants? I mean, obviously, you’re going to have another Love Day, for sure. But, um…”

Daniel: “Are we?”

Sureni: “I don’t know. Do you want us to pour garbage juice again? Let’s run it back.”

Kids of Immigrants intends to grow the word globally. The team feels that ‘immigrant’ carries a similar negative undertone across the globe.

Daniel: “It’s really exciting to me to build a global community, to build outside of LA and New York. That’s something that we are excited to recontextualize–this word in our own way, and use our art as a form of imagination of a better day… At the end of the day, we live in the United States, a capitalistic country, and how you find your way through that in a meaningful way that is pure to you and your community, is very difficult.”

Wishes, hopes, and dreams are abundant for this powerhouse of a team. When each member was asked what wish they’d make after blowing out a dandelion, their true colors radiated.

Sureni: “I have one last question. You’ve been running around all day at the park. Your pants are green from rolling in the grass. You’re full of hot dogs.”

Daniel: “That was us yesterday (referring to the cover shoot)!”

Sureni: “You find a dandelion and you blow it out, what are you wishing for?”

Debbie: “Peace of mind and connection.”

Daniel: “I would say health.”

Sureni: “You got lower back pain?”

Daniel: “Shoulders and ankles… health and wealth. I hope I can live as many days as possible for it. And wealth, so it can go not just this generation, but for future generations to have, not necessarily wealth and money, but this wealth or way of thinking. This way of empowering and manifesting. I used to say in year one, ‘We might not sell luxury clothing, but we sell a luxury mindset.”

Sureni, looking into the camera: “Clip that.”

Weleh: “I wish for a farm.”

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

It’s 10pm in New York at my neighborhood dive bar. The lights have that sagging lampshade sort-of yellow, engulfing the whole room. I sashay towards my friends standing next to the murky-water tank of turtles. They guzzle down their beverages as if wine were in fact water and scream to hear each other over a rather mediocre mix of Temperature by Sean Paul. I’ve thrown on my Kids of Immigrants (KOI) shorts with my cherished first-pair of Jordans, a cropped denim sleeve, and my South Asian armory jewels. The funny thing is, no one here can really see shit.

Style is identity. So neatly tucked into every decision, whether seen or not, are our stories, our ancestry, and our life-curated taste.

Two years ago, I put my big lady pants on and cold-emailed a founding member of KOI, Debbie Gonzales. We bonded over a deep love for hot-sauce, our sorrows for the world’s political climate, and how building community - family - was at the heart of everything we did. Our conversation felt like the warm hug I had been yearning for in an industry that often serves to be an emblem of the White Witch of Narnia: icy, cold, and a little bit too perfect.

In quintessential LA fashion, the weeks before had led me to the Silverlake Flea where I copped a pair of KOI’s brown-mesh basketball shorts marked with an embroidered tiger and the following phrase:

“Shout-out to immigrant parents who came here with nothing but gave us everything”

Before that, the idea of wearing any sort of wording on my body made me audibly want to cringe. Maybe it was the fact that when I was 15, I had purchased a Beyonce-inspired crop tee plastered with the words “Surf Board.”

And no, no one told me what that actually meant.

But these words felt sort of lived in. Like they were carefully woven, stitch by stitch, just for me. Too small to the observer’s eye, but mine to hold onto. Regardless of how convoluted the dynamic of an immigrant family household can be, to be a KOI is to know sacrifice not as an abstract, but as the very ground we stand on. It’s to know that a labor of love may also have been a labor of pain.

And maybe that’s the magic of fashion - pieces that tuck away meaning in details you might miss at first glance. What’s unseen becomes the most precious part, like the sweet spot at the end of the ice cream cone.

To have worked with KOI’s core team alongside one-of-a-kind photographer (and human!), Brittany Bravo, on this issue’s cover story, has reminded me just how powerful art can be when made with care and intention.

Oh, and to never knock a cold email! The art of getting anywhere is thinking you can.

From womenswear designer Erik Charlotte and stylist Mui-Hai Chu, to regenerated textile company Cycora, architectural design firm Food New York, and timeless brands like Abacaxi & Society of Cloth - this issue is a time capsule of what fashion really has to offer.

A little bit of truth.

⭐ Now available for purchase here

⭐ LOS ANGELES, join us for the official launch event in partnership with Flavors from Afar on December 7th

Words by Shelanee Marcelline

On a quiet Saturday morning, I drove across the city to Rajiv Menon Contemporary to see Dhum Lōkaya (Smoke World), a solo exhibition by Rajni Perera—an artist whose name I’d been hearing more and more in global art circles. Born in Dehiwela, Sri Lanka, and now based in Toronto, Perera has shown across the world, from the PHI Foundation in Montreal to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Lyon, and even the UAE’s Sharjah Biennial. This marks her first solo exhibition in the United States—a milestone that feels especially significant for those of us in the diaspora, seeing her work arrive in Los Angeles, a city built on migration and reinvention.

