TARPLEY is the fashion brainchild of Nashville native Brooks Jones, who, in 2009, exchanged Tennessee’s farmlands for Chicago’s Columbia College to purse a career in design. Jones’ creative identity is bolstered by a profound sense of spirituality (and just enough wit to make you look twice); for him, fashion offers the ideal forum for “spreading consciousness and positivity,” and TARPLEY is his vessel for doing so.<\/p>\n
“Fashion is energy,” Jones told Hypebeast. “When you see someone wearing an item of clothing in public, there’s an aura around them that allows you to almost feel it on them. It becomes their person.”<\/p>\n
Jones artfully articulates this sentiment in his Spring\/Summer 2024 “SOFTWEAR” collection, which caters to a plethora of distinct sartorial tropes by fusing contrasting style identities into a singular wardrobe. Each look is labelled with its own illustrative descriptor, painting a crystal-clear picture of where exactly his designs might fit best in the cultural zeitgeist.<\/p>\n
There’s the “nepo baby who takes over the family empire;” she wears an ensemble akin to quiet luxury, with an angular coat and roomy trousers in neutral tones. Then there’s the “snowboarder at a fashion week after party,” who is dressed in a hand-knit hoodie that reveals only the eyes, and the “Tennessee farmer tries ‘fashion’” look, which consists of a padded jacket composed of thick bio-linen from Korea and an elevated spin on a rancher’s workwear pants.<\/p>\n
The TARPLEY personas offer comedic takes on the stereotypes of today, and they’re done with a level of craftsmanship that avoids anything close to kitschy. “Fashion TikToker goes to Yellowstone,” for instance, includes a puffed-up fleece jacket, multi-pocketed utilitarian pants and a crossbody bag, almost like one of those “starter packs” that frequently go viral on the titular social media platform. Another look, titled “crypto anon waiting in line at Berghain,” is satisfyingly symmetrical, with a structured V-lined coat and elevated shorts that the bouncers at the notoriously strict Berlin club would likely enjoy.<\/p>\n
“Something that’s really important to me as a designer is to avoid having one niche,” Jones added. “I want to appeal to a wide range of people. This means that a Tennessee farmer,\u00a0 where I’m from, and the cool Bushwick art kid can be able to wear the same garment unironically.”<\/p>\n
That’s certainly a challenging task, but Jones has a plan: his method of building this limitless design ethos is all about paring back. “It boils down to taking a minimalist approach with the experimentation happening in the material,” he explained.<\/p>\n
TARPLEY is still in its infancy, and Jones says his present-day clientele is “someone who is related to the creative fields” \u2013 be that a violin maker in Brooklyn or a textile manufacturer in India. But if his Spring\/Summer 2024 collection is any indicator, it’s likely that TARPLEY tags will begin to populate the wardrobes of all sorts of people, thanks to the breadth and adaptability of its fundamental design codes.<\/p>\n