Upon entering the gallery, Bittergourd (2025) stood waiting—a terracotta sculpture of a woman’s body, her arms cupping two bowls that burned incense continuously through the day. The smoke traveled through the hollow of her form, winding upward before escaping through the carved crown of her head, filling the entryway in a slow, steady exhale. I stood still for a while, watching, breathing in the familiar scent of frankincense.

In Sri Lankan culture, bittergourd—a knobby green vegetable long revered in Ayurvedic cooking—is as medicinal as it is symbolic. Its fried form, known in Sri Lankan culture as karela, is a crisp, savory topping for rice and curry—the kind of side dish I snack on before dinner even begins. In its raw, more potent state, it’s steeped into tonics and remedies meant to cool the body and cleanse the blood. Seeing it reborn here as a woman’s body felt deeply familiar. I thought of my own mother—how, after immigrating to Los Angeles, she’d return home from long graveyard shifts at a diner, still managing to have food waiting, the kitchen air always heavy with spice and steam. The sculpture felt like her: a figure of nourishment and endurance, shaped by heat and labor, offering what she could to keep the world turning.

But Bittergourd also reminded me how much this story expands beyond her—how it belongs to migrant women everywhere, especially here in Los Angeles. The women who hold this city together behind the scenes; who keep families fed, traditions alive, and neighborhoods breathing while their own fires are rarely acknowledged. They are the quiet infrastructure of migration itself—the emotional and physical fuel source of survival. Perera’s sculpture gave that truth a body. It made visible the unseen labor that has built not only our families but the city itself.

At the beginning of this year, before the exhibition opened, wildfires tore through my hometown in Altadena. I had just touched down at LAX after visiting family in Sri Lanka that same afternoon the fire swept the city. By dawn, the streets I’d grown up on were unrecognizable—charred, skeletal, unmade. Somehow, our house survived. I still remember standing on the curb, breathing air that felt too thick to be real, watching smoke drift through the same sky I’d spent my childhood under. I’d be lying if I said the smell of it hasn’t followed me since—through my hair, my clothes, my memories, my dreams. Because maybe that’s the thing about fire and smoke—they don’t just destroy; they reveal what’s meant to endure.

So when I stood before Bittergourd, watching the incense burn through its crown, I thought about what Perera said that night at the opening: “In Sri Lanka, something is always burning.” Whether it’s the trash on the street, the food in our kitchens, or the incense at our temples—there is always smoke, always transformation in motion. Her words made me tear up, yet they also brought me back to that morning after the fires, to the surreal quiet that follows disaster. To how, even when everything seems lost, something inside insists on surviving.

The gallery around me pulsed with this same quiet resilience. In Dark Matter (2025) and Primitive (2025), Perera threads the fantastical with the familiar, stitching together the cosmos and the human condition. Dark Matter ripples with serpentine forms—snakes that weave through constellations of glass pearls, connecting worlds as though they’ve always been one continuous body. Primitive centers a single woman crowned with a blooming flower, covered by flies, her form suspended somewhere between deity and dream.

Together, they read like pages from a living myth—fantasy not as escape, but as a mirror. Through these works, Perera grounds her speculative visions in the organic textures of life on Earth. There’s an uncanny intimacy to it all; even her most intergalactic imagery feels tethered to something we recognize. The serpents, the blossoms, the pulse of color—they belong as much to the universe as to the soil beneath our feet.

Then there are the sculptures Bangle (2025) and Dance Dance Revolution (2025), which reimagine the adornments of South Asian womanhood—our bangles, our anklets, our jhumkas—as artifacts of resistance. Bangle rests heavy with patinated bronze and wax, its surface cracked like sunburned earth. Dance Dance Revolution transforms the steel anklets of Sri Lanka’s Kandyan dancers into something both familiar and subversive: jewelry that gleams, but also guards.

As Perera explained, women’s adornments in South Asian culture once doubled as armor—our bangles, our anklets, our jhumkas —talismans of protection, their sound meant to announce strength as much as grace. Over centuries, they softened. Simplified. Made easier to overlook. I couldn’t stop thinking about that—how something as small as an ornament could once signify rebellion, and how time has a way of sanding down even the sharpest symbols.

That duality—the smoke and the spark—is what makes this show feel so alive. It’s not nostalgia, but invocation. Perera reclaims myth as a tool of critique, dismantling colonial and patriarchal frameworks while reimagining new cosmologies in their place. She builds a world where mutation is freedom, where multiplicity is survival, where the feminine body is a site of both resistance and rebirth.

Standing there, my mind wandered to my parents—to how they left Sri Lanka, moving away from a civil war only to build a life in a country that didn’t always know what to make of us. As a child, I’d beg my mother not to pack kottu roti or parippu (dhal curry) for lunch, plead with her not to wear a sari to school events. Being Sri Lankan felt like an invitation to be othered. Yet here I was, decades later, in a Los Angeles gallery surrounded by brown faces and shared nostalgia, watching a Sri Lankan woman’s mythology claim space on gallery walls in Hollywood.

I could sense stories like ours all around—quiet, steady ripples across this city. Migrant women who, in their own ways, carry fire every day. Los Angeles runs on their endurance, even as that sense of belonging feels increasingly fragile, threatened by a political administration that treats identity as an inconvenience. Dhum Lōkaya became, in that moment, an intentional act of remembrance for them too.

Moving through the gallery, my thoughts returned to Sri Lanka itself—a country whose spiritual life runs as deep as its fault lines. Predominantly Buddhist, but woven with Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity. A place that has endured colonization, civil war, genocide, economic collapse, tsunamis, and still, somehow, finds its way to faith each morning. The island, like Perera’s vision, has always been a Smoke World—a place where history burns but faith endures, where belief is both a scar and a lifeline.

As I left the gallery, the scent of the incense smoke left with me—the same kind my grandmother would burn each morning in her Kadawatha home, the same scent that lingers after the fires here in LA. Maybe that’s what Dhum Lōkaya is asking us to remember: that smoke, like memory, never really dissipates. It drifts, it carries, it transforms—but it always returns to you.

Since her debut EP was released in 2019, Akshara has refined her sound and artistic vision to create her most true-to-form project thus far. Released last Friday, CLONES is an homage to her upbringing, the strength of the women who came before her, and her individuality as a storyteller, musician, and Indian woman. By blending her traditional vocal training and love of Bollywood cinema with her Yebba and Kali Uchis-esque sound, Akshara has created a dreamscape that turns pillows into clouds and blankets into a cool breeze on a warm summer evening.

Each song on CLONES represents a different version of oneself. We are first introduced to young Akshara in the song theplaceicomefrom as she tells listeners about where her 28-year-long journey began in India. She paints a clear picture of feeling loved and appreciating tradition, learning from her culture the valuable lessons that she brought with her when she moved to America. Though the memories are specific to her, theplaceicomefrom pays tribute to anyone who clings to the memory of the place they once called home.

Akshara’s storytelling abilities reach beyond words as the project’s musical production pulls the listener even deeper into her world. Situated deep in a lively forest, the natural sounds and ethereal vocals of Tree Rings “[describe] the synchronicities we have with nature,” and is followed by Orbit (Outer Space Version), which “takes you away from the trees on Earth and into outer space,” reflects Akshara. Legendary Bollywood actress Rekha introduces the song by sharing how she found her way as a woman who once felt lost in the world, a feeling many of us know all too well. Her words are accompanied by the sounds of shooting stars and galaxies echoing from far away that isolate the listener from the outside world. Originally released a year earlier as simply Orbit, the 2024 version has a more prominent baseline and faster pace that encourages listeners to dance, whereas the 2025 Outer Space Version encourages introspection and meditation.

aksharuh

A post shared by @aksharuh

Back on Earth, Akshara collaborates with fellow Indian-American musician Avara on GLASS, a seemingly upbeat song about the crippling reality of the male ego’s negative impact on womanhood. Glass shattering and woodwinds whistling amplify men’s fragility while the women’s voices slow in response to the patriarchy’s chaos. If you haven’t heard the song yet, watch the music video alongside your first listen; the story is beautifully directed by Elise Schatz.

“Each video shows a different clone - Orbit is my most confident, self-assured clone, GLASS shows feminine rage, and Clones, the title track, is my most vulnerable version.”

Within Akshara’s world, Clones is the point in which “she accepts the multitude and complexity of herselves.” If this project were a movie, this song would be the scene after the stressful climax where the main character learns something about themselves and lives happily ever after. The lesson in this movie is to “make space for every clone that exists within [you], both the good and the bad,” which is what Akshara hopes listeners take away from their listening experience. It’s the song she is most proud of as she not only loves how it sounds, but it’s where she’s most vulnerable with herself and the listener.

Learning to love each of her own clones through the first five songs, the album’s final track is a love song for the person who loves all of her clones alongside her. LOST sonically captures the essence of self discovery found throughout the entire album while expressing gratitude for the person who allows her to “fall into herself in her most peaceful moments.” A love song may seem out of place for a project focused on the multitudes of one individual, but for Akshara, LOST is about the person she trusts to cherish every part of her as much as she does.

From the first listen, I could hear the passion Akshara and her collaborators put into this project. Now on my 15th listen, I still feel chills throughout my body as my head and heart float in serenity and my hips sway instinctually without me noticing. Each song has its own unique sound that blends together in the way each of Akshara’s clones come together to create her truest self. 14 minutes is not enough time to fully absorb the magic of this EP, so until she releases a full-length album, I will be listening to CLONES on repeat every night in hopes of having dreams as beautiful as these six songs are.